“Adventure Time” began as a seven-minute Internet short about a boy and his dog friend that quickly went viral. Picked up by Cartoon Network for full-series production in 2007, “there was a big fan base” for the show before a single episode had aired on television, said Craig “Sven” Gordon, creative director of Cartoon Network’s Creative Group. “You could tell by all the costumes and crafts that people were already working on.”

Something about that initial short’s brief yet jam-packed stew of goofy comedy, surrealism and heartfelt emotion moved its growing legions of supporters to engage with the “Adventure Time” world in demonstrative, frequently tactile ways. For the Creative Group, that unusually expressive community became a promotional goldmine as its team worked to “push [the show] out to a broader audience,” said Gordon. “The fandom of it was a great thing to pull from.”

From the start, Gordon’s team “treated [the show] the same way as a fan would have treated it,” said Candice House, art director for the Creative Group. “There were people who were already making and doing things and posting them online. We wanted to add to that with our promotion, and that’s part of the reason why we did the whole LARPing thing, where we created these costumes [and] role-played how Finn and Jake would enter our real world.”

For those unacquainted with nerd culture, “LARPing,” stands for “live-action role-playing,” a form of fantasy gaming with its origins in Dungeons & Dragons, from which “Adventure Time” draws much inspiration. Since the show’s inception, the Creative Group’s promotional work has paid homage to these fantastical roots, recreating live-action renditions of iconic “Adventure Time” components such as this early, documentary-style spot which intersplices footage of a kid dressed as Finn excitedly asking bystanders “What time is it?” with call-and-response-style clips from the show:

In another spot, a boy receives a mail-order “Adventure Sphere” which enables him and his dog to transform into live-action versions of Finn and Jake. The duo proceeds to burst through the boy’s bedroom wall into a magical realm populated by the Ice King, Princess Bubblegum and other “Adventure Time” characters.

A good third of that above clip depicts the boy cutting and sewing costumes for himself and his loyal pug, reflecting the crafty nature of both the viewership and the promotional team, whose members relish the chance to “get off the computer and make something,” said House. “I love to do crafts, I love to draw and paint. A lot of the time we shoot stuff right here on our floor, and we’ll put together these elaborate shoots, and just spend all day working on it and it’s really collaborative. People are walking by and everyone’s happy and in a good mood because how could you not be in a good mood when there are dog paws flying all over the place?”

“It’s like we’re the fans and we’re creating costumes and acting in our own little scenarios,” added Gordon.

As the show’s tremendous success has extended now into five seasons, with a sixth season on order, those “little scenarios” have expanded into full-blown outdoor experiences as the Creative Group has continually sought to blur the line between the “Adventure Time” kingdom and the “Adventure Time” fandom. In 2013, their promotional efforts extended far beyond the small screen into an array of spectacles ranging from an interactive Ice King head at last year’s Comic-Con to massive balloon recreations of Finn and Jake in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade, to the third year in a row of “LAG-OooN,” an “Adventure Time”-themed, 9,000-square-foot water park and obstacle course at the Bahamas resort, Atlantis Paradise Island.

“At events like that, you’ll see people who have spent months and months and hundreds of dollars making these insane costumes,” said House. “It takes a special show to create that type of fandom. It makes you feel like what you’re doing is reaching people.”

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