uh
hello internet welcome to film theory
the show that's been ruining puppets for
you since 2016. theorists it is back the
og of internet horror don't hug me i'm
scared has returned now if you're not
familiar with the series i can't really
blame you it's been a long time since
we've gotten any sort of update three
years in fact to catch you up don't hug
me i'm scared or dhmis is a youtube
series created by becky sloane and
joseph pelling where puppets learn
important life lessons about creativity
mine is being creative love
and nutrition greedy to eat all that
you'll end up with your gums all grey
but something's
wrong well spotted there duck something
is very clearly wrong at a glance the
show feels like your typical sesame
street inspired children's program about
learning in fact the visuals are such a
good imitation of a kid's show that
youtube marked one of my dhmas theories
as made for kids and tried to shove the
thing onto the kids app at which point i
was forced to write an explanation to
the machine gods that sometimes the
visuals of something don't match the
actual content you see by the end of
every episode things go horribly off the
rails and lessons about love suddenly
turn into cult recruitment tools
nutrition facts wind up with characters
eating each other the whole thing is a
disturbing satire on the nature of kids
programming luckily my um thoughtfully
worded letter to youtube got him to see
reason the flag was removed and a
generation of toddlers was spared from
witnessing this
[Music]
kidzap sure in 2016 after six episodes
the creators literally pulled the plug
on the series but by then it had already
cemented its place as an internet
classic things were quiet until 2018
when dhmas uploaded a trailer for a tv
show based on the series finally we were
gonna get to see more from this twisted
world and then nothing for years nothing
at least until now on june 19th dhmas
uploaded their first new video in three
years a new trailer titled fly
confirming that the show would finally
see the light of day in september but
you know what i don't want to wait that
long i want to get started now we know
from past theories that there's a lot
more to dhmas than meets the eye with
each episode being a commentary on
everything from children's programming
to international politics i expect
nothing less for the full length tv
series so despite the teaser clocking in
at just 50 seconds we've analyzed it
frame by frame and i think it's clear
what we're in for a scathing critique on
the state of world politics i expect
this new season of dhmas is going to
ultimately boil down to one key message
there is a core problem that everyone's
ignoring despite it being right in front
of our eyes and by ignoring it the world
is literally headed towards disaster we
are caught in a cycle of mistakes and tv
the media at large is not helping the
problem yep got all that from 50 seconds
so come on friends there is so much
learning to do as a reminder our three
friends in dhmes are red guy yellow guy
and duck based on our past theories
though we know that they're not just
characters in a kid's program red guy is
the creator of the series he was a
normal guy with an office job who
dreamed of creating his own kids show i
see a silly face
the whole thing is a bust until yellow
guy's dad roy comes in to financially
back the show which seems like it should
be a good thing until he starts filling
it with more and more ads
was there an ad there there was an ad
there wasn't there
art imitating life oh it just gets more
and more meta anyway our previous
theories concluded that dhmas was a
commentary on how the need to earn money
corrupts creativity and how corporate
interest tends to distort the education
in children's programming eventually the
red guy has his mind blown when he
discovers that he can make the show
himself releasing it on the internet for
much cheaper while still maintaining his
artistic integrity red guy pulls the
plug on the tv show when he sees the
harmful effect it's having on children
as symbolized by yellow guy red guy
reboots it on a shoestring budget but
with the freedom for his pure creative
voice to be heard also there's duck
never really had a good explanation for
him but yeah he's an actor on the
program too and that's largely where we
left off like i mentioned earlier there
was another trailer named wakey wakey
released back in 2018 but that's since
been removed by the creators instead
replaced by this new trailer fly so what
horrific life lessons are in store for
us in the new series let's check it out
we open on some sort of structure in
ruin rocked by either an explosion or a
natural disaster it seems to be a house
based on what we see scattered around
the structure a children's tricycle
mattress bathtub what looks to be pipes
and heaters television all items that
you'd typically see in a house the
moment the tv enters the frame we
actually start to hear the buzzing of
flies given that fly is also the name of
the video something tells me that that
detail is going to be important several
shots of our main characters flash by in
the static on the tv including duck with
a newspaper red guy on the phone yellow
guy playing a banjo we then fully enter
the reality of the show with our three
main characters sitting around their
kitchen table exactly like they did in
the original series a fly buzzes around
the refrigerator approaches the table
and lands on yellow guy's eye before
duck squashes it saying
we then zoom back out of the destroyed
house with a don't hug me i'm scared
title card and a release window of
september 2022. okay so that initially
doesn't seem to be a whole lot to work
with but when you break the trailer down
while also looking into the past of the
series and its creators there's actually
