Neon’s new series feels like a kids’ adventure show from the 80s – and that’s a very good thing.

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As a child of the 1980s, I grew up feasting on a nutritious diet of local kidult TV dramas: Hotshotz, Strangers, Under the Mountain. Screening on the telly every Sunday, these shows featured smart, independent kids who explored their town on their BMXes, solving crimes and saving lives with cunning and nous far beyond their years. The adults were always the incompetent bad guys, and it was a thrill to watch kids your own age taking charge of their own destiny.

Four decades later, new drama series Secrets of Red Rocks may well herald a new generation of kidult television. Based on the award-winning 2012 novel by Rachael King, the eight-part drama tells the story of Jake (Korban Knock), a young boy who discovers a mysterious sealskin that unlocks a secret spell. It’s a tale of adventure, told through the eyes of a curious, loveable 12-year-old, with a touch of the supernatural thrown in for good measure.

From the opening scenes of the rugged Wellington coastline, Secrets at Red Rocks sets a mystical tone as Jake arrives at Ōwhiro Bay to stay with his father Robert (Dominic Ona-Ariki), a science writer who’s renting a house by the beach. Jake’s mum has a new partner and a new baby, and Jake is feeling lost and ignored. Sadly, like all boring adults, Robert has to stay home and work, and suggests that Jake occupy himself by riding his bike to the unique Red Rocks along the coast. Robert gives his son one piece of important advice: “steer clear of the seals”.

It’s not long before Jake is clambering over the red rocks and into a cave, where he finds the seal skin. He also meets some of the locals, including the light-fingered Jessie (Zeta Sutherland) and her scary grandfather Ted (Jim Moriarty), who lives in a run-down shack and is a self-appointed kaitiaki of the coast. Plus, Jake keeps seeing the same mysterious red-haired woman wherever he goes. These characters are all somehow tangled up in Jake’s secret discovery of the sealskin – but what’s the significance of it, and what will happen now that Jake has it hidden under his bed?

There are stories within stories in Secrets of Red Rocks, as Māori myth and Celtic legends, sprites and silkies are woven through Jake’s coming-of-age adventure. The series mixes the mystical with the modern, as Jake tries to understand where he belongs in a changing world. There’s shades of The Secret of Roan Inish here, but the story is set amid a distinctly New Zealand landscape. Wellington’s wild, unpredictable coastline is the star of the show, providing the series with a rich and evocative background that’s full of both beauty and foreboding.

It’s hard to find a television show that all the family can enjoy together – especially one created in our own backyard – but Secrets at Red Rocks does the trick. It’s a delightful series filled with warmth and energy, one set in a familiar time and place but that also has a bewitching sense of otherworldliness to it. And as for that 80s nostalgia of the original kidult dramas? There’s not a device in sight here – just a whole lot of fresh air and freedom.

Secrets at Red Rocks is available to stream on Neon now, and screens on Sky Open on Sundays at 7.30pm.