Big Bocca Prods.’ animated action show Huntik: Secrets & Seekers has been picked up by Jetix and CITV in the U.K. The series of 26 half-hour adventures is an original property created by Iginio Straffi, owner of Italian animation studio Rainbow S.p.A. and creator of the animation series Winx Club. Rainbow S.p.A. serves as co-producer on the series, which is developed in partnership with production company m4e AG.
Jetix UK has an exclusive window, launching the show this month and supporting it both on air and online at www.jetix.co.uk/huntik. The network will air the series every day at 8 p.m. and 9:30 p.m., with weekend showings at 1:30 p.m. CITV will then launch the series this Summer.
Targeting boys 6-12, Huntik revolves around a group of seekers traveling around the globe in search of an ancient amulet that can invoke different types of monsters. Lok Lambert, Dante Vale and their crew explore exotic locations from the pyramids of Egypt to the jungles of the Amazon, seeking to unlock the ancient secrets of each locale and find powerful spirit-warriors called Titans to use in battle against the evil Organization. Upperdeck will release a trading carrd game based on the show.
Huntik, which won the 2008 MIPCOM Licensing Challenge, debuted in North America on TheCW4Kids network on Jan. 3, and also premiered on Rai 2 in Italy and MNET in South Africa this month. The series will start in Germany on RTL2 and in Finland on MTV3 in March. Other TV deals have been inked with Jetix in Benelux, Televisa in Latin America, ABS-CBN in the Philippines, Mediacorp in Singapore, NTV7 in Malaysia, KTV in South Africa, Noga in Israel, Antena 3 Neox in Spain, Canal Panda in Spain, MTV3 Finland, Kanal D Turkey, Alter in Greece, Kabar TV in Kazakhstan and TV3 in Baltic States.
In addition to serving as co-creator/producers for Huntik, Big Bocca Prods. manages all marketing, promotional and licensing initiatives for the property in North America, Latin America, Canada, the U.K., Japan, China, Korea, Israel, Africa, the Middle-East and Oceania. Rainbow is managing the property in Europe, South East Asia (excluding South Korea, China, Japan) and India. M4E is in charge of the German Speaking territories.
