An “Animorphs” TV series is in early development at Disney+, Variety has learned in an exclusive interview.
Bayan Walcott will serve as writer and executive producer, with Ryan Coogler, Seb Ohanian and Zinzi Coogler serving as executive producers on behalf of Proximity Media. Iole Lucchese and Caitlin Friedman serve as executive producers through Scholastic, which published the books on which the show is based. TV number 20 is the studio. Proximity Media’s Vice President and Head of TV Simone Harris and Director of TV Development Dezi Gallegos will also oversee the project.
The official logline states that the show “follows a group of teenagers as they navigate relationships, curfews, and the chaos of high school while uncovering the hidden threats that lurk beneath their everyday lives.”
The book series, written by Katherine Applegate and her husband Michael Grant, follows a group of teenagers Jake, Marco, Cassie, Rachel, and Tobias who discover that Earth has been secretly taken over by a parasitic alien race known as the Yeerks.
The group encounters a dying alien race of Andalites who have been fighting the galaxy and its ever-expanding Yeerks. Andalites give them the ability to absorb the DNA of any animal they touch and transform into that animal. They use this power to mount a secret resistance against the Yeerks and save the world. They are then joined by Ax, a young Andalite stranded on Earth.
The “Animorphs” series has 54 main books, starting with “The Invasion” in 1996 and ending with “The Beginning” in 2001. Each book was told from the first-person perspective of one of the main characters. There were also several sister novels such as The Hork-Bajir Chronicles, The Andalite Chronicles, and Visser. It has sold over 35 million copies worldwide.
Walcott most recently worked as a supervising producer on Hulu’s “The Testes” and wrote the screenplay for the FX series “Class of ’09.” He has also worked on shows such as “The Summer I Turned Pretty” and “Inmpeachment: American Crime Story.” He is repped by UTA, Echo Lake Entertainment and Jackoway Austin Tyerman.
bayan walcott
Sera Sironi
Coogler and Proximity Media currently have a general television deal with Disney. Under the deal, Coogler is working on a pilot for an “X-Files” reboot starring Daniel Deadwyler and Himesh Patel. He just won an Oscar for his hit film “Sinners,” which won four awards overall and Coogler won for Best Original Screenplay. Mr. Kugler is repped by WME, M88, The Lede Company, and Cohen & Gardner.
If the broadcast goes ahead, this will be the second “Animorph” TV show to be broadcast. A live-action series that aired on Nickelodeon for two seasons from 1998 to 2000. It starred Sean Ashmore, Brooke Nevin, Boris Cabrera, Nadia Nascimento, Christopher Ralph, Paulo Costanzo, and Eugene Lipinski. There was previously an attempt to develop an “Animorph” movie in 2020, but nothing progressed.
It’s also the latest adaptation of a YA book to series to find a home on Disney+. The streamer is currently airing the “Percy Jackson” series, which is entering its third season, and is currently prepping a live-action “Eragon” series. Previously, Disney+ aired a series based on R.L. Stine’s “Goosebumps” books for two seasons.
