Blink 182’s Tom DeLonge is developing a show that sounds a lot like Stranger Things — in name and in theory — but for grimy ’90s teens instead of quaint ’80s nerds. Strange Times is the name of DeLonge’s just-announced show for TBS, and it will feature a group of skateboarding buddies who solve paranormal mysteries “while being chased by Deep State government agents.†As DeLonge said in a release, “My love for all things paranormal and skateboarding are sometimes only superseded by my love for offensive humor,†and really, he isn’t just saying that because he’s making a show about ghost-hunting teens. DeLonge started a kind of alt-news site called Strange Times dedicated to “unexplained phenomena†back in 2011, and that eventually expanded to a graphic novel and a YA book series he’s co-writing with Geoff Herbach. So DeLonge’s Strange brand actually predates Stranger Things.
The release for the new show promises a “love letter to punk rock culture and a middle finger to everybody else,†and one of the executive producers calls it “a comedic take on the tropes of coming of age, friendship, and how to escalate ways to humiliate your best friends while staying out of detention, and ideally, the hospital.†So taken all together, it sounds like Scooby Doo meets Stranger Things by way of someone raised on South Park jokes.