Bob Ross may be gone, but Twitch's week-long marathon proved that the beloved TV painter has not been forgotten. So much so that reruns of Ross hosting The Joy of Painting will now have a regular presence on the site, running every Monday from 3 p.m. PT to 9:30 p.m. PT.
The launch was probably a no-brainer after 5.6 million unique viewers tuned in for the original marathon. That one kicked off on Oct. 29, the painter's birthday, and ran through Nov. 6, amassing 545,800,000 minutes of views in that time. Its success paved the way for Bob Ross Mondays, which will simply rerun episodes from the show's 31 seasons.
For those that want to get into the spirit of interactivity, there's a little more to it than that. Twitch struck a deal with rights-holders Janson Media and Bob Ross Inc. that will allow the site's users to re-broadcast the Bob Ross Mondays streams, meaning they can paint along with each episode and add commentary on their own Twitch channels.
Twitch also confirmed that the birthday marathon will be an annual occurrence moving forward. It was initially meant as a tie-in to the launch of Twitch Creative, a new channel where users can share their creative efforts. But the site's users made it clear: they want to see more happy little trees.
You can tune in for continued Bob Ross action on Twitch at www.twitch.tv/bobross.