a ton here first of all it's clear that
the new show is going to continue its
critiques on television and advertising
the framing device of zooming through a
ruined house before focusing on a tv at
the center of it all is not particularly
subtle but i actually think the release
date is our strongest evidence to this
point dates are very important in dhmas
as we've pointed out in past theories
june 19th that date on the back wall of
every episode of the show on that day in
1955 stock markets across the world
soared so high that they broke
practically every record it was also
around this time that the uk television
market opened for private companies to
make their own tv channels channels that
are focused solely on profit and for a
series focused on how advertising
corrupts media made for kids yeah that
is a that is going to be a pivotal
moment the first of these for-profit
channels was itv founded on september
22nd 1955 and wouldn't you know it but
this new season of dhmas is premiering
in wait for it september 22. for a
series that's so concerned about dates
it's not likely that that's a
coincidence it's also no mistake that
the calendar in the show is once again
stuck on june 19th but uh we'll get back
to that in a minute next let's talk
about the fly clearly the symbolism of
flies is important here fly is the title
of the video we hear buzzing flies the
moment the television enters the frame
it lands on yellow guy's eye it gets
squished it is the main thing from the
trailer flies are also the only aspect
of the teaser that exist in both the
ruined building and in the world of the
show in the television so the issue or
issues that the flies represent exist
both in the real world and are infecting
the programming itself but what does it
mean well flies usually indicate a
problem they're usually depicted
alongside things that are dead or rotten
rotting fruit dead bodies that kind of
thing so dhmas's commentary here might
be indicating that modern tv for profit
with advertisement is either a dying
medium or is rotten in some way we
children of the internet have known that
for a while now and even the original
six episodes of dhmas seem to know that
back in 2016 so i feel like that's
probably not what they're going for here
instead it feels like something is
rotten here rotting your brain rotting
society unclear but let's keep looking
for clues i bet we'll figure out
something red guy is actually featured
the least in the trailer appearing only
in the cartoon world's establishing shot
a glitchy shot where he's holding a
phone and a brief reaction shot to the
fly buzzing around the fridge admittedly
this is only really conjecture but we
can potentially make some assumptions
based on red guy's previous role in the
series as the lead creative of the
in-universe show if we still think of
him as the representative of creators
like sloan and pelling we see that he's
the first to notice the fly buzzing
around the fridge he is the first to
notice the problem when he tries to
communicate his ideas or raise concerns
like say over a phone the signal gets
distorted just like it does on the tv
again just conjecture here but we may be
able to identify him here as the
creative voice that gets squashed or
distorted when he tries to bring up
issues through his art after red guy
notices the fly it lands on yellow guy's
eye now throughout the hmis yellow guy
has always represented the youth younger
people in the process of learning about
the world those younger people are also
always being told that they're wrong by
the media i might paint a picture of a
clown whoa there friend you might need
to slow down arrange them into your
favorite color green green is not a
creative color or taken advantage of
here the fly lands directly on yellow
guy's eye and he reacts
clearly yellow guy sees the problem he
can't not see it it is literally on his
eyeball it is symbolic of young people
seeing that there's clearly a problem in
society the question is what is he gonna
do about it for now all we get is aha
which is consistent with yellow guy's
reactions in previous episodes he's
naive uncertain absorbing ideas along
the way i suspect it has to do with the
brief shot of yellow guy with the banjo
it's important to note that up to this
point yellow guy has never been the one
singing the actual songs in the show
he's always getting bombarded with
everyone else's lessons but in this case
he's the one holding the instrument so
maybe we're at a point where we get to
hear what yellow guy finally has to say
he's stepping up and taking action maybe
this new series is the story of him
standing up and doing something for a
change he sees the fly and he has
something to say about it and then
there's duck like i mentioned before
duck's role in the series has always
been a bit unclear but it seems like the
creators recently have been interested
in exploring the character more
considering that both the deleted wakey
wakey trailer as well as in fly duck is
the one taken center stage though the
episode wakey wakey never aired
summaries of it appeared online after it
premiered at the sundance film festival
in it duck takes advantage of his
history as a well-known television
personality to step up and fill the
power vacuum left by the mayor's
disappearance he's manipulated by a
singing key into locking down the city
installing duck-billed cameras
everywhere to create a secure
surveillance state and he ultimately
blames everything bad that happens on
mysterious strangers who are coming to
get us he creates chaos by causing
people to suspect their neighbors and
when anyone descends duck drills into
the heads of the locals in order to
brainwash them into repeating everything
he says at the time wakey wakey seemed
to be the creators becky sloane and
