Back in September, Hollywood Reporter announced that Paramount Animation had acquired the rights for upcoming Image Comics series Stray Dogs, Details about the comic, created by Tony Fleecs and Trish Forstner, described as “Silence of the Lambs meets Lady and the Tramp.”

Having previously worked together on the IDW comic series My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, Fleecs and Forstner are no stranger to comics projects with cute animals, though it probably goes without saying that Stray Dogs isn’t for the young kid readership of MLP.

How about an endorsement from acclaimed comic writer Brian Michael Bendis

“My favorite thing about comics is when someone shows you something you didn’t know you needed. The Secret Life of Pets meets Seven? Yes, please!! Welcome to Stray Dogs. I was blown away!” —Brian Michael Bendis

A trailer for Stray Dogs was released today, which fittingly featured the voices of Nicole Oliver and Ian James Corlett, two veteran voice actors who were previously involved in the successful My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic animated series.

Check out the official trailer and preview pages for Stray Dogs below.

Stray Dogs

Stray Dogs

Image Comics will unleash a five issue, Don Bluth-style thriller called Stray Dogs by My Little Pony artists Tony Fleecs and Trish Forstner this February.

In an exclusive scoop, The Hollywood Reporter revealed that Paramount Animation “has picked up the rights to [Stray Dogs], setting Game Night scribe Mark Perez to write the script. Gary Dauberman, the horror filmmaker who counts the Annabelle and It movies among his writing credits, is set to produce via his banner, Coin Operated.”

As the mystery unfolds over each issue of the comic book series, fans will be treated with special Horror Movie homage variants that feature a canine spin on the iconic imagery. The first, of course, will be a nod to Silence of the Lambs.

The five-issue series is the creation of Tony Fleecs and Trish Forstner, both of whom have some experience in comic books featuring cute animals, with their experience working on IDW Publishing’s My Little Pony titles — although Stray Dogs is anything but a simple cute animal book. Instead, it’s a tense thriller that just so happens to feature some adorable cartoon creatures, as Sophie arrives at an unfamiliar location, surrounded by other dogs, with no idea how it happened… or, for that matter, what happened to her owner.

“When I had the idea for this comic, a suspense/horror story told from the perspective of dogs,  I knew that if I wanted it to REALLY work, I needed it to look exactly like one of those great, 80s-90s era animated movies,” said Fleecs in an exclusive scoop at The Hollywood Reporter on the announcement. “That’s what made me think of Trish.”

Forstner told THR: “I had studied with Don Bluth in his online program and learned some of his theories on storytelling and acting for animation. Drawing this book, I’m taking those ideas and creating believable, lovable characters with emotional acting and expressions. This story is something special.”

Stray Dogs #1 will be available at comic book shops on Wednesday, February 17.

Stray Dogs #1 will also be available for purchase across many digital platforms, including Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, comiXology, and Google Play.

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