As I wrap-up my time here in San Francisco, reporting back from the PBS Annual Meeting, I’m mulling over a gigantic, and impressive slate of programming for the year ahead (and beyond) from both PBS KIDS and For Grownups. While there will be much to discuss in the months ahead, the star of the show on the PBS KIDS front is ODD SQUAD, the new, live-action series for kids that I first posted about here on THE ROCK FATHER back in January. Here at the meeting, it was confirmed that ODD SQUAD will premiere on Wednesday, November 26, 2014 on PBS KIDS with a special one-hour broadcast of two back-to-back episodes that follow the adventures of two young government agents, Olive and Otto, who use math skills and collaboration to investigate weird and unusual phenomena.
In each episode of ODD SQUAD, the young agents use math to put things right when oddness strikes. Olive and Otto solve cases ranging from disappearing zeroes to runaway dinosaurs, and the agents often find additional clues in the “Mathroom,” a futuristic space that is just a teleport away.
ODD SQUAD is created by Tim McKeon (The Electric Company, Fosterʼs Home for Imaginary Friends, Adventure Time) and Adam Peltzman (The Electric Company, The Backyardigans, Wallykazam!) and produced by The Fred Rogers Company and Sinking Ship Entertainment. It is funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and the U.S. Department of Education through the CPB-PBS Ready To Learn Initiative, a program that supports the development of innovative educational television and digital media targeted to preschool and early elementary school children and their families.
