Angry Birds Slingshot Stories Unveils the secrets of the Angry Birds Universe.

Angry Birds Slingshot Stories season 4 premieres on Sunday, May 11! This short form animated series goes behind the Angry Birds games to explore all of the hypothetical questions that arise from the Angry Birds universe. What sort of hypothetical questions? That’s what we are here for! Take a look below for a few of the biggest questions that the previous three seasons of Angry Birds Slingshot Stories have answered. It’s surprising what you can learn from an animated series of one minute episodes in which not a single word is spoken.

You might think that it’s game over for the birds and pigs after the towers are toppled and the score is counted, but in Slingshot Stories, that is just when the story begins. As a flock with their origins in mobile gaming, the Angry Birds are right at home in your phone – literally. When the screen goes dark, the birds and pigs go about their daily lives, building and rebuilding structures, tending to their gardens, throwing parties, playing golf, and even putting on theatrical performances.

We have seen these two team up in the past to overcome difficulties, take for example The Angry Birds Movie 2 where their powers combined to take on the villainous Eagles. Angry Birds Slingshot Stories sees the two rival camps living closer to each other than ever before, so they have to find a way to make the most of it. Rivalries aside, at the end of the day, it’s all fun and games, albeit a game that each side is determined to win.

Conscientious bird flingers everywhere can stop worrying about cruelty to piggies because pigs don’t actually die when the birds go crashing into their towers. No, they are “popped”, only to be teleported to a safe waiting area where they can regroup and return to the game later. That’s a good thing because the number of piggies popped in Angry Birds games likely numbers in the hundreds of BILLIONS. Or was it just the same handful of piggies the whole time?

Many people know the Angry Birds story: “the birds who fling themselves from a slingshot to protect their eggs,” but where did it all begin? Why did the birds start using a slingshot to begin with? If game designer Jaakko Iisalo is to be believed, the slingshot was included in the game because it was a convenient means of propulsion that can be intuitively controlled with touch controls. More intuitive than early versions of the game, which had the birds simply jumping into the piggies’ structures. Nobody liked this, and thus the slingshot was born. OR was it a spontaneous splitting of a wooden mast in prehistoric times that was the inciting incident that launched the Angry Birds legend?

Look out high fantasy buffs, there’s a new fictional language in town. Much like the Quenya language created by J. R. R. Tolkien for The Lord of the Rings, language in Angry Birds Slingshot Stories is largely based on the Finnish language, which makes sense considering the birds’ Finnish roots. However, it is the piggies who do most of the talking. Yes, most of their vocabulary is… sounds, but Forman Pig needs something to shout when the piggies are neglecting their duties. Here are a few words and utterances to listen out for, along with their English translation:

• • Tai tai: hello
  • GRAMMA!: let’s go, move out
  • Piggu: piggy
  • Smif: smile
  • KWA?: (French, Quoi) WHAT?!
  • Kukka: (Finnish) flower
  • Nöf: (Finnish, onomatopoea) a pig’s snort, oink
  • Uij-uij-uij: (Finnish) expression of concern at some unfortunate unfolding action
  • Nonii: (Finnish) ok, ok then, well then, too many meanings to list

Still so many questions remain. Why aren’t the birds more careful with their eggs? Where do their special abilities come from? The answers to these questions might have to wait. For now, Angry Birds Slingshot Stories is back with its fourth season, which begins on Sunday, May 11. Who knows what other interesting tidbits we can learn as the birds’ story plays out in a new episode every week. Tune into Angry Birds Slingshot Stories on the Angry Birds YouTube channel for a new episode every Sunday and find out!