Netflix has unveiled the first trailer for Ray Gunn, the animated feature from filmmaker Brad Bird. The preview introduces a stylized alternate-future metropolis, a private investigator with an extraterrestrial mystery on his hands, and a distinctly old-school detective atmosphere filtered through ambitious science-fiction animation.
The announcement also confirms that Ray Gunn will receive a limited theatrical release beginning December 4. The movie will then arrive for streaming on Netflix on December 18. That window gives audiences a chance to see Bird's latest large-scale animated project on the big screen before it reaches the streaming service later in the month.
It is a notable return for Bird, whose last directing credit was 2018's Incredibles 2. While he remains one of animation's most celebrated modern filmmakers, the gap between his feature directing efforts makes Ray Gunn an especially anticipated project. The new film is also positioned as a different kind of animated adventure from his better-known family blockbusters, leaning into noir, vintage futurism, aliens, murder, and a sprawling city with an intentionally period-specific visual identity.
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A detective story in an alternate 1939 future
Ray Gunn takes place in Metropia, described as a gigantic city existing in an alternate future envisioned from the perspective of 1939. The setting immediately establishes the film's key contrast: it imagines tomorrow using the aesthetics, cultural assumptions, and design language of an earlier era. That premise leaves room for sleek retro technology, towering urban environments, and the shadowy mood associated with classic crime cinema.
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At the center of the story is private eye Raymond Gunn, voiced by Sam Rockwell. Gunn is drawn into a case that encompasses aliens and murder, as well as a multimedia celebrity named Venus Nova, played by Scarlett Johansson. The initial trailer frames the investigator's case as bigger than an ordinary missing-person inquiry or criminal pursuit, building toward a mystery with consequences beyond the usual detective-office walls.
The character setup evokes the archetypal hard-boiled investigator: a lone professional who follows an uneasy trail through powerful interests, strange witnesses, and an increasingly tangled conspiracy. In this case, though, the familiar noir framework has been expanded with extraterrestrial elements and a science-fiction city. That blend is central to what Bird has wanted the project to be from its earliest conception.
"Ray Gunn has been in my mind for over 30 years," Bird said. "The film is a blend of sci-fi and classic detective movies from the '40s... it's The Maltese Falcon meets Buck Rogers."
Bird's comparison is a concise guide to the movie's creative territory. The Maltese Falcon is one of the defining detective films of the 1940s, associated with cynical investigators, dangerous secrets, and a famously complicated search for a valuable object. Buck Rogers, meanwhile, is deeply tied to pulp science fiction and the optimistic, fantastical image of space-age adventure popular in the first half of the 20th century. Combining those sensibilities could make Ray Gunn both a mystery and a genre experiment.
Brad Bird returns with a long-gestating original feature
The project has apparently lived with Bird for decades, with the director saying the concept has been on his mind for more than 30 years. That long gestation is significant because the premise does not appear to be based on an existing franchise or a previously established character. Instead, it represents an original world built around Bird's affection for two very different storytelling traditions.
Bird has a filmography that spans emotional science-fiction, superhero action, culinary character comedy, and high-energy spy spectacle. He directed The Iron Giant, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, Tomorrowland, and Incredibles 2. His previous animated films have often worked on multiple levels, offering accessible characters and broad entertainment while also using their concepts to explore adult anxieties, personal ambition, family responsibility, artistic identity, or the consequences of technological progress.
Ray Gunn is potentially well suited to that approach. Noir stories routinely depend on moral uncertainty and social tension, while retro-futurist science fiction invites questions about what people of an earlier generation expected the future to become. The Metropia setting may give Bird room to explore those ideas visually as much as narratively, particularly if the city's advanced world is shaped by 1939-era architecture, fashion, media, advertising, and entertainment.
Bird explained that he has long been a fan of both the science-fiction and detective genres. For him, putting them together was an appealing opportunity to use highly cinematic imagery and exaggerated personalities. That intention is visible in the film's basic ingredients: a giant city, a private detective, aliens, a murder investigation, and a celebrity whose involvement suggests the case will move through both the city's underworld and its public-facing culture.
Sam Rockwell and Scarlett Johansson lead the announced cast
Rockwell takes on the title role as Raymond Gunn. The actor has played a wide range of eccentric, volatile, charming, and emotionally guarded characters across dramas, comedies, thrillers, and genre films, making him a natural fit for a detective who must navigate a bizarre and potentially dangerous futuristic case. The trailer's introduction to Gunn presents him as the audience's route into Metropia and its stranger corners.
Johansson voices Venus Nova, the multimedia star tied to Gunn's investigation. The description of Nova as a multimedia figure is especially interesting within the alternate-1939 concept. The phrase suggests a character with enormous cultural visibility, but in a world where mass communication, celebrity, and technology may have developed along a radically different path. Her relationship to the aliens and murder at the heart of the plot has not been detailed, leaving the trailer to tease rather than explain her place in the larger mystery.
With only the first trailer now available, many story specifics remain under wraps. It is not yet clear who the central victim is, what form the alien presence takes, how deep the conspiracy reaches, or whether Venus Nova is a client, a suspect, a target, or something more difficult to categorize. That uncertainty is fitting for a detective film, especially one that appears to be embracing the twists and ambiguity associated with classic noir.
A limited theatrical release before the streaming debut
The December 4 limited theatrical launch gives Ray Gunn a theatrical component ahead of its December 18 Netflix release. Limited engagements can be particularly meaningful for animation with elaborate visual design, allowing viewers to encounter the scale of the city and the movie's lighting, color, and composition in a cinema setting. The format may be an especially strong match for a project built around a "cinematic" merger of old detective movies and vintage science-fiction imagery.
Netflix has not detailed the specific theaters or markets included in the limited run. As a result, audiences interested in a big-screen viewing will need to watch for local booking information closer to December. The confirmed dates do, however, establish a two-week span between the start of the theatrical release and the streaming premiere.
For viewers who wait for the home release, the film will be available through Netflix beginning December 18. The service's release plan means the holiday-season animated lineup will include a new feature from one of the medium's most recognizable directors, but one with a markedly more noir-driven premise than conventional family animation.
Why Ray Gunn stands apart
There is no shortage of stories that mix detectives with science fiction, from cyberpunk investigations to space operas with noir influences. Ray Gunn stands out because its retro-future perspective is not merely a background detail. Metropia is explicitly framed as an alternate future seen through 1939 eyes, tying the entire setting to a time when science fiction, radio drama, movie serials, and hard-boiled crime tales were all major cultural forces.
That could provide the movie with a visual and thematic identity separate from more familiar futuristic animation. Rather than presenting a sleek modern prediction of tomorrow, it can ask what a past era imagined tomorrow would look like. The result may be playful, ominous, glamorous, or all of those at once, depending on where Gunn's investigation leads.
For now, the debut trailer offers the first substantial look at that world and confirms when audiences will be able to see it. Ray Gunn opens in limited theaters December 4 and begins streaming on Netflix December 18. With Brad Bird returning to feature directing, Sam Rockwell and Scarlett Johansson leading the voice cast, and a premise that brings pulp science fiction into contact with classic detective fiction, the movie is shaping up as one of animation's more unusual late-year releases.
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