Picture Credit: Netflix
This marked What’s on Netflix’s second time on the ground at a sweltering Annecy Festival! Netflix brought its A-game again in 2026, though its presence felt substantially different from 2025. Between the pre-show mouth pops, the paper airplanes launched in hopes of hitting the screen to thunderous applause, and the obligatory French shouting whenever a rabbit (or croissant) appeared during Aardman’s festival intro—not to mention Netflix’s epic Hans Zimmer fanfare—the energy was undeniable. Here is our full debrief and a roundup of the best things I saw at Annecy 2026.
Before we get into it, as a reminder, you can catch all of our Annecy Festival coverage using our tag page here.
The theme of Netflix’s Annecy in 2026 was focus: what they brought was explored in depth, and we learned a bunch and got to see a lot. That contrasts a little with 2025, though, when we got a much more comprehensive preview of new animated projects, even if it was just a small tease from an executive and a picture. If it didn’t get a big, comprehensive deep dive, there’s not much to talk about.
There were a few other titles featured in Netflix’s sizzle reel before its main presentation, including Motel Transylvania and Magic: The Gathering, but alas, they were very brief clips and were never expanded on. Given they were momentary flashes, I don’t exactly remember the details of each, but they both were instantly recognizable.
So that means we got no big updates for the two titles mentioned above or series like Minecraft, Clash of Clans, nor did we find out the future of a few series still waiting for renewal, most notably Love, Death and Robots (which I got to see on the big screen at Pathé and damn, it was awesome).
On the movie side, that meant no big updates on Leo 2, The Mitchells vs. the Machines, or what The Sea Beast‘s Chris Williams is up to.
A quick note: won’t be featuring much of the anime slate here because the majority of titles featured are out within the next month or two, and we didn’t really learn anything materially new about them, with The One Piece being the exception.
In no particular order, here are the best things I got to see, along with some impressions/thoughts, with the caveat that I’m no critic.
Steps
STEPS – (Pictured) Lilith (Ali Wong). Cr: Netflix Animation © 2026
The Steps‘ work-in-progress panel was the best panel format I experienced all week. It offered a dedicated slot to dive deep into the origin, design philosophy, and the amount of hard graft that’s gone into creating this new take on Cinderella, which is a daunting task given audiences’ reluctance nowadays to touch anything that’s been adapted before.
The nature of this panel meant that anyone in the audience, ranging from students to those in the trade press, could ask questions. It was interesting to see who dove into which areas, and we got some fascinating answers about how they approached different aspects of the story and design. You can find our full write-up of the panel here.
The film is in good shape, in my opinion, with the lighting absolutely superb and the characters’ expressions and personalities being particular highlights.
Then, on another level, this movie represents a big moment for Netflix, which has been reliant on established animation houses for its movies for most of its existence. After years of building its own internal teams across the US, Canada, and Australia, this movie is the first film to be made entirely (end-to-end, as one executive said on stage) under the Netflix umbrella. This is a massive flex, and the fact that it looks so damn good means that, hopefully, the next stage in the studio’s evolution is greater efficiency in getting movies from page to screen at a much faster cadence because, as we’ve said many times before, Netflix needs many more animated features to satiate the clear demand the genre has.
The Thanksgiving release window exudes a lot of confidence that Netflix expects the movie to perform well, with that slot having gone to some big movies over the years, not least Adam Sandler’s Leo.
Living the Dream
Living the Dream. (L to R) Javone Prince as Des, George Gendi as Ray, as in Living the Dream. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2025
The biggest surprise of the week on Netflix’s side is Living the Dream. To be brutally honest, I was not sold on the show upon its initial announcement. Netflix adult animation comedies are a dime a dozen, and most struggle to stand out, but as soon as the creator began explaining the premise, how it came about, and what it’s poking fun at, I got it instantly and am now a big fan. Will this break records? Probably not, but it’s quintessentially British, much like Alley Cats, but with universal themes and gripes that are now universal.
Ghostbusters: Night Shift
Ghostbusters: Night Shift – Visual Development Art. Cr: Sony Pictures Animation ©2026
On the series side, the big title Netflix was pushing this year was Ghostbusters: Night Shift, for which we got a ton of new information and more background on what to expect when it releases sometime in 2027. Publicly, two stills were released: one of which was a concept art still and the other a finished still from the clip shown to audiences.
Let’s start with the good: this series is crafted with a lot of love and care for the Ghostbusters IP, and the monster designs in particular are very fitting for the world. New York looks like one of the best on-screen incarnations I’ve seen in a while, with the goal of authenticity and love for the Big Apple.
My only concern right now for the series is how it’s trying to straddle multiple different audiences. From its main characters and rather corny tone, you’d easily think this is built for the YA crowd, but its ambitions clearly stretch to age ranges of all kinds. It’s just unclear to me if fans who grew up with the original will be on board. Also, browsing Reddit after our post, I do have some concerns that this could fall into the culture war trap, which consumes all, warranted or not. Hopefully, I’m wrong on that.
Either way, this series is definitely one to watch next year, and the visuals we saw in the clip were incredibly large-scale and ambitious. We’ll see if this translates across all the other sequences.
Alley Cats
Picture: Netflix
Winner of the funniest Netflix title of the week is undoubtedly Alley Cats, which hits the spot for me as a massive fan of Ricky Gervais throughout his career. This iteration reminds me of the free-riffing nature that made The Ricky Gervais Podcast so relistenable.
The screening of the first two episodes and a bunch of clips saw a lot of laughs during Gervais’ masterclass, and they were well deserved. The natural banter does feel like listening to a bunch of friends talking shit to each other. Because it was recorded with everyone under the same roof, the overlapping nature, frequent breaks with cast members laughing, and more effing and jeffing than you can throw a stick at mean it won’t be for everyone, but it was super enjoyable.
Blue Eye Samurai (Season 2)
BLUE EYE SAMURAI – Season 2
I won’t go into much here as Blue Eye Samurai very much sells itself at this point, and for most, the multi-year wait has been tantalizing. We finally got a new still, publicly, and some fresh footage was shown to audiences, and it was just as good as we expected. It involves Mizu being a badass in a kinetic, bloody fight set in London.
The only criticism, which we’re in sync with online audiences on, is that we were hoping for more than a few crumbs and maybe a release window of some description. The wait continues, but man, it’s looking like it’s worth it.
Ray Gunn
While we’ve chosen not to rank, Ray Gunn was the undoubted highlight for the week. Getting to see the opening sequence and its living, breathing futuristic city gave me instant flashbacks to being a kid and arriving on Kerwan in Ratchet & Clank 1 as a kid and seeing Metropolis for the first time (sorry, very niche reference, but it hits my point home!). It’s a densely packed world, lovingly created after being vaulted away for many years, perhaps criminally so. Brad Bird’s style and, to an extent, Pixar’s is highly present throughout everything shown, with the visuals being a cross between Monsters, Inc and The Incredibles.
We didn’t get too much more, but if I had it my way, I don’t want to see anything else and will instantly be watching on the day of release or better still on a big screen somewhere, assuming we collectively get the opportunity to.
What did you enjoy from this week at Annecy? What did you hope Netflix would show? Let us know in the comments.
