What is the Huggy Wuggy trend on TikTok?

HUGGY WUGGY is a villain in a popular online game called Poppy Playtime; thanks to TikTok, he’s made it mainstream and has a cult following on the app.

But the trend isn’t nearly as harmless or adorable as it sounds; police have recently issued warnings about children re-enacting the violent game after seeing it on TikTok.

YouTube/poppyplaytimeHuggy Wuggy is a fictional character that is part of an online game called Poppy Playtime[/caption]

Who is Huggy Wuggy?

In the online game Poppy Playtime, players are ex-employees of Playtime Co., a factory where children’s toys were manufactured.

The players return to the factory ten years after all of the employees seem to have vanished and must solve puzzles and avoid killer toys to advance.

Huggy Wuggy is one of these killer toys; it was originally a sweet teddy bear for kids, but, according to Villains Fandom, ” he was eventually modified at some point prior to the events of the game with a transferred but corrupted human conscience, which turned him into a monster.”

Why is Huggy Wuggy trending on TikTok?

Due to cosplay, advances in video animation, and screen grabs from the game itself, Huggy Wuggy became a niche trend for those who played the game.

But like other internet horror trends, this one took on a life of its own, and soon some children were terrified that their teddy bears would grow fangs in the night.

Others re-enacted the violence from the videos on the playground, prompting worried parents and a police response.

What was the police response to Huggy Wuggy?

While children are required to be 13 to sign up for TikTok accounts, YouTube Kids is a channel that offers parental controls for kids aged five and up.

Unfortunately, YouTube Kids relies on names and descriptions of videos to weed them out, meaning that a video called Huggy Wuggy would probably pass through their initial screening.

Poppy PlaytimeReal-life stuffed animal versions of the character are for sale[/caption]

Police in the UK have led the crusade against Huggy Wuggy and similar horror videos, with Chris Conroy, a cyber protection officer for the Dorset Police warning,

“It really comes down to paying attention of what your children are doing and making sure they are not just trusting YouTube Kids videos are safe because unfortunately with videos like this, things do slip through the cracks.”