TRAILER: ‘Spirit Riding Free’ Takes The Dreamworks Franchise In A New Direction

Remember the 2002 hand-drawn Dreamworks feature Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron starring the voice of Matt Damon?

Well, it’s no longer a feature. And it’s no longer hand-drawn. And Matt Damon is no longer voicing Spirit.

Dreamworks Animation Television’s new cgi spinoff series Spirit Riding Free could have been presented as an original concept, but it would appear that for branding purposes they retained the name and character from the earlier Oscar-nominated feature film. Six 22-minute episodes will debut exclusively May 5 on Netflix. Here’s the trailer:

The star of Spirit Riding Free is city-turned-country girl Lucky, who is described as “courageous” and “gutsy,” and who befriends the wild mustang Spirit. The girl-power series will follow the adventures she has with her two new best friends, Pru and Abigail, and their respective horses. The trio will also “find genuine friendship and discover what it means to be free.”

Showrunner and executive producer Aury Wallington (Sex and the City, Heroes, Veronica Mars) acknowledges that the series is different from the film. “When DreamWorks said they wanted to do a show based on the movie, I was really excited by the thought of having the film’s tone and sense of freedom and adventure,” Wallington told Kidscreen recently. “But none of the characters are the same. It’s the next generation from the movie told to the next generation of audiences.”

Jim Schumann (Robot & Monster, Monsters vs. Aliens) is co-executive producer.