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This adaptation of Carole Wilkinson’s children’s fantasy novel is let down by fairly average animation, oddly bland characters and some ill-fitting Bill Nighy-ness

Bill Nighy’s distinctive, rather wonderful, Bill Nighy-ness is perfect in so many roles, especially those requiring an expensive lounge suit and a roguish arch of the eyebrow. But he’s a less comfortable fit for the part of a dragon in this animation adapted from a children’s fantasy novel by Carole Wilkinson. It is the tale of a plucky young servant girl in ancient China whose destiny is to save dragonkind from extinction, in an action-packed kids’ movie with plenty of PG-rated bashing and a real spirit of adventure. The letdown is some fairly average animation, and human characters that move like cheap marionettes with jolty limbs.

Ping (voiced by Mayalinee Griffiths) is an orphan who has grown up in a house...

Libertine Pictures and Slim Film + Television’s family action-adventure series Mystic has been recommissioned for two more seasons by Cbbc and Tvnz.

The adaption of New Zealand author Stacy Gregg’s Pony Club Secrets book series will have writers Sam Shore (Filthy Rich), Martha Hardy-Ward (Ellen is Leaving), Hamish Bennett (Bellbird), and Briar Grace-Smith (Grace Beside Me) join creators Amy Shindler and Beth Chalmers (Horrible Histories) for its next phase.

British actor Macey Chipping (Vampire Academy) returns in the lead role of Issie Brown and is joined once again by New Zealanders Antonia Robinson, Max Crean, Jacqueline Joe (Top of the Lake), Josh Tan (Mulan) and Harriet Walton.

In the new seasons, Issie and her gang of horse-mad friends will not only have to tackle all the usual trials and tribulations of being a teenager – romance, identity, friendship, and conflict with parents – but will also have to battle against...

Exclusive: Libertine Pictures (Nz) and Slim Film + Television (UK)’s family action adventure series Mystic, has been recommissioned for two more seasons by Cbbc (UK) and Tvnz (Nz).

British actor Macey Chipping (Holby City) returns in the lead role of Issie Brown and is joined once again by New Zealanders Antonia Robinson, Max Crean, Jacqueline Joe (Top of the Lake), Josh Tan (Mulan) and Harriet Walton.

Production on the two new series, each comprising 8 x 30” episodes, is due to commence on May 31 in New Zealand.

In the new seasons, Issie and her gang of horse-mad friends will not only have to tackle all the usual trials and tribulations of being a teenager but will also have to battle against new and unexpected threats to their beloved stables and local environment. In season two, their lives will be thrown into turmoil by the arrival of a charismatic stranger and an...

Exclusive: British drama producer Slim Film + Television has teamed with Luther creator Neil Cross’ New Zealand-based production company on an adaptation of Stacy Gregg’s Pony Club Secrets books.

Slim Film + Television, run by former Kudos Managing Director Simon Crawford Collins, has partnered with Libertine Pictures, which is behind Rose McIver-fronted feature Daffodils, on 13-part series Mystic for the BBC’s Cbbc, Australia’s Seven and New Zealand’s Tvnz.

The environmental thriller, which will start filming in New Zealand in January 2020, is a character-driven thriller for a family audience. The drama follows a group of horse-mad teenagers who are regulars at their local stables on the fictional peninsula of Kauri Point, New Zealand. New girl, Issie, is struggling to make friends having recently moved out to the quiet, backwater town from London but an unexpected interest in horses, a surprising bond with unbroken pony, Blaze, and an enigmatic stallion,...

"This is your dream! You have to go for it, do you hear me...?" Vue Cinemas has unveiled an official trailer for an indie stop-motion animated film titled Strike, made by a small studio in the UK and being released next month. As pointed out on Twitter, "the title refers to both soccer and mining - you don't get much more British than that." Strike is about a young mole from the town of Diggington who dreams of becoming a soccer player (a "footballer" in the UK) but his big challenge is telling his father. "How can he tell his dad he does not want to work at the mine, it will break his heart... This mole with a goal... should he tell?" Strike stars the voices of Lizzie Waterworth, Ken Stott, Alex Kelly, Naomi McDonald, Tom Turner, Dave Mounfield, and Beth Chalmers. This looks cute, and it's great to...

Chris Swanson is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Okay, so we’re finally onto the concluding set of Dark Eyes, a project that began in 2012. Here’s what this fourth set is all about: 4.1 A Life in the Day by John Dorney The Doctor and Liv return to post-World War One London, where the Doctor meets Kitty Donaldson (Beth Chalmers), and Liv strikes a...

The post Reviewed – Dark Eyes 4 appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

(Warning: Extremely significant spoilers follow! Please Do Not read further if you do not want a major plot element spoiled!)

Well, how’s that for a spoiler warning, eh? Trust me, it’s necessary, and even with that warning, I still won’t get around to discussing the main spoiler until we’re some distance into this, just to keep people from accidentally learning something important.

This boxed set is quite a thing. It features the Seventh Doctor (Sylvester McCoy), Raine Creevey (Beth Chalmers), in her first appearance since the Season 27 Lost Stories arc, a brief cameo by Ace (Sophie Aldred), Elizabeth Klein (Tracey Childs), someone simply known as the Other Doctor (Alexander Macqueen), about whom I shall talk more later, and has all of them working to stop a set of incursions from another dimension, which take the form of things like giant floating baby heads and giant lava-spewing spiders.