“They’re weird”— Adult Swim’s new TV series Common Side Effects takes cues from Coen brothers and real-world Pharma issues
Common Side Effects, Adult Swim's new half-hour series that premiered back on February 2, 2025, has slowly garnered a fan base over the last month. Created by Joseph Bennett and Steven Hely, the show follows an ethnobotanist known as Marshall who discovers a rare blue mushroom that can cure any illness and reunites with his old friend Frances to grow more of it to save lives.
The premise for Common Side Effects itself came to the creators as they were obsessed with mushrooms and began a deep dive into them. In an interview with GameRant on February 13, 2025, they revealed how they thought of mushrooms to be "weird" and researched a lot on them, which helped form the show's tone and plot.
"Mushrooms are interesting and strange. Some of them can kill you. Some of them make you feel funny. Some of them are delicious. They're weird," said co-creator Steven Hely.
He continued:
"There's so much we don't know about them. The more you learn about them, the weirder and stranger they get - the way they spread, the way they reproduce, the way they are cultivated, the way people use them."
However, mushrooms isn't exactly where a lot of Common Side Effects' influences would end.
Common Side Effects is inspired by Coen Brothers movies and big pharma issues
The main character Marshall is inspired by real-life mycologists and ethnobotanists as well—especially the likes of Paul Stamets, Terence McKenna, and Wade Davis. This helps inform a character who is world-traveled and likes keeping to himself. Not to mention, his trust is hard to come by as well, given that he is speculative about everyone and doesn't trust big corpos.
However, the biggest inspiration for Common Side Effects came from the work of the Coen Brothers. The two have helmed films like The Big Lebowski, Fargo, and many more, and are known for how their plots can combine any set of genres to deliver a full and rounded experience. Burn After Reading was especially a film pointed out by the co-creators, as it had a massive impact on the show.
Not just films, but real-life experiences also helped form the plot of the Adult Swim animated series. In the show, the big pharma known as Reutical are the main villains. They do everything in their power to make sure that the drug can never reach the public, and this is a big plot point.
The co-creators mentioned that living through COVID-19 and seeing how big pharmas operated then helped form the villains of the show.
"Joe and I, like everybody else in the world, have encountered the massive insurance [and] health care system that we all have to deal with," explained Hely.
He continued:
"It's incredibly frustrating and annoying - how do we get to the humanity of that?"
How to watch Common Side Effects?
Fans can watch Common Side Effects when new episodes of the show exclusively premiere on Adult Swim every Sunday at 11:30 pm Eastern Standard Time. However, if they miss the initial broadcast of the show, then they can tune into Max the next day to watch it as well.
However, to watch the show, they will require a valid subscription to the service.
For further updates, stay tuned.
