Pocoyo (Pocoyó in Spanish and stylised as POCOYO) is an animated interactive preschool comedy television series created by David Cantolla, Luis Gallego, and Guillermo García Carsí, and is produced by the Spanish animation company Zinkia Entertainment, with the first two series were co-productions with Granada Kids, and the first series was a co-production of Cosgrove Hall Films, both in the United Kingdom. In 2019, Pocoyo was a co-production of Koyi Talent. Four series have been produced, each consisting of 52 seven-minute episodes along with 27 specials and 29 webisodes produced for YouTube. The show is currently in its fifth series. English actor and comedian Stephen Fry narrates the English-language version of the first two series of the show, while Stephen Hughes narrates the third series, titled Let's Go Pocoyo, and the fourth and fifth series along with the specials and webisodes. José María del Río narrates the Castilian Spanish version of the show. A feature film titled Pocoyo and the Space Circus premiered on 23 November 2008 at Cine Capitol followed by a sequel film, Pocoyo in Cinemas: Your First Movie featuring the short film, Pocoyo and the League of Extraordinary Super Friends releasing in theaters on 11 May 2018 in Mexico with a Spain release on 23 June 2018. On 21 December 2008, a one-hour special titled The Pocoyo Show premiered on La 1. On 27 August 2009, a musical one-hour special titled Pocoyo’s Big Party was released on DVD with a linear premiere on Clan TVE on 31 December 2015. The fifth series was released on 22 July 2024 with the first 13 episodes on Max (formerly known as HBO Max) for select countries and aired on Cartoonito in Latin America. The second part of the first batch released on 30 September 2024, with a third part released on 14 October 2024. When the second batch releases in Q2 2025, the series will feature more new characters like Pocoyo's little sister, Bea along with new locations expanding Pocoyo's World. It will also feature the return of British actor and comedian Stephen Fry who narrated the first 2 seasons of Pocoyo as well with Pocoyo speaking in full sentences with his friends, adding more depth for the story and appeal fans in a new way. Similar to the series 4 episode "Dragon Island", five of the episodes will be mixed into live action. In 2023, the franchise was acquired by Animaj. With the use of AI tools, a new series will release every 12 to 18 months for traditional television and premium streaming services. As of 2024, it has been confirmed that a sixth series is set to release in 2026, a third feature film will release in 2028, and a seventh series will release between 2029–30.

Overview

Set in a 3D space, with a plain white background and usually no backdrops, it is about Pocoyo, a four-year-old kid who is dressed all in blue, interacting with his animal companions Elly (the elephant), Pato (the duck), Nina (girl), Fred (the octopus), Loula (the dog), Roberto (the robot), Baby Bird, Caterpillar and Sleepy Bird. Viewers are encouraged to recognize situations that Pocoyo is in, and things that are going on with or around him. The Narrator usually speaks explicitly to the viewers and to the characters as well. Each character has its own distinctive dance and also a specific sound (usually from a musical instrument), and most episodes end with the characters dancing.

Characters

Main

Recurring

Development and production

Pocoyo's name was provided by David Cantolla, one of the creators, after his then two-year-old daughter used it in her nightly "Dear Child Jesus " prayers saying "Eres niño poco yo" ("You're a child little me"), but not "Eres niño como yo" ("You're a child like me"). "Pocoyo" could roughly be translated to English as "little me", though it is a made-up construction. The show is animated with Softimage XSI software. The show was first announced to be in development in March 2003. In October, it was announced that Carlton International would co-produce and distribute the series, and that production delivery on the first half of the first series would begin in September 2004. In March 2004, Novel Entertainment joined in production as co-producer with Carlton and Zinkia. However, nothing else was known about this initial announcement otherwise. The show was showcased by Granada International at MIP TV in April 2005, with a broadcast window for CITV announced for the autumn. It was also announced that Stephen Fry would narrate the series in the United Kingdom. The series was renewed for a second series on May 12, 2006. The makers also wish to embark upon other projects, one of which may be a Pocoyo movie. In June 2006, Pocoyo was awarded the Cristal Award for the "Best TV Production" at the 30th Annecy International Animated Film Festival. In April 2011, Zinkia and ITV Global Entertainment announced they would end their co-distribution partnership on the series and that Zinkia would now hold worldwide distribution of the series. In May 2023, Zinkia announced the sale of the franchise to French children's investment firm Animaj for an indisclosed amount. The sale would include all IP rights, distribution, and licensing to the franchise but would exclude the educational portions, which Zinkia would retain. In exchange for the deal, Zinkia would acquire a 7.99% in Animaj. The deal was closed on September 20, 2023.

