Former Lucasfilm Exec to Launch ‘Potatoverse’ Climate-Focused Kids Content Platform (Exclusive)

Etan Vlessing
·2 min read
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Former Lucasfilm exec Catherine Winder, whose animation credits include Star Wars: Clone Wars, Angry Birds, Ice Age and Invincible, is teaming with veteran kids producer Annabel Slaight to launch a new digital content platform as kids anxiously confront climate change.

Potatoverse will includes short-form animation, Roblox games, podcasts and other output aimed at children and their families to generate positive climate change for a better environment. Winder and Slaight say the initiative aims to build on the imagination and enthusiasm of young audiences.

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“By empowering kids to explore their own ideas while fostering a deep connection with nature, Potatoverse will be a forum for kids to contribute meaningfully as catalysts for positive change. We are filling the hope gap for children when it comes to the future. But as it should be for kids, play and fun is at the heart of everything we are doing,” Winder and Slaight said in a joint statement.

Potatoverse is the latest example of cross-platform content going green by introducing eco-friendly superheroes that entertain and inform young people about what’s next for the Earth. Cartoon Network’s Climate Champions campaign similarly urges young people to be kind to the environment through positive change.

The lead animated character for the new Potatoverse platform is Potato, an “eco-superhero” chicken named for her love of potato peels, who travels back and forth from the year 2050 to reveal how climate change ideas have taken hold in a better future.

Potato surrounds herself with lovable Planet Protectors, including an electric catfish, a joke-cracking egg, a soil connoisseur worm and an eco-detective mushroom with a passion for cyclical regeneration. Aimed at kids between the ages of six and 10, the new digital platform is set to formally launch in September under the Future Chicken global brand.

Winder, while at Lucasfilm, was a producer on Invincible, both Angry Birds movies and Star Wars: The Clone Wars before returning to Canada and eventually setting up her production banner, Wind Sun Sky Entertainment, based in Vancouver. Slaight founded Ontario Water Centre as an educational charity after co-creating the OWL kids’ empire of magazines, books and TV series.

The new platform built around 30- to 60-second videos will kick off with The Future Chicken Today Show, using game-engine animation technology to allow the fun-loving Potato to interview climate experts, celebrities and kids taking positive steps to help the planet.

Potatoverse will include a website hub where kids, parents and teachers can converge.

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