The first teaser for Canadian series Yaga is finally here.
The first look at the series dropped Saturday during the show’s San Diego Comic-Con panel. The half-hour mystery thriller, which hails from Canadian streamer Crave and is set to air on AMC+ in the U.S., stars Carrie-Anne Moss, Noah Reid, Clark Backo and Hudson Williams. Yaga will premiere in October, the team revealed during the panel.
The series marks Heated Rivalry breakout Williams’ first major project since the queer hockey romance drama, another Crave original, exploded late last year. Moss, Reid and Backo were in attendance at the SDCC panel where the teaser first premiered, along with executive producer and showrunner Kat Sandler. Both Moss and Williams were unable to be at the panel but sent in video messages for the gathered crowd.
Crave released first look photos earlier this week, showing Moss and Williams in a near kiss, Backo and Reid seemingly chasing down something or someone and Moss looking equal parts ethereal and spooky alone in the woods. A large poster of the series appeared along a San Diego building in the days leading up to SDCC. AMC+ and Crave have been teasing the show and the SDCC appearance on social media as well.
Yaga is based on the play by Sandler, who serves as the show’s writer and showrunner, and is a contemporary reimagining of the myth of Baba Yaga set in a coastal town. Crave dubbed the series “not your grandmother’s Baba Yaga” in a recent Instagram post.
The show follows a private investigator, Rapp, played by Reid, who heads to a small coastal town to investigate the disappearance of Henry Park, played by Williams, the young heir to a powerful fishery. The show’s synopsis reads, “[Rapp] finds himself at odds with an apprehensive local detective, Carson (Backo), a charismatic university professor with a taste for younger men, Katherine (Moss) and a labyrinth of enigmatic suspects, secret lives and ancient magic.”
Sadler said in an initial release that the series has evolved from “myth to stage” to her first greenlit series, “reclaiming the wicked witch and reshaping her as an incendiary feminist antihero for our time.” She continued, “It reflects the kind of storytelling I love: propulsive, accessible, dark, funny and unapologetically bold.”
Sheila McCarthy, Megan Follows, Ezra Franky, Patrick Gilmore, Katharine Isabelle and Hiro Kanagawa also star in the series, along with Emilija Baranac, Georgia Acken, Anisa Harris and Sam Krochmal.
Yaga is produced by Front Street Pictures and Blink49 Studios. Mackenzie Donaldson, Andrew Miller and Moss serve as executive producers, and Charles Cooper serves as a producer. Sandler is showrunning the series, with David Frazee and Rachel Talalay directing.
Watch the first teaser for Yaga below.
