MIPJunior Hot Pick: Go Jetters

Go Jetters hails from BBC In-house Production and BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of the UK pubcaster. It started out as an online game on the CBeebies website but has been developed into a fully-fledged 52x11mins series.

“The game was developed first, at the front, and that is the first time that has been done in the UK,” says Henrietta Hurford Jones, director of children’s, content at BBCWW.

The look of the series has been refined from that of the game, she adds, with Dublin’s Boulder Media and Giant Animation sharing the service work.

The show follows four ‘Go Jetters’: Xuli, Kyan, Lars and Foz. They are fresh out of training and explore iconic locations around the world. “It’s a fun, animated comedy adventure with some disco funk thrown in,” says Hurford-Jones.

“It introduces preschoolers to accessible geography concepts, and there is a funky disco grooving unicorn, Ubercorn, thrown in,” she adds. “There are ‘funky facts’ in every episode, but it is done with a light touch. It is learning through geography, but done through comedy and adventure, and there are vehicles and gadgets.”

BBC Worldwide is handling international sales and will launch the series at MIPJunior, with a Go Jetters party on the Tuesday of MIPCOM itself.

The show will play on the CBeebies channel where it has rolled out, but as Hurford-Jones says, ”we’re a newbie channel compared to the big, global channel brands”, so there are plenty of territories left where first-window rights are available.
Skewing 4-6, the series launches on CBeebies in October.

The show: Go Jetters
The producers: CBeebies, BBC Worldwide, Boulder Media, Giant Animation
The distributor: BBC Worldwide
The broadcaster: CBeebies (UK, international)
The concept: Online game turned toon, combining disco music with travel and geography concepts in a preschool show