Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken Trailer Splashes Down

There was a time that DreamWorks Animation seemed to be beating Disney at their own game. After going through something of a rough patch, the studio seems to be going through something of a creative renaissance with their last releases The Bad Guys and Puss In Boots: The Last Wish. Will that carry on with their next release?

Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken sees DreamWorks head back to the Ocean for the first time since Shark Tale. And for the first time, it heads somewhere much scarier... High School. The film is described as a "hilarious heartfelt action comedy" that features an awkward teenager who discovers that she is part of a royal lineage of mythical sea krakens and that her destiny is bigger than she could have ever have dreamed of.

The film centres on shy 16-year-old Ruby- voiced by Lana Condor. She wants nothing more than to fit in at Oceanside High, but ends up feeling invisible.

She's tutoring her skater-boy crush (Jaboukie Young-White) at maths, but he seems to only admire her for her fractals. Worse still she's prevented from hanging out with the cool kids because her overprotective mum (Toni Collette) has forbidden her from going into the Ocean.

It's only when she breaks her mother's number one rule that she discovers that she is descended from the lineage of warrior queen Krakens and is destined to inherit the throne from her formidable grandmother (Jane Fonda) The Warrior Queen Of The Seven Seas.

The Kraken are sworn to protect the oceans from their ancient enemy, the vain and power hungry Mermaids. The problem is the popular new girl in school just happens to be a mermaid. Ruby has to embrace who she is to face her destiny and protect those she holds dear.

The first trailer has arrived and shows off the film's charmingly chunky character designs and some beautiful underwater imagery. The film is also fairly atypical for mainstream western animation is having a high-school-aged protagonist. Plus there's Kaiju-style smackdown between Krakens and mermaids.

The film features the voices of Colman Domingo as Ruby's Dad, Sam Richardson as her Uncle and Blue Chapman as her cool little brother. The cast also includes Will Forte, Nicole Byer, Liza Koshy, Ramona Young, Eduardo Franco and Echo Kellum.

The film is directed by Kirk DeMicco (The Kroods, Vivo), co-directed by Faryn Pearl and produced by Kelly Cooney Cilella. 

Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken will arrive in cinemas in North America on June 30.