Put on your backpack and prep for a journey because Paramount and producer Michael Bay – yes, you read right – are bringing Nickelodeon’s popular children’s show Dora the Explorer to theaters.
Muppets director Nicholas Stoller has been tasked with writing the script, which would focus on a now-teenage Dora moving to the city to live with her cousin, Diego (who had his own spin-off series on Nickelodeon for seven years). The project has been in development since the series went off the air in 2014 and is being fast-tracked for a 2019 release.
Dora the Explorer was an international and merchandising phenomenon for Nickelodeon. The series followed the seven-year-old Dora as she went on adventures with her monkey companion Boots and attempted to stop a villainous fox named Swiper.
The most bizarre element of the entire project is Bay’s involvement. The director of the Transformers series will be putting the film out through his Platinum Dunes producing arm. Suffice it to say many on Twitter made their displeasure known about the project.
https://twitter.com/Ender132_/status/922688075041525761
For many young adults, Dora the Explorer was the first major Latina character they saw on television, teaching children about the Spanish language and various international locations. It’s unclear how transitioning her into a teenager coping with the city will work out, particularly considering the demographic of the original series.