Dakota Blue Richards joins Skins

The 16-year-old Hollywood star, who appeared alongside Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig in The Golden Compass, is among the eight teenagers chosen from 7,000 hopefuls who attended open auditions across the UK earlier this year.

Dakota will be joined by Alexander Arnold, Sean Teale, Sebastian De Souza, Will Merrick, Laya Lewis, Freya Mavor and finally Jessica Sula.

It has not yet been revealed what roles the teens will play in the hit show, which sees each episode of the show focus on a different character.

The actors have posed for pictures as themselves, and fans will have to wait until January, when the show airs, to find out what is in store for them.

The new gang are the third cast for the award-winning Bristol-based show, which begins its fifth series next year.

Previous series of the gritty show have starred a cast of new faces alongside A Single Man's Nicholas Hoult and This Is England's Jack O'Connell and launched the careers of Clash Of The Titans' Kaya Scodelario and Slumdog Millionaire star Dev Patel.