Who are The Backyardigans and why are they blowing up on TikTok rn?

A newfound admiration for the Backyardigans discography has dominated a large part of TikTok all thanks to Gen Z.

The popularity of the song started with Merlysha Pierre, a 19-year-old TikToker who began posting videos of the iconic banger Castaways, which led on to other TikTokers to create their own version which then bumped the song up on Spotify making it number one in the global viral chart.

Castaways is a musical and cinematic masterpiece. It has reached over 11 million streams on Spotify and there are almost one million videos on TikTok using the sound. But what we want to know is who actually makes up The Backyardigans and are they enjoying this wave of fame?

Okay so, who are The Backyardigans?

The Backyardigans is a musical children’s TV show which aired on Nickelodeon from 2004 to 2013 and released 80 episodes in total. It followed five animal neighbours who imagine themselves on adventures in their back garden. Each episode has a different musical genre and features four songs.

The Backyardigans

The show’s main characters are Uniqua, Pablo, Tyrone, Tasha and Austin. Each character was voiced by several different characters.

Are The Backyardigans enjoying their newfound TikTok fame?

Buzzfeed News spoke to the three voice actors, two lyricists, and two composers to find out how the samba song Castaways came to be. Corwin C. Tuggles, the season one actor for Tyrone, the moose, told Buzzfeed News recording Castaways felt special. “The music for each episode was always stacked,” Corwin said. “But I remember with Castaways, the producers were saying, ‘This is going to be a good one, this is going to be the one,” he continued.

The Backyardigans have a backlog of over 300 songs but no one predicted Castaways would blow up this much.

They’ve had other massively popular songs on TikTok, such as Into the Thick of it!, The Backyardigans Theme Song and more recently Secret Agent.