Episodes

Series overview

Four series have been produced with 52 episodes along with 27 specials and 29 webisodes produced for YouTube. The show is currently in its fifth series. There is also an unreleased pilot episode entitled "The See-Saw". This pilot was only released in the DVD version of "The Pocoyo Show" during 2009. Series 3 is known as Let's Go Pocoyo, with episodes that have different segments. The 1st segment contains one relating to the story and the 2nd part involves stuff like counting, exercising, and learning about shapes. In the end, there is a music video recapping the story. Series 4 consists of episodes similar to the first two series, but now with less audience engagement from the narrator and introduces another human character Nina and her Robot friend, Roberto as the main characters. Originally on YouTube, the first half produced 26 episodes and it became successful. Because of its success, the second half with 26 episodes was produced exclusively on the Spanish children's channel Clan TVE, ABC Kids in Australia, and exclusively in the Pocoyo Party game for the PlayStation 4 and the Nintendo Switch. Since 2016, there are specials in relation with the holidays each year with few relating to sports. Following the success of series 4, there are episodes produced as a web series, and both series are exclusively online in YouTube. In "A Very Special Guest", a Christmas Special for 2019, Yanko, a giant snow yeti is introduced. Series 5 released its first 13 episodes exclusively on Max in select countries on 22 July 2024. The next 7 episodes released on 30 September 2024 and the next 6 episodes on 14 October 2024.

Pilots (2002–2005)

Series 1 (2005)

Series 2 (2006–07)

Series 3: Let's Go Pocoyo (2010)

Series 4 (2016–24)

Series 4 – Part One (2016–17)

Series 4 – Part Two (2020–21)

Specials (2016–24)

Webisodes (2019–24)

Series 5 (2024)

Broadcast

United Kingdom

On September 11, 2007, Granada International pre-sold the first and second series to Five's Milkshake! strand. This deal meant that while the CITV Channel could still air the series, they could not air it within Milkshake!'s airtime.

Spain

In June 2006, TVE2 and Boomerang acquired free and pay-TV rights respectively to the series from Zinkia. The first series premiered on TVE2 in October 2006. The second series premiered on the network in April 2008. The third series, Let's Go Pocoyo began airing in 2010. In October 2017, Clan acquired the TV rights to the fourth series.

Other

In April 2005, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation became the first international broadcaster to acquire the series. In October, Granada pre-sold the series to Treehouse TV (Canada), Disney Channel (Southeast Asia), TVNZ (New Zealand), CYBC (Cyprus) Gulf DTH/Showtime and MBC (Middle East), IBC (Iceland), EBS (South Korea), Alter Channel (Greece), RTFBH (Bosnia), RTV (Slovenia), BabyTV (Israel) and the ABC (Australia). At the time, deals were current underway for Germany, Japan, Finland, Sweden, France and Hong Kong. In March 2006, Nickelodeon acquired French broadcast rights. This was followed up in May with Granada pre-selling the series to KiKA (Germany), Discovery Kids (Latin America), WOWOW (Japan) and MNET (South Africa), and Zinkia selling Portuguese rights to RTP in June. In October, Granada pre-sold the pay TV rights to the series to Disney Channel Scandivania, while Yle acquired free-TV rights to the first series in Finland. In April 2008, Zinkia pre-sold Mexican broadcast rights to Grupo Televisa. In 2010, the series entered Italy when Zinkia sold broadcast rights to Rai 2 in March and the United States in April when ITV Global Entertainment sold the series to the Nick Jr. Channel for broadcast within the spring. In the US, the series was originally shown as 7-minute segments between shows before being expanded to a half-hour show from July 23, 2011, to January 1, 2015. Currently, episodes of the show were made available on the Noggin app. Episodes of "Pocoyo Planet" are also currently on the app as well. In end of same year, the series also broadcast on Indonesia and aired by RCTI with Indonesian languages, then it will soon be aired on Mentari TV (a sister channel of Indosiar) in 2024. Pocoyo aired alongside Peep and the Big Wide World in a shared half-hour timeslot on public television in the US from 2010 to 2021. It was distributed to local PBS stations through American Public Television from January 2010 until January 2018, when it was picked up by PBS Kids 24/7 Channel. In 2021, the series moved to US commercial broadcast on Cartoon Network on September 13, 2021, as part of their preschool block Cartoonito. The show was removed from Cartoonito's lineup on September 23, 2022, and was removed from HBO Max on September 30, 2022. The broadcast of the series on PBS Kids came to an end on December 26, 2021, and it, along with the show it aired with, was replaced with reruns of Dinosaur Train to the 7:30 a.m. weekend morning time slot instead. In 2024, the first 13 episodes of series 5 released on Max on July 22, 2024 in select countries and started airing on Cartoonito (Latin America) on August 2, 2024.

