The capital region is playing a starring role in a reboot of a popular 1990s animated series, its producers confirmed Tuesday.
Filming has taken place since mid-February under a cloak of secrecy on initial sequences for ReBoot: The Guardian Code, a 20-episode hybrid of computer-generated animation and live action being shot here.
Locations include private homes, the Roundhouse and Oak Bay High School, doubling as Alan Turing High, and a custom-built studio in Central Saanich.
The new series will première in Canada on YTV next year.
There has been lots of online buzz about the franchise’s future since the 2015 Banff World Media Festival. That’s when Canadian media and broadcasting company Corus Entertainment said it had given Vancouver’s Mainframe Studios the green light to produce a re-imagined version of the series that aired on YTV from 1994 to 2001. Forty-eight episodes of the original were sold to 84 countries and the series inspired a line of Irwin Toys and an Electronic Arts video game.
Creator Michael Hefferon’s multiple-platform remake follows four teenagers selected to become the next generation of cyberspace guardians.
“As groundbreaking as the original ReBoot was, being the first-ever CG [computer graphics] animated series, ReBoot: The Guardian Code takes it to a whole new level,” Hefferon said.
The remake stars Ty Wood, Sydney Scotia, Ajay Parikh-Friese and Gabriel Darku as the teenage heroes recruited by V.E.R.A., a “virtual evolutionary recombinant avatar,” to stream into cyberspace and protect it.
Live-action sequences will be intercut with CG animation produced with the Unreal game engine, which Hefferon said will deliver “a truly unique and engaging experience” for a new tech-savvy generation of viewers.
ReBoot: The Guardian Code will be augmented by 360-degree interactive mobile games, a digital trading card game that syncs with the broadcast and a virtual reality experience.
Victoria film commissioner Kathleen Gilbert said she welcomed production of such a series here, especially after losing Chesapeake Shores, the Hallmark series, to the Qualicum area.
Gilbert acknowledged she was disappointed that Gracepoint, the Fox series that filmed here in 2014, wasn’t picked up for a second season. “Series like these tend to keep crews here, and they employ a lot of people in entry-level positions,” she said.
