Is that Tinky Winky twerking?
Once upon a time, the Teletubbies ended up a cutesy quad of 10-foot, childlike humanoids sporting signature onesies.
The colour-coded Television people brought wholesome pleasure to infants, toddlers and tykes of the late 1990s and early aughts from their grassy hill house in Teletubbyland.
But now, the fake toddlers have turn out to be vogue-obsessed, booty-bouncing badasses.
And their “X-rated” makeover is breaking the internet.
“Come and RAVE with the Teletubbies,” wrote the foursome — comprised of plushy pals Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laa Laa and Po — in the caption of a current Instagram Reel.
The eye-popping post, topping 715,000 sights, emerged as a promo for the kiddie crew’s new collaboration with San Francisco streetwear label, Dolls Get rid of.
But visuals of the after-snuggly sweeties shaking their stuffing to club music have outraged some Gen Zs and millennials who grew up looking at their purple, environmentally friendly, yellow and red mates frolic below the beaming warmth of “Sun Toddler.”
“This is sacrilegious to me,” commented a disapproving detractor.
“So gross, drug-oriented, pedophilic and mistaken,” spat an similarly perturbed spectator.
“The Teletubbies X-rated version,” an additional sneered.
In individual snippets, the cartoonish cuties can be viewed gyrating to fashionable tracks these kinds of as “I Luv It” by Camila Cabello and Playboi Carti, and jamming out to hits on Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” anthology.
The series of wild antics — presumed tries at remaining pop-culturally applicable — have still left bewildered commenters inquiring, “Isn’t this a kids’ exhibit?”
But this is not the goo-goo-gaa-gaa group’s initial social media scolding for inappropriateness.
Parents pretty much spanked Tinky Winky right after a resurfaced episode showed the purple plaything tickling Dipsy‘s green derrière with a bash balloon in April 2023.
“What did I just check out?” questioned a mother who shared the stunning viral footage with her a lot more than 70,000 TikTok followers.
“That was the most strangest children’s method I’ve at any time witnessed,” wrote a creeped-out critic beneath the clip.
Nevertheless, not all 20- and 30-somethings are providing the Tubbies’ newfound cheekiness a thumbs down.
In fact, some young grown ups discover comfort and ease in observing their childhood idols experienced into trendy social gathering animals.
“Bringing nostalgia to your feed with a splash of sunshine and tubby custard,” reported Claire, an adult fan of the Y2K show, whilst rocking the funky “Telly Memories Intarsia sweater” from the troupe’s edgy attire line in a clip.
“We’re the Telletubby technology all grown up,” she additional.
The viral “Harbin sisters,” a group of 6 voguish siblings, also wowed their additional than 870,000 followers in saucy items from the Teletubby and Dolls Destroy selection — which include the $88 cow-printed, lime inexperienced-trimmed “Dipsy style fake fur coat” and the $78 “Po fuzzy jacket.”
Tubby-satisfied hipsters, way too, stomped close to in the equipment on the desert grounds of Coachella this yr.
But the not-so-babyish band is in fact showing up late to its possess attire bash.
New York fashion designer Christian Cowan formerly premiered a line of Teletubbies togs, which include a pair of neon inexperienced, knee-higher “Dipsy” boots that retail for $2,500, in March 2023.
“We had been throwing around lots of pop tradition icons, and then it struck us, let’s do THE icons,” claimed Cowan adhering to the debut of his duds — which garnered “big hugs” from the Tubbies.
“We treated Dipsy, Laa-Laa, Po & Tinky-Winky like the legends they are.”
