Disney is trying out a new distribution tactic to build a bigger audience for its live-action series American Born Chinese (pictured) on Disney+.

Select episodes of the Disney+ action-comedy will be released on a handful of partner platforms—YouTube, ABC, Hulu and Roku—to introduce the show to kids and drive them back to Disney+ to keep watching. This marks one of the only times Disney+ has shared one of its original shows beyond its own platform.

The first episode of the eight x 30-minute series dropped yesterday on the Disney+ YouTube channel (1.32 million subscribers), where it has already racked up more than 40,000 views. That same ep will air on Disney-owned US network ABC on June 24. And the first three episodes are slated to stream for two weeks on Hulu and Roku, starting on June 26 until July 9 and 10.

American Born Chinese is adapted from the same-name graphic novel by Gene Luen Yang. Featuring coming-of-age themes and Kung Fu, it follows a young boy from an immigrant family who befriends the son of a mythological god. Disney greenlit the series in 2021, and 20th Television produces it. 

Putting episodes on multiple platforms is an unusual step for a Disney+ original, which are usually available exclusively on the platform. By opening up distribution on a temporary and limited basis, Disney is hoping to expose the show to more viewers and draw them back to its flagship streamer.  

The company previously tested out this strategy with the Disney+ sci-fi series Andor (two episodes of which were released on ABC, FX, Freeform and Hulu in 2022) and sports dramedy The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers, which aired on Freeform earlier this year. 

This test comes on the heels of Disney+ losing 300,000 subscribers in the US and Canada in Q2 2023. And it’s not the only one playing around with streaming exclusives—Amazon Prime Video experimented with a similar approach this year when it released select original episodes of teen/YA shows such as The Summer I Turned Pretty and Paper Girls on its Freevee platform.