Brad Bird’s Ray Gunn finally arrives on Netflix with Sam Rockwell and Scarlett Johansson in a retro-futuristic detective noir 30 years in the making.
Ray Gunn finally has a release date, and I need you to sit down for this one. Brad Bird, the two-time Oscar winner who gave us The Incredibles, Ratatouille, and The Iron Giant, has been trying to make this animated detective noir since before some of you were born. Thirty years ago, he wrote the script for a mystery sci-fi film called Ray Gunn. The 1996 Turner-Time Warner merger killed the project, and Bird went off to make The Iron Giant instead. Now, after three decades of false starts and studio shuffles, Netflix is bringing it to screens on December 18, 2026.
The film follows Raymond Gunn, the last human private detective in Metropia—a gigantic city in an alternate future as seen from 1939. Sam Rockwell voices Ray, a small-time PI drawn into a case involving murder, aliens, and Venus Nova, the world’s most famous pop star played by Scarlett Johansson. Tom Waits rounds out the main cast as Eyera, a one-eyed alien who happens to be Ray’s most trusted compatriot. Bird describes the elevator pitch as “The Maltese Falcon meets Buck Rogers,” which is the kind of genre mashup that only he could pull off.
Ray Gunn Release Date Finally Locked
Ray Gunn release date news comes with some genuinely wild production history. The project was officially revived in 2022 when Skydance Animation announced they would produce it, with John Lasseter overseeing. Bird opted not to direct Incredibles 3—which he is writing and producing—personally selecting Elemental director Peter Sohn to helm that sequel instead. He chose Ray Gunn, a film that has haunted his career like a particularly stylish ghost.
The visual approach is deliberately retro-futuristic, drawing from Art Deco aesthetics and pre-World War II optimism about technology. Bird envisioned “what if cities just kept getting taller and taller and more streamlined, and cars could fly, and people had jetpacks as an alternative form of getting about?” The animation was handled by Skydance Animation Madrid and Cinesite Animation, creating a look that Bird promises “looks like nothing else out there.”
Johansson, who has worked with Bird before in Her and Jojo Rabbit adjacent circles, called the collaboration “a career milestone.” Rockwell, fresh off his White Lotus success, brings the same twitchy charisma that makes him perfect for a down-on-his-luck detective. And Tom Waits as a one-eyed alien? That’s just casting poetry.
John Ratzenberger, who has voiced characters in every Bird Pixar film, also joined the cast, continuing a collaboration that spans from The Underminer to Mustafa the waiter. Michael Giacchino, who scored every Bird film beginning with The Incredibles, composed the music. Ray Gunn is essentially a reunion tour disguised as a new project.
Netflix releasing it on December 18 positions Ray Gunn as their big holiday offering, a prestige animated film for adults in a landscape dominated by family fare. After years of Bird telling anyone who would listen that animation is “way too limited in people’s minds,” he’s finally getting to prove it on the biggest streaming stage in the world.
Stream Ray Gunn on Netflix starting December 18 and witness the animated noir that took 30 years to become real.
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