In case you had no idea, Teletubbies is a British children's television series created by Anne Wood and Andrew Davenport for the BBC. The programme focuses on four differently coloured characters known as the Teletubbies, named after the television screens on their bellies, Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laa-laa and Po. But a conspiracy theory has surfaced, suggesting that this children's series has a dark past and that it was inspired by four children held in a Bulgarian mental asylum.

According to an article on ebaumsworld, in the 1990s, Bulgaria had some of the highest numbers of children in state institutions in all of Europe. Bulgaria's mental institutions were a well-known problem and in 2007, the BBC even released a documentary on the atrocious conditions in these hospitals: Bulgaria's Abandoned Children.

According to the article, the Teletubbies are meant to represent actual children from one of the asylums and the theory claims that the four children who inspired the show all died on the same day. 

The institution in question was colloquially known as 'La La Land.' The yellow Teletubby 'Laa-Laa' was supposedly based on a child patient who spent years in isolation, hence the permanent facial disfigurement. Think Joker and his Chelsea smile. 

One of the children had gone deaf and also had some unfortunate facial deformities. Allegedly the child was tied to a fence outside and eventually got frostbite. Hence Tinky Winky as the purple/blue Teletubby.

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Dipsy was inspired by a child who had clearly been malnourished to the point of getting sick. Hungry and unwell the child vomited, and with conditions as bad as they were at the institution, he ends up lying in his own puke for days on end. This is where Dipsy gets his green colour. 

As if the other Teletubbies weren't tortured enough, now we have Po. The child that Po is based on allegedly fell into a fire and was burnt to a crisp, hence Po's red colouring. 

"But what about the TV's in their stomachs?", you might ask. Television sets were the only form of joy and laughter for children in the asylum. When the mental institution decided to get rid of all the TVs, the children decided to swallow the smaller television sets for safekeeping.