I hate children. Well, now that we’ve established that my career as a teacher is well and truly over after that Frostpunk review; let’s not hold back. I hate children (ages 0-18 and beyond): they are loud, annoying, and pretend they have the world figured out; to find in ten years’ time, their thoughts on Communism weren’t true. I especially hate teenagers, their lack of attention unless you are either another moody teenager they want to have sex with, or an iPhone makes them horrible to create entertainment for.

That said, one of my more favorite series in the last few years of gaming has been Ubisoft’s Watch_Dogs. A series of twenty-something (aside from that prat Aiden Pearce) being a boardroom executive’s idea of the perennial hipster with their drones and knowledge of technology. It is a perfectly light and happy affair that I’ve spoken about before in my love of Watch_Dogs 2. Now it seems teenagers are going to ruin that with their moody sex nonsense and lack of understanding of what light and happy tones happen to be. It will be like that Horatio mission all over again.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Ubisoft are aiming several of their series to reach the small screen. The first of which is a children’s tv series which has been on since 2013 called Rabbids Invasion: think of the minions from Despicable Me with less personality. Nonetheless, this four-season show is the baseline for what is yet to come. Honestly, this is the least interesting part of the article by The Hollywood Reporter. As well as Rabbids Invasion, there are two more family-friendly shows in the works based on Rayman and Hungry Shark. I have no clue what that last one is, probably a mobile phone pile of trash.

However, it is the quote The Hollywood Reporter has from the managing director at Ubisoft Film & Television Paris, Helene Juguet states to the reporter, “Every show has a different target that it’s aiming at and a different format.” Suggesting that there is going to be something for everyone.

With that, the reporter notes that for older audiences the exuberant, sometimes dark, and violent themes of the Watch_Dogs series is the basis for a “tween” cartoon. The series will be a “cyber mystery” centered around a teenager who solves crimes at her school with her “super hacker” abilities. Yes, expect two things from this; a dull teenage drama that is diluted down to our protagonist loving someone, and some young men on the internet yelling about it having a female person of color as our protagonist (extra points to Ubisoft if she’s LGBT).

Personally, I’m mostly concerned with Ubisoft doing one of two things with this series. They could either camp it up and make it a crappy modern version of the 1995 Angelina Jolie and Jonny Lee Miller movie Hackers. Conversely, they could make another version of the crap (if I used the profanity I wanted here, my editor would hit me) of the Doctor Who spin-off Class. A show so bad that it took the fun adventures of a space wizard and made a show about moody teenagers wanting to have sex with each other. It was dreadful. I’d rather defecate in my hands and clap with my mouth open than watch that parochial drivel.

However, since the announcement Ubisoft has since come out with a statement on the untitled series. Stating, “To clarify, the animated television show involving hacking is inspired by the themes and ideas of the Watch Dogs brand but it is not set in the same universe or tied to it directly.” This is also accompanied by a piece of concept art for the series, as is the case with the Hungry Shark Squad concept art above, and Blood Dragon one below.

The next show announced was young adult series called, “Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Vibe.” As is the case with Blood Dragon and the art above, I have to say: That’s the most 80s thing I’ve seen all day, down to the porn mustache on that man. As you can guess, that reaction suggests I’ve got a little bit more hope for this series not to be panned, until. The series is set to be produced by Adi Shankar, producer of the Netflix series Castlevania which received some mixed reviews at its own beginning. This will be accompanied by an animated sketch comedy show “about video game culture,” which is as fun as it sounds.

To this, Juguet makes a few statements on Adi and the last of their projects being announced. “Adi is such a great fan of video games. We share the same culture and references,” Juguet continues, “It’s been great to give him the freedom to do something very fresh and bold with our characters.”

The final project is a project by Ubisoft themselves, with an in-house animation studio, with a so-called “incubator” team being tasked with bringing games to tv shows and movies. To this Juguet states, “One of the incubator’s key projects is to translate the essence of video games,” going on to say, “Our goal is to translate that into an innovative visual and engaging storytelling in animation.” The usual Ubisoft hype that will die down once we’ve seen it, I’d assume.

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