In other media

Specials/Movies

Pocoyo & the Space Circus (2008)

Pocoyo & the Space Circus had its world premiere at Cine Capitol on November 23, 2008 as part of a charity. The special later had its linear premiere on La 1 on December 21, 2008 as part of the stand-alone special El Show de Pocoyo It was announced for international distribution by Zinkia and ITV Global Entertainment in March 2009. The special centers on The Martian Brothers, a pack of 5 aliens from outer space that arrive in Pocoyo's World, hosting a circus. Pocoyo, Elly, and Pato along with Loula join in as well.

Pocoyo and the League of Extraordinary Super Friends (Pocoyo in Cinemas: Your First Movie) (2018)

Pocoyo in Cinemas: Your First Movie released in Mexican theaters on May 11, 2018. It released in Spain theaters on June 23, 2018 and worldwide on June 24, 2018. In Spain, the film grossed $28,000 in 40 theaters and $34,000 worldwide. The film includes a 15 minute short where Angry Alien is back and is destroying the city using his U.F.O. So Pocoyo as a super hero and his team of his super friends (Pato, Elly, Nina, & Roberto including Elly's doll) join forces as they have to stop Angry Alien from his evil schemes. The film also includes episodes from the series like Ready, Set, Go!, Crazy Inventions and Easter Eggs, plus Super Pocoyo shorts and Let’s Go Pocoyo songs.

Untitled third feature film (2028)

A third feature film of Pocoyo was announced to release in 2028.

Video games

Hello, Pocoyo!

In October 2007, Zinkia signed a video game publishing deal with Virgin Play for the video game Hello, Pocoyo!, planned for a release on the Nintendo DS in 2008. The game was developed in-house at Zinkia. The game released in Europe on November 17, 2008. In Hello, Pocoyo!, Baby Spider finds a magic felt-tip pen and whatever he draws come to life so he draws a disco floor which flips over and all of Pocoyo’s friends disappear. The player will play the role as Pocoyo and search for his friends by using clues like coloring pictures and drawing objects.

Pocoyo Racing

Pocoyo Racing was released for the Nintendo DS and Wii in November 18, 2011 being published by Zinkia Entertainment and exclusive to Europe only. In Pocoyo Racing, Pocoyo and all of his friends have a car race around Pocoyo World. The player is able to play the role as various characters including Pocoyo, Pato, or Elly and race against other characters in multiple worlds.

Pocoyo Party

Pocoyo Party was released for the PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch on April 15, 2021 and published by RECOTechnology. In Pocoyo Party, following the events of the episode, “The Videogame Party”, Pocoyo writes invitations to his party but Angry Alien (disguised as a mailman) steals the invitations but accidentally drops each of them in different locations. The player will play the role as Pocoyo and play multiple mini games to try and retrieve the invitations before the party starts.

Others

Alongside those games various app games have been released based on the franchise.