Trollhunters will feature one of Anton Yelchin’s final performances before his tragic death earlier this year; the creative team behind the Netflix series, helmed by Guillermo del Toro, chose to keep Yelchin in the lead role rather than replace him. The very first trailer gives you a glimpse at the warmth and joy that Yelchin brought to the lead character Jim, who gets thrust into an unexpected underground magical world of trolls.

Ron Perlman and Kelsey Grammar voice two of the trolls, and you’ll definitely recognize their characteristic timbres right away. Charlie Sexton is the voice of Jim’s best friend Toby, who gets most of the laugh lines in this trailer. There’s also at least one female character here; I believe that’s Lexi Medrano voicing her, since she’s on the cast list, but her character name and details about her haven’t been revealed anywhere yet.

The story looks like a classic kid-friendly coming-of-age journey. Jim discovers a secret magical world, gets a magic pendant and armor and a sword and a bunch of new world-saving responsibilities, etc. The unexpected element here is, how will the show approach Yelchin’s passing?

I had assumed the show would end with some sort of tragedy that removed Jim from the narrative, and that another character would end up having to take on his super-heroic mantle–either Jim’s best friend Toby, or possibly the female character, or someone else entirely. That seems like an obvious way to go to me, but since this trailer is so light-hearted, I’m not sure if they’ll want to go in that dark of a direction.

Trollhunters comes out on Netflix this December 23rd, so we’ll find out then!

(via /Film, image via YouTube screencap)

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