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"Mostly, I’m excited that fans will get to see the show at all," he says. When asked what he's most excited for fans to see, Coleite points to Ann Foley's costumes, Elena Albenese's production design, and the VFX spearheaded by Curt Miller, as well as Slater's performance as Mulgarath, Jack Dylan Grazer’s as the boggart Thimbletack, and those from the Grace family. "Although different from the books, the rich performances from Noah Cotrell (Simon) and Lyon Daniels (Jared) nailed the heart soul of the characters - which never wavered from the original." "We had to change the twins from identical to fraternal," he explains. As he points out, the 2008 Spiderwick Chronicles movie had one actor (Freddie Highmore) playing both characters, which they weren't able to do, and "although we tried our hardest, we weren’t able to cast identical twins either." "They will have our audiences getting their knees dirty as they hunt through grass and bushes to see if they can spot a sprite for themselves."Īnother challenge arose in the casting, particularly with twins Simon and Jared. "The end results are creatures that everyone around the world can recognize instantly, but have never seen quite like this," he says. He notes that Black and DiTerlizzi have always called The Spiderwick Chronicles an "American fairytale," and the production "delved deep into that idea." The idea, he says, is "to imagine how creatures living in America would adapt and hide from humans," both grounding them in the real world while honoring the lore. There, too, are entirely new characters and creatures that Black and DiTerlizzi helped create to give "devoted fans of the books something new to sink their teeth into."Ĭoleite also points to those aforementioned creatures as one of the biggest challenges behind bringing the show to life. "But," he continues, "the fans who grew up reading the books are now adults with children of their own, so we deepened existing stories, added some new elements and crafted new twists to keep the audience on their toes."Ĭoleite says there's more "dark fantasy and "dangerous romances," in addition to creatures they've pulled from Arthur Spiderwick's Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around You, a compendium by Black and DiTerlizzi published in 2005. "The dumbwaiter, Spiderwick’s attic, seeing stones and even Simon’s poor mice - Lemondrop and Jeffrey," Coleite teases. He reveals that, for Season 1, "we blended Book One, The Field Guide, and Book Five, The Wrath of Mulgarath," complete with "all the iconic moments from those books." We also got the chance to speak to creator/showrunner Aron Eli Coleite via email, who teased what fans can expect.
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Image courtesy of Roku Channel.Īfter being scrapped by Disney - and then subsequently saved by Roku - The Spiderwick Chronicles will premiere on Roku Channel on April 19. It beckons fans to "look closer," teasing Mulgarath's more montrous form. Slater is also the focus of the exclusive poster, which you can see below. "The world would be a better place without humans," Slater says in the trailer.