What if the cheeriest children's show from your childhood suddenly became the worst place to be trapped? That's the promise of Buddy, a new horror-comedy that turns TV nostalgia into a full-blown analog nightmare.
Roadside Attractions and Saban Films have just released the first official trailer for this feature, which already made a strong impression at Sundance 2026. Analog horror has never looked so colorful… or so unsettling.
Official trailer
What is It's Buddy!?
At the heart of the film is It's Buddy!, a 1990s children's television show that deliberately evokes educational programs of the era, somewhere between Barney, Blue's Clues, and Thomas the Tank Engine. Buddy, the main mascot, is a bright orange unicorn who hosts his own clubhouse and teaches children life lessons about sharing, friendship, and expressing emotions.
But behind this pastel set and those cheerful songs hides a much darker reality. In the show's world, a group of amnesiac children lives trapped in this episodic universe with no memory of their past. As long as they obey Buddy and join his games, everything seems fine. But when one child simply refuses to dance and prefers to read quietly, the mood shifts.
Buddy doesn't appreciate refusal. And the show's perfect world begins to crack.
When the children's show turns into a nightmare
Directed by Casper Kelly (known for the viral short Too Many Cooks), Buddy blends a meticulous recreation of a 1990s children's show with increasingly bloody detours. Slowly, this colorful, singalong mascot slides from sugar-coated daytime television into visceral analog horror.
The story takes place in 1999. After one of the children disappears, the survivors begin to defy their captor. Buddy then sends them on a perilous journey to the mythical Diamond City. Meanwhile, in the "real world," Grace, a traumatized suburban mother played by Cristin Milioti, is also drawn into Buddy's abomination.
The result? A film that asks a question as simple as it is terrifying: what if the children's shows we watched without a second thought were actually hiding something monstrous?
Sundance, then U.S. theaters on August 28, 2026
Buddy premiered in the Midnight section at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival on January 22. In April, Roadside Attractions and Saban Films acquired North American distribution rights and scheduled a theatrical release for August 28, 2026, in the United States. The feature runs 95 minutes.
Early international press reviews are broadly favorable: the film holds an 84% positive critics score on Rotten Tomatoes and a 64/100 rating on Metacritic.
However, a French theatrical release date remains unconfirmed at this time. No local distributor has yet been officially announced.
After the success of Backrooms and Hollywood's rush toward analog horror, Buddy could become one of the most singular films of summer 2026 — a blend of childhood nostalgia, media satire, and demented violence.
