Sequel in demand for ‘Faultless’ and producers are listening
“Encore!” is the cry from fans of this summer’s groundbreaking showjumping docuseries ‘Faultless’ originally aired in the US and Canada on Roku and now available on streaming platforms further afield.
“We’ve gotten rave reviews about the quality of the content,” said Kyle Koss, who co-executive produced ‘Faultless’ with his brother Ben Asselin for their company Brighter Frame Productions. “And all of the riders involved have been very, very happy. Everybody’s trying to push us towards a ‘Season Two’.”
The six-part documentary series follows 14 of the biggest names in international show jumping, taking viewers behind the scenes of the 2025 Rolex Grand Slam. With show jumping at the World Championships underway, Faultless gives unprecedented insight into many of the top riders competing in Aachen this week.
“Ultimately, we tried to make something that was not just for the horse expert,” said Kyle. “It was really tailored towards somebody that maybe didn’t have any expertise in the sport or even had never seen the sport before.”
For the creators, one of the most important elements of Faultless was authenticity. Rather than manufacture conflict or encourage riders to create television-friendly drama, the production team deliberately allowed the sport itself to provide the tension.
“One of the main things for us was that we did not want to manufacture any drama,” Kyle said. “We really relied on the sport and the real grit that the riders actually need to have, and the difficulty of the sport to kind of create a drama for us.”
Filmed in eight countries from Europe to North America, ‘Faultless’, by the producers’ admission, was created to emulate the success of behind-the-scenes sports docuseries such as Netflix’ Formula 1: Drive to Survive.
Comparably the riders featured in Faultless were miked throughout the process, allowing conversations and reactions to unfold naturally. Press conference-like Vanilla quotes were replaced by real dialogue. Ireland’s Darragh Kenny does not mince his words when it comes to his frustration on team selection for the Nations’ Cup in Dublin and Germany’s Richie Vogel’s assertion that he has “learned more from horses than from people” is simple but revealing. Overcoming injury is also a harsh reality for most riders. Faultless does not sugar coat the determination of Switzerland’s Steve Guerdat, who has had repeated back surgeries, to compete, while looking more comfortable in the saddle than on foot.
“The human side of those stories, whether it’s the grooms or the athletes or the course designer or the mom of the rider or the dad of the rider, it gives an audience a real inside look into the personalities behind the sport,” Ben said.
Faultless has a subtle way of revealing the way riders view their work. “I ride horses – that’s my job,” one put it simply. “He’s going to Hickstead,” said another, talking as if the horse itself was charting its own career outside of the riders’ ambitions but actually stating that show jumping is all about the horses and their individual trajectories through the sport.
Rewriting the narrative to position show jumping in a true sporting light also means dealing with the stigma that it is financially and socially exclusive. Ben believes the stories in Faultless demonstrate that there are many different routes to the top. “The cast members really come from all different walks of life,” he said. “There is opportunity and there’s chances for people to follow their dreams no matter what their background may be.”
Being a true storyteller of the sport required editing with a balanced eye. The series portrays the physical realities of show jumping. Rails come down, mistakes happen and the risks involved in asking horse and rider to perform at the highest level are not left on the cutting room floor. Ben, himself a successful rider at the top professional level, knew that understanding those realities was fundamental to making the series work. “We were both very blessed in the sense that we have a background in the sport,” he said.
Both he and Kyle grew up as part of the family that owns Spruce Meadows and while Kyle brought a commercial bent to the production of the series, he looked to his brother for his firsthand experience. “Having that knowledge of what it does take and all the tiny margins of error that these athletes evade – we really focused on making sure that we could be true to the sport, true to the difficulty of the sport, the risks associated with it, as well as ultimately honoring the sport as a whole,” Kyle said.
Since its launch, the series, produced by Brighter Frame Productions partnering with Terminal B TV, and narrated unexpectedly but effectively by Walton Goggins – of White Lotus fame – has attracted an increasingly international audience. The first season is now available across Europe on platforms including Amazon Prime, Horse & Country TV and Cheval TV. The distribution expansion marks the next stage of a campaign that its creators say has already enjoyed a “really strong start.”
“For the most part, our engagement has been excellent,” Ben said. “Our general consensus of people tuning in and enjoying the series has been very, very heartwarming and humbling for us.”
And that may ultimately be the biggest achievement of Faultless – not simply bringing more eyes to show jumping, but allowing those viewers to understand why the people at its heart are so passionate about it.
“We are working very, very diligently and do have some plans in process of trying to get season two green-lit,” Ben said. “We would love to continue to highlight the sport in the right way, it is definitely a big wish of ours.”
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