Netflix's first trailer for Ray Gunn has offered the clearest look yet at Brad Bird's long-promised animated sci-fi noir, a project that blends the shadowy mechanics of classic detective fiction with the gleaming menace of pulp futurism. The film, led by Sam Rockwell, Scarlett Johansson and Tom Waits, is set in Metropia, an alternate future rendered through the visual language of 1939, where Art Deco towers, flying cars and alien intrigue coexist with corruption, celebrity worship and old-fashioned private investigation.
At the center of the story is Raymond Gunn, voiced by Rockwell, a detective whose line of work has been largely displaced by technology. In Bird's world, tiny "pry bots" now handle much of the investigative labor, leaving Ray and his one-eyed alien partner Eyera, voiced by Waits, among the dwindling number of gumshoes still operating by instinct, persistence and human error. That setup gives the film its noir spine: a man out of time, trying to stay relevant in a city that has automated nearly everything except vice.
Johansson voices Venus Nova, a hugely famous multimedia star whose public scandals set the plot in motion and place her life in danger. Ray's investigation draws him into her inner circle, record-company executives and the criminal underworld of Metropia, suggesting a story that moves between glamour and rot, fame and exploitation, spectacle and violence. The trailer points to a world in which celebrity is not merely a backdrop but a dangerous force with its own ecosystem of handlers, opportunists and predators.
Bird has described the film as "The Maltese Falcon meets Buck Rogers," a concise framing that captures both its narrative DNA and its aesthetic ambition. The trailer appears to honor that promise with a city of polished surfaces and hidden decay, where the hard shadows of noir collide with the optimism and absurdity of early science fiction. The result is less a parody of either genre than a deliberate collision of them, using the familiar language of detective stories to explore a future that feels both nostalgic and unstable.
The project also carries the weight of Bird's own history. He has said the film was conceived more than 30 years ago, before he made The Iron Giant, and has remained a story he wanted to bring to the screen throughout his career. That long gestation gives Ray Gunn a particular significance within Bird's filmography: it is not simply another animated feature, but the realization of an idea that has followed him across decades of changing technology, studio systems and audience expectations.
The voice cast extends well beyond its marquee names. Alan Tudyk, Matt Berry, Bobby Cannavale, Michael Chernus, Kether Donohue, Michelle Rodriguez, Aasif Mandvi, Matt Jones, Kathryn Hunter, John Ratzenberger, Justin Peck and Patton Oswalt are also part of the ensemble, underscoring the scale of the production and the breadth of its character world. Bird directs from a screenplay he co-wrote with Matthew Robbins, based on his original story, with Michael Giacchino composing the score, a reunion that suggests the film will lean heavily on atmosphere and musical texture as much as plot.
The release strategy reflects Netflix's confidence in the project's event status. Ray Gunn will first premiere at the BFI London Film Festival, then open in select U.S. theaters on December 4, including limited 70mm engagements, before beginning its global streaming rollout on Netflix on December 18. The theatrical component, especially the 70mm bookings, signals an effort to position the film as a cinematic event rather than a routine streaming title.
For Bird, whose work has often combined technical precision with emotional clarity, Ray Gunn appears to be a culmination of long-held ideas about genre, design and storytelling. The trailer suggests a film that is at once playful and ominous, nostalgic and futuristic, grounded in the moral weariness of noir while reaching for the visual exuberance of classic science fiction. If the finished film delivers on that promise, it could stand as one of Bird's most personal and stylistically audacious works yet.