Yaga Puts a Folk Legend at the Centre of a Coastal Disappearance

A student is missing. Three adults circle the people who knew him.

That is the setup for Yaga, an eight-episode mystery thriller that moves the Slavic folk figure Baba Yaga into a present-day coastal town, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The series had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in mid-September.

Carrie-Anne Moss leads the cast as Katherine, a professor with a taste for younger men. Noah Reid plays Rapp, a private investigator hired to look for answers. Clark Backo plays Carson, a local detective working the same case from inside the police. Hudson Williams plays Henry Park, the young man whose disappearance starts the inquiry.

The show comes from creator Kat Sandler, who wrote the original theatre play and serves as writer and showrunner, meaning the lead writer in charge of creative decisions day to day. It is made as a half-hour drama, meaning scripted drama episodes cut to about 30 minutes rather than the usual hour. It is the first series in that form ordered by Crave, the Canadian streaming service, where it will go out as a Crave Original.

Viewers in Canada will see it on Crave in October. Viewers in the United States will see it on AMC+, the subscription streaming service from AMC Networks. The series was acquired for the U.S. market by AMC Global Media, Bell Media announced in April, and for the United Kingdom and Ireland by Sky, announced in March Bell Media.

Filming took place in Victoria, British Columbia. The series is produced by Front Street Pictures and Blink49 Studios, with Charles Cooper as producer. Mackenzie Donaldson, Andrew Miller and Moss are executive producers, the senior credits who oversee creative and business decisions.

Promotion has run through the fan convention circuit. The global first look was revealed at San Diego Comic-Con in July, after an initial teaser debut at Comic-Con. Two further clips were then unveiled at New York Comic Con on 10 October, according to Bell Media. The trailer ends on a blunt line. “Women — we’re angry about everything.”

For viewers, this means a short, tight mystery. Eight half-hours. One disappearance. A very old folk story retold in a new town, with a crew behind it that now gets to see the work reach three markets at once.