The highly anticipated Mighty Ducks series will soon find its way to the Disney+ streaming service, and it’s safe to say that all of us who grew up with the original trilogy are more than a little excited to tie up those skates, grab a stick, and jump back into the action.
Not much is known about the series besides the casting of Gilmore Girls alum Lauren Graham as Alex, the mother of a 12-year-old boy, Evan, who is cut from the “Mighty Ducks” youth hockey team. When her son is cut from the team, Alex starts one of her own. And even though it looks like the “Ducks” may, play the villains of the series this time, we’re all pumped to see the show for ourselves and find out what happened to the beloved group of miscasts who perfected the “Flying V.”
Here are just a few things we hope to see when the Mighty Ducks series kicks off on Disney+.
The “Flying V”
We couldn’t have a Mighty Ducks series without the beloved “Flying V” formation the team used in the movies. The beautifully crafted, yet highly illegal formation, gave us one of the most iconic scenes in early 1990s kids sports movies, and it should be no surprise that we’re still talking about it today.
It is pretty much a given we’ll see the “Flying V” in action at some point in the series, but it’s not known if the Ducks will utilize it or if Alex’s team busts it out to get back at the team for cutting her son. Maybe the Ducks have moved on from their fun-loving and goofy nature and instead focus on more serious and dominating hockey plays.
Perhaps this is where a certain lawyer turned youth hockey coach comes into the picture.
How Does Gordon Bombay Play Into All Of This?
As we recently learned, Emilio Estevez will return to portray Coach Gordon Bombay, but unlike in the films, this time Bombay won't be coaching the Mighty Ducks as when they take the ice. Instead, it looks like Bombay is going back to his roots to teach Alex and Evan that there's more to hockey than winning games and championships. Bombay will be helping them discover the joys of playing hockey just for the fun of it.
We don't know what led to Bombay to leave the Ducks before the events of the 10-episode series, but maybe the new attitude of the team has something to do with it. Maybe the team became the alpha of the league once Bombay took a step back. Let’s hope so.
Will Any Of The Original Ducks Come Off The Bench?
Emilio Estevez isn’t the only former cast member we want to see lacing up his skates when The Mighty Ducks series debuts on Disney+, in fact, we hope we see just about all of the former “Ducks” show up at some point or another throughout the series.
Obviously we won’t be seeing Charlie Conway (Joshua Jackson), Fulton Reed (Elden Henson), or Russ Tyler (Kenan Thompson) get out on the ice with the new Ducks because, well, how can we put this, they’re all a little too old to be playing peewee hockey. But maybe they could return in some other capacity?
With Charlie having such a large role in the original film series, it would be amazing to see him return as a coach or parent in the new show. It would be even better for him to have a starring role in the series. I mean, he was a large part of the first film with his mom and Coach Bombay having a thing for one another.
Besides those three iconic Ducks, it would be a fun little nostalgia pop if anyone else showed up for a brief cameo at one or another.
How The Ducks Turn Into The Hotshot Team
One of the biggest questions going into the series is how did the Ducks become the “powerhouse” team of the youth hockey league in the first place. Sure, they had some success in the local, national, and international youth leagues featured in the original trilogy, but judging by the series description, this new team sounds more like the Hawks than the Ducks we grew up watching.
Hopefully, this is explained in the form of those iconic flashbacks that provided a great deal of the exposition in the first Mighty Ducks movie nearly 30 years ago.
If The Ducks Are The Top Team, Where Do The Hawks Fit In?
The story of the contention between the Ducks and the Hawks goes all the way back prior to the events of the first film, when Bombay, a star player on the team as a youth, missed a shot in overtime to give the Hawks one of their only championship game losses. When we cut back to the present day in the first film, the Hawks remain the top team in the league and don’t let Bombay, or his Ducks, forget it.
But now with the Ducks being the top team in the youth league, where do the Hawks fit in? Maybe Alex and her son Evan pick up the Hawks moniker and give the team a nice reboot. That is, assuming the Hawks aren't still out there trying to take down the Ducks.
Will There Be Another Outsider Like Adam Banks On The Team?
One of the most memorable scenes in the first film is when Bombay informs Hawks coach Jack Reilly (Lane Smith) that his star player, Adam Banks (Vincent Larusso) was no longer eligible for his team and would have to play for the Ducks due to redistricting. Initially dogged on by his teammates from being from an affluent suburb of Minneapolis and calling him derivative names like “Cake Eater,” Banks quickly becomes a major component of the Ducks and even helps them in the championship game before the Hawks take him out with an injury.
This whole setup could work well in the new Disney+ series, as you could have a member of the new Ducks team. It would be both a nice throwback to the original movie and offer a fun plot device to add some tension and humor to the series.
Will There Be Another Love Story?
We learned Lauren Graham’s time on Gilmore Girls that she has a way of balancing being a single mother with having a fully-developed romantic relationship. Perhaps she could bring those chops to a possible love story in the new series because, if they’re planning on bringing back the whole b-plot of Coach Bombay and Ms. Conway (Heidi Kling), maybe they can do it some justice this time around.
It wasn’t the worst romance angle we’ve seen in a children’s sports movie from the early 1990s (Hello, Rookie Of The Year and Little Big League), but none of us were excited as kids to watch the dating scene way back when.
Who knows what we’ll actually see when The Mighty Ducks premieres on Disney+, all we know is that we’re excited to see it.
