LITTLEFOOT Went Viral This Weekend. I’m Still Processing It.

This weekend, something I’ve dreamed about for years actually happened: LITTLEFOOT, our 15‑minute, completely independent fan film inspired by The Land Before Time, went viral.

I’ve been making indie films and fan projects online for a long time, but this one has always been different for me. LITTLEFOOT wasn’t designed as “content” or a clever way to chase an algorithm. It was a love letter to a film that shaped my childhood, made with a tiny team, a tiny budget, and a frankly ridiculous amount of stubbornness.

Seeing it suddenly everywhere — on timelines, in group chats, in comment sections full of people sharing their own childhood memories — has been overwhelming in the best and strangest way. I keep refreshing pages and thinking, “This is still our little passion project… right?”

Why I Had to Make LITTLEFOOT

If you grew up with The Land Before Time, you know it’s not just a dinosaur movie. It’s a film about grief, found family, and trying to be brave when everything feels too big for you. That emotional honesty is what stuck with me.

I didn’t want to “modernise” it or remake it shot‑for‑shot. I wanted to re‑imagine the feeling of that world in a short, self‑contained story — something that would hit both kids discovering it for the first time and adults who still remember crying over Littlefoot’s mum.

LITTLEFOOT is completely unofficial. There’s no studio behind it, no corporate safety net, no rights to anything. Just a group of artists, voice actors, and friends who care way too much about a 1988 dinosaur film and refused to let that emotional DNA fade away. That’s honestly the whole engine behind this thing.

Wearing All the Hats (And a Few Dinosaur Ones)

On this project, I’m not just “the director.” I’m one of the writers, a producer, I voice Spike, I’m in the edit, I live in the feedback sessions, and I’ve spent a frankly unhealthy amount of time staring at frames of dinosaur eyes trying to decide if they feel alive enough.

I’ve been lucky to surround myself with an absolutely ridiculous team for a 15‑minute indie film. From animation and lighting to sound design and score, everyone has treated LITTLEFOOT like it’s a full‑blown feature, even though it’s being made with the resources of a student short.

Every single person involved could have walked away at any point. No one is here for a big paycheque or a Marvel credit. They’re here because this story matters to them. That’s the only reason this film exists in the form it does.

A Cast I Still Can’t Believe We Landed

One of the things I’m proudest of is the cast we’ve pulled together for LITTLEFOOT. Hearing these characters come to life through such talented voices has been genuinely surreal.

Summer‑Joules Saunders brings Littlefoot to life with a vulnerability and strength that hit me the first time I heard her audition. Larissa Loeffler gives Mama Long Neck exactly the warmth and weight you want from a character like that. Cristina Vee is our Cera, AJ LoCascio is Petrie, and Sarah Natochenny gives Ducky that perfect mix of charm and heart. I jump in as Spike, alongside Sam Retic as our Narrator and Mark Meer as Daddy Topps, plus a handful of other brilliant voices who believed in this as much as we did.

For a small, non‑commercial fan film to have a lineup like that is not normal. It’s a gift, and I don’t take it lightly.

From Teasers… to Everywhere

If you’ve been following me for a while, you’ll know LITTLEFOOT has been a slow burn. Over the past year, I’ve been sharing tiny teasers, animation tests, character reveals, and reaction‑based trailers — basically showing you the film as it found itself.

Those early reactions are what kept us going when the render times were long, the shots weren’t working, or real life stepped in and tried to derail everything. People didn’t just say, “This looks cool.” They said, “This is my childhood.”

Then this weekend happened.

The views spiked. Shares exploded. Messages started flooding in. People who hadn’t thought about The Land Before Time in decades were suddenly telling us where they were when they first watched it, who they watched it with, and how it made them feel. It stopped being “our little fan film” and started feeling like a shared memory that everyone wanted to revisit at once.

What This Moment Means to Me

Going viral doesn’t magically turn LITTLEFOOT into an official project. It’s still a non‑commercial, unofficial tribute made by fans, for fans. That’s important to me and it always will be.

What has changed is the size of the conversation around it. Suddenly, this tiny idea that lived in my head for years is being discussed by people all over the world. That’s terrifying, humbling, and energising all at the same time.

For me personally, it’s a reminder of why I started making films in the first place. Not to chase the biggest IP, or the biggest budget, but to tell stories that make people feel something real. If LITTLEFOOT has done that for you — if it made you tear up, or smile, or remember a moment from your childhood you hadn’t thought about in years — then every sleepless night on this project was worth it.

What’s Next

So, what now?

Now, we keep polishing. We keep listening. We keep treating this 15‑minute film with the care it deserves. I want LITTLEFOOT to be something you want to revisit, share, and maybe even show to someone who’s never seen The Land Before Time before.

Thank you for watching, for sharing, for commenting, for caring. You turned a small, stubborn passion project into something much bigger than I ever expected.

From the bottom of my very tired, very grateful heart: see you in the Great Valley.