The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers.

The long-in-the-works The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers TV series, following a new group of players competing against the old powerhouse Ducks and featuring actors including Lauren Graham and Emilio Estevez (coach Gordon Bombay from the original movies), has received some pretty strong reviews (89 percent positive on Rotten Tomatoes) since its March release. It’s seemed to attract an audience from kids new to the series, adults with nostalgia for the movies, and more, and the behind-the-scenes combination of original trilogy writer Steve Brill and producer Jordan Kerner with new-to-the-series faces Cathy Yuspa and Josh Goldsmith appears to have paid off. Now, it’s been renewed for a second season, with production expected to resume in early 2022. Here’s more on that from Joe Otterson at Variety:

“The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers” has been renewed for Season 2 at Disney Plus.

Set in present day Minnesota, the series takes place after the events of the original films. The Mighty Ducks have evolved from scrappy underdogs to an ultra-competitive, powerhouse youth hockey team. After 12-year-old Evan Morrow (Brady Noon) is unceremoniously cut from the Ducks, he and his mom, Alex (Lauren Graham), set out to build their own team of misfits to challenge the cutthroat, win-at-all-costs culture of youth sports today. With the help of Gordon Bombay, (Emilio Estevez) they rediscover the joys of playing just for love of the game.

…Steve Brill, Cathy Yuspa and Josh Goldsmith co-created the series. Yuspa and Goldsmith will return as showrunners and executive producers for Season 2, with Brill also executive producing. Brad Petrigala and George Heller of Brillstein Entertainment Partners will also executive produce as will Jordan Kerner. James Griffiths and Michael Spiller executive produce, with the Griffiths also directing. Graham will be co-executive producer. ABC Signature is the studio.

Here’s the trailer from the first season:

The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers is part of a large number of sports-focused and coaching-focused TV series and movies in the past few years, also including Ted Lasso and Big Shot on the TV front and The Way Back on the movie front. And there are several others in the works. It’s certainly interesting that the Ducks’ series has proven worthwhile enough for Disney to make another season, and we’ll see if this trend of sports-focused series and movies continues.

[Variety]

About Andrew Bucholtz

Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.