'Tooning Out The News' gets a second season for Paramount Plus

Promo picture for "Stephen Colbert's Tooning Out The News" on Paramount Plus.
(Image credit: Paramount Plus)

It never will be not funny to make fun of the news — especially when you can do so in cartoon form. And so it's especially excellent Tooning Out The News has been renewed for a second season and will make the leap from CBS All Access to Paramount+ as Stephen Colbert Presents Tooning Out The News when the rebranded streaming service launches on March 4. Season 2 will premiere on March 8, with new segments daily building into a weekly full episode.

Tooning Out The News, which features a cast of animated characters led by anchor James Smartwood, recently was nominated for a Critics' Choice Award for best short form series. It's produced by Colbert and Chris Licht (also of Colbert's late-nite show on CBS).

“We are so excited for Season 2 of Tooning Out The News, which will feature even more incisive questions, unrelenting egomania, Freudian projection, shameless brand integration, tasteful nudity, unapologetic slander and flat out lying,” Colbert said in a press release.

So basically like the real news, then.

The first season of Tooning Out The News covered many breaking stories from the year 2020 and led interviews with a wide range of special guests, including Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, Chasten Buttigieg, Rep. Jamaal Bowman, Rep. Pramila Jayapal, Alyssa Milano, Charlamagne Tha God, Symone Sanders, Alan Dershowitz, Rep. Ted Lieu and Matt Schlapp.

“We are ecstatic to be collaborating again with the talented creative team behind STEPHEN COLBERT PRESENTS TOONING OUT THE NEWS,” Julie McNamara, Executive Vice President and Head of Programming, Paramount+, said in a press release“They overcame every obstacle 2020 threw at them and day after day delivered an extremely smart, inventive and funny program that offered our audience a bit of reprieve from the ‘regular’ news cycle. We’re cautiously optimistic about what’s in store for 2021, but no matter what, we’re eager to know what the series’ mostly informative segments and characters will have to say about it.”

Paramount+ is the rebranded and expanded CBS All Access. It'll be available outside the United States, but still include access to local CBS affiliates domestically. The Paramount Plus price will land the same as current CBS All Access — $5.99 a month or $59.99 a year with advertising on the on-demand content, and $9.99 a month or $99.99 a year if you want to get rid of most advertising.

And, yes, you'll be able to watch the NFL on Paramount+. (You'll also be able to watch other live sports on Paramount+.)

You can watch Paramount+ on Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Android TV and Google TV, on Android and iOS, on smart TVs, and on the web.

Phil Nickinson

Phil spent his 20s in the newsroom of the Pensacola (Fla.) News Journal, his 30s on the road for AndroidCentral.com and Mobile Nations and is the Dad part of Modern Dad.