Dragon Striker is a new soccer-themed animated series that landed on Disney+ just days before the 2026 FIFA World Cup kicks off across the United States, Canada, and Mexico. While the timing might have been unintentional, it could not have worked out better. Created by Sylvain Dos Santos and Charles Lefebvre at Paris-based animation studio La Chouette Compagnie, the animated series follows Key, a 12-year-old farm boy who discovers he may be destined to become the legendary Dragon Striker at Kal Asterock. In this elite academy, magic and a five-a-side combat sport called Gorotama collide.
I had the chance to watch the first few episodes before sitting down with Dos Santos and Lefebvre to talk about Dragon Striker‘s unlikely origins as a rugby show. We also discussed the anime and gaming influences baked into the world of Asteria, and why a bright color palette and heavy storytelling aren’t the contradiction some people think they are.
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The world of Dragon Striker is built around Gorotama, a superpowered sport that looks and feels like soccer cranked up to eleven. But the series almost went in a completely different direction. “Soccer was actually not the first choice,” Dos Santos said. “The first concept was about rugby.” The show started life as Ovalon, an Arthurian world built around rugby, before Disney pushed the team toward a sport with wider reach.
“Soccer is universal.”
“We decided that soccer was the most popular. It’s something everybody in the world plays, so it’s more universal,” Dos Santos explained. “I love soccer, so it was not a sacrifice. I’m from the south of France, so rugby is huge there. But soccer is universal. Everybody loves it, everybody plays it, kids from all sides of the world play soccer.”
Dragon Striker is anime through and through. The action has the timing and energy of a sports shonen, and the character designs look like they belong in a shonen manga. But the show also blends European medieval fantasy with modern streetwear aesthetics. Asteria doesn’t look like anything else on TV right now. When asked about how those influences came together, Lefebvre started with geography.
“The first idea was to blend the big capitals of football,” he said. “That was to bring in places like Rio de Janeiro, islands, those types of countries where soccer is really big. Even the city of Mestraz, which is in the show, the topology of the place is like the Rio de Janeiro Bay.”
The design language evolved from there. “It was really to mix the medieval fantasy style with something a little bit streetwear, the shoes, the hoodies,” Lefebvre continued. “We tried to blend all those different elements into a world that looks cool and, at the same time, gives the vibe of a medieval setting or something out of this world. That was really the main idea behind each design.”
There was never a question of anime influences on Dragon Striker.
For Dos Santos, anime isn’t a style the studio is borrowing; it’s who they are. “It’s not even a choice,” he said. “We are just huge fans of anime. It’s our natural culture. It feels super natural for us to come up with this art direction and these stories because it’s us.” La Chouette Compagnie was founded by people who grew up on Japanese animation and comics, and the studio’s entire output reflects it. Dragon Striker‘s score comes from Kevin Penkin, who scored Made in Abyss and Star Wars: Visions, recording the music with an 80-piece orchestra in Tokyo.
When asked about specific works that influenced Dragon Striker, Lefebvre rattled off a list that makes the show click into place. “Inazuma Eleven for sure,” he said. “Captain Tsubasa was the big thing. For me, I’m a big fan of Monster Hunter and Final Fantasy. All those worlds are really pillars to my imagination.” Lefebvre had been drawing in that style long before this project came along. “The things I’m used to drawing, even before Dragon Striker, were heavily in this type of world. This opportunity was like, ‘Okay, let’s bring a lot of my creation into this.’ So I brought a lot of the things I love into it.”
The Captain Tsubasa and Inazuma Eleven references click the moment you see Gorotama in action, but the Monster Hunter and Final Fantasy influences are what push Dragon Striker beyond a sports show. Kal Asterock could exist in an RPG. The magic system and the creatures surrounding the sport draw on that tradition, giving the series a sense of scale that most sports-focused animation never reaches.
Dragon Striker combines a colorful aesthetic with deeper narratives.
Shows that air on Disney typically get slapped with the “kids show” label, but Dragon Striker proves that animation is so much more than what some audiences see it as. It’s written in a way that should appeal to more than just the marketing base Disney had in mind. Dos Santos pointed to the shonen anime that shaped it.
“Anime in general is not for kids, per se,” he said. “If you look at One Piece or Naruto, they are categorized as shonen, so basically for kids. But if you watch those series, you talk about super heavy stuff like death, politics, sometimes religion, and grief. It’s always about coming-of-age stories.” Dragon Striker, he said, follows that same playbook. “You can have colorful characters and colorful backgrounds, but we talk about real stuff, real stories about legacy. We say all the time that it’s more than just soccer. It’s actually way more than just soccer.”
Lefebvre added that keeping the show’s brightness was actually a fight with Disney. “They wanted the world to look a little more grayish, a little bit darker,” he said. “From our part, we pushed back. ‘No, I think we should stay lighter because the story has heavy moments.'” The counterbalance was the point. “It’s really not a cozy place; the setting is quite harsh,” Lefebvre explained. “To have that counterbalance with a world where we can give wonder and amazement, it’s really good to contrast with the story, which can go into difficult parts about relationships.”
He put it plainly: “Don’t let yourself be tricked by the skin.” And he is right. There is so much more to Dragon Striker than what you see on the surface, and it is worth taking the time to watch and let yourself enjoy what the world of Asteria has to offer.
Dragon Striker is streaming June 10th on Disney+ and Hulu.
