For the first time in Disney’s 100 year history, The House Of Mouse is collaborating with an outside studio, Pan-African company Kugali, to bring the mini-series, Iwájú, to Disney+. The series is coming to the streaming service on February 28. The title is a Yoruba word that roughly translates to “Future”. The story gives us a glimpse of a futuristic Lagos, Nigeria and deals with issues such as inequality, class, innocence and defying the status quo.

The main characters of the story are Tola (voiced by Simisola Gbadamosi) , a young heiress who lives on one of the islands of Lagos, and her best friend, Kole (Siji Soetan), a poor boy from the mainland, who is a self taught tech genius. Together they will be facing dangerous threats, despite their different social standings. But all is good, Tola has protection from Otin, a cyborg chameleon her father gifted her to protect her from harm.

Though set in the future, Lagos is a real place in Nigeria, and the creators admitted to drawing inspiration from the detachment of the wealthy islanders and the mainlanders, a huge portion of the population that is living in poverty. This story does not use any African myths or legends as the basis for it’s story, but the very real social difference that, not only face Nigeria, but the rest of the world, as well.

Based in Britain, Kugali got it’s start as a media company whose podcasts dealt with comic related stories. When they noticed a lack of African animators in the field, they began building an animation team of African artists with the purpose of creating and telling African stories. Originally, their goal was for Iwájú to be a series of shorts. Disney executive producer Jennifer Lee (The Frozen series) read an article where Kugali was set out to be serious competition for Disney (The words used was “Kick Disney’s arse”), and reached out to the company, and was very impressed with the Iwájú story, and now, here we are.

Iwájú is directed by Olufikayo Ziki Adeola, with a script by Adeola and Halima Hudson. Kugali’s creative director, Hamid Ibrahim, serves as the production designer. The animation style is different than Disney projects in the past, drawing inspiration from African, Eastern and Western styles, but still maintain that Disney quality. The visual effects will be supervised by Disney’s Marlon West. The music for the series was composed by Nigerian composer, Ré Olunuga.

Animation will be done by the company Cinesite, a co-producer of the series, at both their Vancouver and London facilities with Disney animations Vancouver site. Disney Burbank handled the pre-production and storyboards.

For the first time in a long time, Disney and Kugali are bringing us an original series, not based on any past properties. Not only is Disney collaborating with another studio, they are allowing them to bring THEIR voice to Disney+. Perhaps, we’ll be seeing more diverse voices telling their stories in the future.

In addition to the series, a tie-in mobile game, Disney Iwájú: Rising Chef, will be available for iOS and Android devices. Bring your appetite.

All episodes of Iwájú will be available on Disney+ on February 28

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