Introducing “Drawn In” A New Animated Initiative From PBS
“Whatever you do, don’t scream,” Nevaeh encourages her ghost-busting friends in episode 12 of “Drawn In” from Nine PBS—and the four animated problem-solvers calmly proceed with a clever scheme to restore a trio of ghouls to the comic book from which they escaped.
There’s a whole lot to unpack around that simple scene from the animated video short “Squad Ghouls.” It’s part of a multimedia initiative designed to positively represent kids of color and help close the literacy gap by addressing educational objectives for English and language arts among kids ages 6 to 8.
And from its premise to its ideators to its voice actors, “Drawn In” illustrates the incredible work of Black creators and artists dedicated to elevating and educating within the St. Louis community and beyond.
The animated characters
Nevaeh Campbell is an 11-year-old longboard-riding, manga-loving girl who thinks fast and moves fast.
Yeong-Ja “Grace” Park is the life of the party. She has big ideas—and, importantly, she has the ability to sketch them out for the crew usually adding in a few funny details.
Tyler Agbani is an expressive, emotional 10-year-old who sees the world through his own unique prism and loves a good action/adventure comic, ideally one with lots of humor.
Jadyn Harris, Tyler’s younger cousin, is a quiet sci-fi reader armed with a trusty backpack, a fanny pack and a huge arsenal of words and phrases.
Lady Magnitude is the 60-year-old owner of the Imaginarium, the comix club where each episode’s adventures are unleashed and resolved.
St. Louis voice actors Riley Carter Adams, Ricco Martin Jr. and Leia Yogi.
The actors
Riley Carter Adams, the young St. Louisan who voices Nevaeh, has a long history of stage and screen work already, starting when she was just 3 years old. The current seventh-grader has performed everywhere from COCA to The Black Rep to The Muny, where she’s a member of The Muny Kids Touring Troupe. She made her national television debut in 2019 in a Showtime Original series produced by George Clooney and starring Kirsten Dunst. She’ll appear on stage in St. Louis this spring in Max and Louie Productions’ staging of “What the Constitution Means to Me.”
Leia Yogi’s real-life sparkling smile comes through in the voice of Grace—and the young St. Louisan says she loves helping build the character on screen. Like Adams, she is a member of the singing and dancing Muny Kids. It’s her first time doing a voice-over.
This is the first screen credit—and the first time doing a voice-over—for eighth-grader Ricco Martin Jr., who voices Tyler. The young St. Louisan, who has also appeared in local stage productions, says his favorite episode is “Robot Revolution.” To him, the fun and adventurous aspects of the show are what will draw in young kids—just as the fun parts of recording the voices drew him in.
Daizha Moton, who voices Jadyn, is the only non-St. Louisan among the main characters. “[Drawn In]” is really, really special,” she said in a behind-the-scenes video interview. “It’s going to touch kids around the world as well as people of color and children of color.”
St. Louis actor and playwright Mariah Richardson voices Lady M, who introduces each of the “magnificent words” like Access or Infer or Evidence that help the characters track down the comic book escapees. Richardson is no stranger to educational entertainment for children; she has written an ongoing series of plays in collaboration with Metro Theater Company around a thoughtful and precocious girl named Madeline Delilah.
The creators
Nine PBS partnered with Lion Forge Animation, a St. Louis-based, Black-owned, full-service animation studio that sources, acquires, develops and produces authentic, diverse content for global distribution. LFA is a recognized leader in bringing authentic content focusing on underrepresented voices and experiences to worldwide audiences. For example, LFA was behind the Academy Award®–winning short “Hair Love” about a father learning to do his daughter’s hair for the first time.
LFA is one of the few Black-owned animation studios in the world—and the only one to win an Oscar®. Its portfolio continues to expand, with the development and production of TV series and feature films about everything from the life of Wendell Scott, NASCAR’s first Black racer and team owner, to the Nigerian-influenced superhero project Iyanu: Child of Wonder with HBO Max and Cartoon Network, to a new series based on the award-winning Folktellers book series “Excerpts from an Unknown Guidebook.”
What to expect
The kid-facing comic books and videos are accompanied by adult-facing curriculum and early learning resources with age-specific prompts for writing and social-emotional awareness as well as other activities like coloring sheets and do-it-yourself comic book templates.
The companion website is one of the latest additions to a long line of interactive educational online games and apps created for a PBS audience. There are currently two “Drawn In” games, both designed for kids who have basic reading skills (or are playing with an adult who can read the prompts to them). One involves a pick-a-path hunt for a missing dragon egg; the other is a clickable, riddle-filled quest for foods and drinks.
The Community
To make sure they were developing stories, settings and characters that resonated with and reflected the young people it was designed to serve, the creative team received input from the “Drawn In” Community Advisory Board before any content was written, drawn or produced.
Two clear messages emerged:
When kids enjoy learning, they become more confident readers.
Examples abound of using comics to create a bridge between learning to read and reading to learn. This initiative takes that a step further with both short (5-minute) and full-length (30-minute) episodes where vocabulary is incorporated and repeated in the dialogue of each adventure. Children hear the words used effectively as tools to explain the plot and ultimately to set the world right again.
Representation matters in our community.
Stories about smart, fun, multidimensional kids who aren’t stereotyped characters are beneficial to all children. But the creators felt it was especially important to positively represent and celebrate Black and Brown kids who use problem-solving and literacy skills to set their world right again after villains escape from comic book pages.
For those who prefer the hand-held comic book experience, hard copies are available for free at:
EyeSeeMe African American Children’s Bookstore
Apotheosis Comics and Game Lounge on Cherokee
Apotheosis Comic and Lounge on South Grand
The future
To get the initiative off the ground locally, Nine PBS distributed print editions of “Drawn In” comic books on newsstands around the metro area and in the St. Louis American newspaper last fall. Episodes are airing on channel 9 and on the @DrawnInOfficial YouTube channel, which already has more than 40,000 views. There are also collaborations across the region, from public school classroom programs to activities at MADE for Kids, a Magic House studio on Delmar Boulevard.
Eventually, the initiative has aspirations to expand to the national level. It has robust financial backing thanks to major funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis, as well as major support for community engagement work from the Steward Family Foundation and additional support from Joseph and Sandra Lehrer in memory of Ted Koplar.
Steward has national connects thanks to his position as the lay vice chair of America’s Public Television Stations; he also received the organization’s APTS Advocacy Award in 2021. “’Drawn In’ is among the first animated kids’ initiatives with African Americans as lead characters in public media. We’re motivated to ensure it will be a catalyst for many more,” he said in a press release when the initiative launched in the fall of 2022. “While advancing diversity and inclusion initiatives, we need to start seeing heightened diversity in programming that is reflective of a diverse society. ‘Drawn In’ does just that.”
In honor of Black History Month, on our website we’ve compiled more stories about the creative, diverse Black St. Louisans who have shaped and are shaping our community today.
Featured photo by Annie Spratt.
Image courtesy of Nine PBS and Lion Forge Animation.