joseph pelling drawing parallels to the
politics of the united states duck as a
former tv star in political power
sharing many similarities with then
president donald trump who was infamous
for othering and seeding suspicion over
various ethnic groups but looking at
duck's role now he seems to represent
something much broader one thing that's
always slipped my notice is that duck's
always reading a right wing newspaper
and that's not me making judgment calls
here either that is literally the name
of the newspaper that we see in episode
one duck has it again in the computer
episode and again here in fly so duck
seems to be a right-leaning figure a
conservative but the creators have added
more commentary than just that notice
that the headline is power surge leads
to blackout at first i thought that this
was just a funny little detail it's been
well documented that during the
commercial breaks of soap operas or
other popular programs power grids in
the united kingdom experience a surge of
demand as thousands of people
simultaneously put kettles on the stove
to make their tea maybe this shot of
duck was just a small nod to that
phenomenon another way that tv is
controlling people's lives and shaping
the world but then i noticed which
section of the paper this was in it's
under the opinion section that sort of
news is not the sort of story that
should be filed as an opinion that is a
legitimate news story and so it appears
to me that this is yet another critique
from sloan and pelling about the news
media misreporting objective fact as
opinion in an attempt to create a false
balance between the sides of an issue
it's also a commentary on the person
reading the paper considering opinion is
misspelled opinion in short the creators
don't seem to think duck or people like
him are very smart which leads to fly
where duck sees the fly swats it down
and calls it by the wrong name pesky b
this directly calls us back to dhmas
episode 3 which was about love when a
butterfly gets swatted
let's look at both of them and see how
they compare since these moments are
clearly meant to be parallel in the
first case yellow guy sees the butterfly
gets excited by this beautiful harmless
creature in the outdoors and duck kills
it without thinking this drives yellow
guy away for the rest of the episode to
learn about love in fly again yellow guy
sees something first in this case it's
the fly an indicator of the problems in
the broader world before duck swats it
down in both cases duck sees something
he fails to recognize it for what it is
and then he kills it without asking
questions in the first duck kills
something that's a beautiful part of
nature in the second a fly should be
telling duck that there's a deeper
problem here something is rotting nearby
but duck calls him a b he's failing to
recognize that anything is truly wrong
it's symbolic of leaders failing to
recognize the bigger problems that we're
facing instead just swatting down the
symptoms and pretending that that's
enough it's a pesky bee not the rotting
corpse that's hidden inside the
refrigerator or whatever it's not clear
whether duck is meant to be a specific
right-wing figure here the creators of
the show are british which would point
to the right-wing soon-to-be former
british pm boris johnson regardless of
who it is it seems like the theme is
consistent duck and those like him are
ignoring the rot around them pretending
everything is fine or just tackling
symptoms without getting to the root
cause of the problem the implication
here is that ultimately something in
dhmas and the broader world is
systematically wrong and our leadership
is collectively ignoring it i think the
takeaway from the trailer other than i'm
just excited to see more is that dhmas
is gonna be picking up right where it
left off when it comes to thinly veiled
political commentary and extremely sharp
social observation in fact i think
they're gonna go one step further and
not just pick up where they left off but
pick up before they left off the
original six episode run of dhmas ended
with the calendar in the background
changing days from june 19th to june
20th we've moved forward in time we've
progressed red guy pulled the plug on
his ad heavy children show and decided
to independently produce it on youtube
there was hope there was new opportunity
but now we've regressed the calendar and
fly has reset to june 19th resetting the
date seems to be meant to tell us that
history is repeating we're making the
same mistakes we are stuck in a negative
cycle like duck ignoring the problems or
a yellow guy who doesn't know enough to
recognize history when he sees it we're
going to be reliving the same issues
over and over again we keep swatting the
fly but calling it a b we keep treating
the symptoms but not addressing the root
problem maybe we as viewers didn't do a
good enough job of recognizing the
problems around us so dhmas new season
will be us reliving them again until we
can get it right looks like the show is
trying to teach us something after all
and not just about nutrition but the bad
not healthy foods are very rude and must
leave through the cat flap that doesn't
make sense
also guess we're gonna have to wait
until september to find out more suppose
it gives me time to figure out how to
watch shows that are currently airing on
the bbc but hey that's just a theory a
film theory and cuts and hey if you want
to catch up on our previous theories on
don't hug me i'm scared you should check
them out because they're on screen right
now we dove deep into the lore of the
franchise and i cannot wait to see what
this new show has in store for us
speaking of if you don't want to miss
our analysis of the dhmas tv show when
it hits hit the subscribe button it will
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