--- description: As more states legalize cannabis, TV is embracing a stoner-friendly audience. Here are three weed-adjacent shows that will debut on 4/20. title: 3 New Stoner-Friendly TV Series to Watch on 4/20 image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt717634c3150a113d/698a18cc011682c112980850/sasquatch_06-1.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Entertainment](/section/entertainment/) ## Entertainment Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [Television](/tag/television/) ## Television Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # 3 New Stoner-Friendly TV Series to Watch on 4/20  by [Judy Berman](/author/judy-berman/)  ## Judy Berman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close TV Critic Apr 20, 2021 2:30 PM CUT  Cannabis plants in a still from 'Sasquatch' Cannabis plants in a still from 'Sasquatch'Hulu  by [Judy Berman](/author/judy-berman/)  ## Judy Berman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close TV Critic Apr 20, 2021 2:30 PM CUT It isn’t exactly news that marijuana mixes well with TV. If bars are the natural habitat of drinkers, then basement rec rooms (or any domestic space casual enough to countenance spontaneous snoozing) belong to weed smokers. Fueled by snack food and surrounded by buddies, the stereotypical stoner consumes hours of funny, trippy eye-candy programming—from [Adult Swim](https://time.com/5752400/adult-animation-golden-age/ "undefined") and [_High Maintenance_](https://time.com/3695776/high-maintenance-vimeo/ "undefined") to food porn and [_Planet Earth_](https://time.com/4673008/planet-earth-ii-david-attenborough/ "undefined")—in a single sitting. Television has, consciously and otherwise, catered to this audience for decades. What _has_ changed in the past several years is the legal status of cannabis in an ever-increasing number of U.S. states. In the last few weeks alone, [New York](https://time.com/5950642/new-york-marijuana/ "undefined") and Virginia joined 15 other states in legalizing recreational use of the drug. And public opinion supports this shift. A Pew survey conducted earlier this month found that [91% of American adults](https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/04/16/americans-overwhelmingly-say-marijuana-should-be-legal-for-recreational-or-medical-use/ "undefined") believe it should be legal for some uses, with almost two-thirds of that group supporting recreational as well as medical use. TV execs have, evidently, noticed. Gone are the days when the creators of [_That ’70s Show_](https://entertainment.time.com/2010/03/30/top-10-shows-that-overstayed-their-welcome/slide/that-70s-show/ "undefined") had to devise elaborate gimmicks and rely on euphemistic slang in order to [insinuate that its teenage characters were smoking pot](https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/tv/2018/08/22/seventies-show-celebrates-20th-anniversary-launched-mila-kunis-career/1058062002/ "undefined") while avoiding network blowback. In 2021, even the tamest, most Middle American franchises—[_Chopped_](https://entertainment.time.com/2012/02/22/top-chef-vs-chopped-who-rules-the-food-tv-kitchen/ "undefined"), anyone?—are looking to the stoner holiday 4/20 as an opportunity for apparently uncontroversial brand expansion. Whether this makes you clutch your pearls, curse Hollywood for commercializing counterculture (again) or simply shrug and reach for the vape, the result is, admittedly, some pretty entertaining TV. Here are three very different weed-adjacent series that will make their streaming debuts on April 20. ## _Sasquatch_ (Hulu) “I’ve been witness to a lot of crazy stories,” says the journalist David Holthouse in the first episode of this unusual three-part crime docuseries. “But the one about a [Sasquatch](https://time.com/5771683/bigfoot-sasquatch-washington/ "undefined") wasting three dudes in dope country is bar none the craziest.” What sounds like the beginning of a spooky campfire yarn is actually the inexplicable memory of a night in the fall of 1993, when two terrified guys rolled up to the Mendocino County home where a 23-year-old Holthouse was visiting a weed-grower friend, claiming to have three found bodies that had been torn apart by some kind of monster. The crime was never reported. So, decades into a [career](https://www.davidholthouse.com/ "undefined") that had sent him on high-risk investigations of neo-Nazis, meth addicts and, most poignantly, the man who raped him when he was a child, Holthouse decided to find out what (if anything) really happened that night. There are certainly some oddballs in _Sasquatch_: paranoid hippie pot farmers, cryptozoology obsessives, two men described as “Sasquatch hunters/life partners” who seem to have an ongoing disagreement over whether Bigfoots can teleport. But this is not [_Tiger King_](https://time.com/5807284/tiger-king-netflix-true-story/ "undefined"); its purpose is not to poke fun. Though it’s a shame so much of it unfolds in phone calls with subjects who wouldn’t speak on-camera, Holthouse’s investigation feels genuinely dangerous. And after reeling us in with a supernatural mystery, he and director Joshua Rofé (both executive producers, as part of a team that also includes [Mark and Jay Duplass](https://time.com/4236992/how-a-pair-of-fraternal-filmmakers-perfected-low-budget-success/ "undefined")) unearth a true story that touches some of America’s sorest spots, from the War on Drugs to racism and xenophobia. ## _Cinema Toast_ (Showtime)  A still from the episode "Report on the Canine Auto-Mechanical Soviet Threat" Courtesy of SHOWTIME—2021 Courtesy of SHOWTIME NETWORKS INC. It’s a classic film-school assignment: edit together found footage in the public domain to create your own transformative work. The result, like so many student films, tends toward some deeply derivative combination of cheeky, kitschy and surreal—the kind of thing you’d only want to watch if your grade or livelihood depended upon it. But what if you were to pose this same found-footage challenge to directors, writers and performers at the top of their game? This is precisely what creator Jeff Baena (the filmmaker behind wonderfully raunchy historical comedy [_The Little Hours_](https://time.com/4838703/the-little-hours-review/ "undefined")) and producers the Duplass Brothers (who seem to be cornering the market on 4/20 television) have done in _Cinema Toast_. As a way of passing the time amid the past year’s pandemic-related production shutdowns, creators such as [Aubrey Plaza](https://time.com/5917931/black-bear-review-aubrey-plaza/ "undefined"), Jay Duplass, Alex Ross Perry ([_Her Smell_](https://time.com/5568325/elisabeth-moss-her-smell-review/ "undefined")) and Numa Perrier (_Jezebel_) made half-hour film collages, swapping original actors’ voices for those of famous friends ([Alison Brie](https://time.com/5318257/glow-second-season-review/ "undefined"), [Christina Ricci](https://time.com/4648485/christina-ricci-zelda-fitzgerald-misogyny/ "undefined"), the Offerman-Mullallys). While a project of this nature is always going to end up somewhat uneven, most of the show’s 10 very different episodes are a blast. We get an amusingly histrionic psychological thriller from Plaza and a clever [Ronald Reagan](https://time.com/4828781/ronald-reagan-show-clip/ "undefined") pastiche from Duplass and actor-producer Ethan Sandler. Horror fans will recognize plenty of [_Night of the Living Dead_](https://time.com/4861329/george-a-romero/ "undefined") footage in “Attack of the Karens,” from the accomplished TV director Marta Cunningham. My favorite of the bunch, for sheer commitment to a weird bit, is probably Perry’s episode, a red scare sendup that imagines a sinister Soviet plot to mind-meld the two things postwar American families loved best: dogs and cars. ## _Chopped 420_ (discovery+) Shows that combine weed and food are kind of a no-brainer, and they’re certainly nothing new for nonfiction TV. VICE’s _Bong Appétit_, which challenged notable chefs to cater themed, cannabis-infused dinner parties, ran for three seasons beginning in 2016 (and is now available to stream on [Hulu](https://www.hulu.com/series/bong-appetit-e6fdba06-10c8-4703-b0bd-df13ecb6cb3c "undefined")). Netflix got into the game a few years later with the lackluster competition _Cooking on High_; its apparent replacement, 2020’s _Cooked With Cannabis_, was essentially _Chopped_, but with gourmet edibles and lots of giggly chatter among the G-list celebrity judges. So it was probably inevitable that _Chopped_—a [consistent ratings driver](http://www.showbuzzdaily.com/tag/chopped-ratings "undefined") for Food Network, which has cranked out well over 500 episodes of the show since its 2009 debut—would complete the circle with its own herbaceous take on the cooking competition. Better yet, that spinoff lives on parent company Discovery’s new subscription service discovery+, where it’s likely to reach a younger, more 420-friendly demographic than it would have on cable. The extremely watchable _Chopped 420_ doesn’t fundamentally reinvent the _Chopped_ format, nor does it need to. The biggest difference is the personnel. In place of Ted Allen, we get the always hilarious, never irritating comedian and actor Ron Funches. Alongside the top-tier chefs, the judging panel rotates in familiar faces like [_Drag Race_](https://time.com/5188791/rupauls-drag-race-history/ "undefined") alum Laganja Estranja and comic Taccara Williams. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5956264/weed-tv-shows/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5956264/weed-tv-shows/"},"headline":"3 New Stoner-Friendly TV Series to Watch on 4/20","datePublished":"2021-04-20T14:30:38.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:55:15.969Z","description":"In 2021, even the tamest, most Middle American TV franchises are looking to 4/20 as an opportunity for brand expansion","url":"https://time.com/5956264/weed-tv-shows/","keywords":["Television","list"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt717634c3150a113d/698a18cc011682c112980850/sasquatch_06-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Judy Berman","jobTitle":"TV Critic","url":"https://time.com/author/judy-berman/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt717634c3150a113d/698a18cc011682c112980850/sasquatch_06-1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"sasquatch_06-1","caption":"Sasquatch Ñ While visiting a pot farm in Northern California in 1993, investigative journalist David Holthouse heard a story that still haunts him: On a nearby farm three men were torn limb from limb in a savage Bigfoot attack. 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