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Jennifer Skelly, co-creator of the HBO Max animated series “Little Ellen,” found out that her show was being removed from the platform earlier this month by reading the news online.
“It was definitely a gut punch,” Skelly told Insider. “I’m still processing it.”
Skelly said she’s grateful that “Little Ellen” was able to air at all but is disappointed that the show won’t get a chance to reach its full potential.
“It’s frustrating because I feel like we had so much more story to tell,” she said. “It feels like being kicked to the curb.”
Warner Bros. Discovery is in the process of purging HBO Max of several shows to reduce costs. In addition to “Little Ellen,” other casualties include “Tig n’ Seek” and “Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai.”
Twenty fully completed, unreleased episodes — comprising the next two seasons — will never be released.
“It’s a shame that they’re not going to be seen,” Skelly said of the unreleased episodes. “I hope that maybe one day they’ll see the light of day, but who knows.”
For now, Skelly is focusing on her next project, an animated series for Warner Bros. Discovery’s new streaming platform, Peacock.
“I’m trying to stay positive and look towards the future,” she said. “It’s just a bummer all around.”
First, the studio announced it was shutting down production on a number of its shows, including “Little Ellen” and “Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency.” Then, it was revealed that Warner Bros. Discovery was planning to remove all episodes of these shows from HBO Max, despite there being 20 unaired episodes of “Little Ellen” alone.
Now, “Little Ellen” co-creator Mike Mitchell is speaking out about the decision to remove the show from HBO Max.
“It’s a bummer,” Mitchell said. “We had such a great time making that show, and we were so proud of it. It’s just a really unfortunate situation.”
Mitchell also said that he was “surprised” Warner Bros. Discovery would decide to remove the show, given that there are still 20 unaired episodes.
“I don’t know what their thinking was,” Mitchell said. “It seems like a strange decision to me.”
“Little Ellen” is not the only Warner Bros. Discovery show that has been removed from HBO Max. “Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency” was also removed from the streaming service, despite there being ten unaired episodes.
It’s unclear why Warner Bros. Discovery has decided to remove these shows from HBO Max. However, it is likely because the studio is looking to cut costs.
When HBO Max launched in May, it was with a wide array of content – including some shows that had been previously canceled by other networks. Among those was “Little Ellen,” an animated series about a young girl learning to navigate the world.
However, just a few months after launch, HBO Max has started to remove some of that content – and “Little Ellen” is one of the latest casualties.
Twenty episodes of the show were completed but never released. Villard says that they had been in talks with HBO Max about releasing them, but those talks fell through.
It’s a frustrating situation for Villard, who says that he’s “disappointed” in how HBO Max has handled the series. “I think they’re making a mistake,” he says.
Warner Bros. Discovery declined to comment on this story.
