Most Anticipated Animated Movies of 2025

A new year means a lot of new animated movies on the horizon. I've scoured the internet to bring you this list of the ones I'm most excited to see. 

A few honorable mentions:

-Michel Gondry returns to animation with Maya, Give Me a Title, in which he uses suggestions from his daughter to inspire paper-cut-out and stop-motion animation sequences. The film already played in France, and has its international premiere at next month's Berlin International Film Festival.

Maya, Give Me a Title

-Two sequels that I'm looking forward to: The Bad Guys 2, which looks like a fun follow-up to the supremely entertaining DreamWorks movie from a few years ago. This time, the eponymous gang gets sucked back into the world of crime after "going good." I'm also excited to see Mononoke Second Chapter: Hinezumi (I'm assuming it'll have a different English title once we get there). It hits Japanese theaters in March, and I assume will come to Netflix later in the year on these shores. Even if it's as hard-to-follow as Mononoke the Movie: Phantom in the Rain, I'm sure it'll be a feast for the eyes.

-Netflix and Sony Animation have a movie about a K-Pop group that has a secret life as demon hunters called, appropriately, K-Pop: Demon Hunters. I love the concept, the animation looks great, and I imagine it'll have some great music, so I'm in.

K-Pop: Demon Hunters

-A few movies that I'm hoping will come out this year, but I'm having trouble finding confirmation: Brume, about a young girl who wants to become a witch; Bergeronnette, about the son of a shepherd who befriends a strange, reclusive woman who is surrounded by birds; and Mu Yi and the Handsome General, about a teenage girl who finds a helmet with mysterious powers. These all look great.

Now, onto the countdown:

10. Zootopia 2 (November 26) -- Maybe I'm a fool to have high hopes for this one, considering how bad Moana 2 was, and the losing streak Disney Animation has been on post-Encanto. But I'm choosing to be optimistic about our return to Zootopia. The first one was such a clever and fun movie, one whose central metaphor was enhanced and empowered by the ways it didn't perfectly mirror the real world issues on its mind. All of our favorite characters are back this time around, and the big addition is the world of reptiles, including a major new snake character voiced by Ke Huy Quan. 

9. Elio (June 13) -- I feel a bit safer in my excitement for Elio, because Pixar is always in better form when they're working on an original story rather than delivering a sequel. The fact this was delayed and reworked weirdly makes me more confident it'll deliver -- it's a good sign when a studio takes the time to get things right rather than rushing to hit an arbitrary release date. The basic premise here is that Elio, an 11 year-old Earthling with an alien obsession, gets beamed up to a galactic meeting and gets mistaken for Earth's leader. Where it goes from there, I don't know, but it's a fun set-up that I hope will pay off with an exciting adventure.

8. A New Dawn (TBA) -- Yoshitoshi Shinomiya, an animator on the global mega-hit Your Name, makes his directorial debut with A New Dawn, which is inspired by the shift in Japanese life following the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011. It takes place inside an abandoned fireworks factory that will soon cease to exist. Keitaro has lived in the factory for four years, and as he's about to lose his home, he recruits help from his brother and a friend to help bring some symbolic closure to this part of his life. The images that have been released look absolutely gorgeous. I just hope it makes it to the US this year.

A New Dawn

7. Lost in Starlight (TBA) -- Lost in Starlight is Netflix's first Korean animated movie, which is about the longest long-distance relationship ever, that between astronaut Nan-young and musician Jay. Nan-young is on a mission to Mars, so I expect this will have a lot of yearning, which honestly is all I want from a romance. There's no release date yet, but I have a feeling this will come out sooner rather than later. Or maybe I'm just hoping that's the case.

6. Demon Slayer - Kimetsu No Yaiba - The Movie: Infinity Castle Arc Trilogy (TBA) -- The massively popular anime series is coming to an end. Tanjiro's quest has been a harrowing one, and for this final arc, we're getting a trilogy of movies rather than a season of the anime. The trilogy will start its run later this year, and I imagine will roll into 2026, but hopefully not into 2027. I actually haven't watched the most recent season yet -- I'm waiting until we're closer to the first movie's release, but I love this series so much, and I think it's cool that it's getting this cinematic send-off. (If I was caught up, there's a good chance this would be ranked higher.)

5. Savages (TBA) -- I'm a huge fan of Claude Barras's My Life as a Zucchini, so I have been chomping at the bit waiting for his new movie. Savages follows a young Swiss girl living in Borneo, where her mother was from. It has strong environmental themes, and features the fantastic animation you would expect from Barras. The film has already come out in theaters in a lot of Europe, and I'm not sure what the hold-up is here. I keep hoping GKIDS will announce they're distributing it in the US. Maybe an announcement will come soon, since the film is having its US premiere at Animation First in NYC later this month.

Savages

4. Grand Theft Hamlet (January 17) -- Next up on the list is a documentary about two actors trying to stage a full production of Hamlet within the sprawling world of Grand Theft Auto Online. I love the recent trend toward documentaries being shot within video game worlds, and this premise is so weird and specific that I imagine I'm going to really love this one. My review will be up the week of release.

3. Scarlet (Winter) -- Mamoru Hosoda has become a bigger name in the US with his last couple movies, the gorgeous Mirai and Belle, so there's understandably a lot of excitement for his recently-announced Scarlet, which Sony will bring to the US later this year. All we have to go on so far is a single image, and a basic premise: the film is about a princess who transcends time and space. But that's enough. Just his name is enough to get me incredibly hyped. And the looming release is a great excuse to catch up on his work that I haven't yet seen.

Scarlet

2. The Magnificent Life of Marcel Pagnol (TBA) -- I love when biopics are animated. It doesn't happen very often, maybe because live-action biopics are seen as such prestigious awards-magnets, maybe because animation is still largely seen as a younger-skewing medium. But this year, Sylvain Chomet is finally, finally back with his first animated feature since 2010's The Illusionist. As the title states, this is the story of Marcel Pagnol, a French novelist, playwright, and filmmaker whose career flourished in the 1930s through the 1950s. I don't know anything about him, but I can't wait to see this and learn all about him. It hits French theaters in October, and Sony Pictures Classics will bring it to the US by the end of the year, surely targeting an awards run.

1. Wildwood (TBA) -- This is the easiest call in the world. Stop-motion animation is my favorite kind of animation, and LAIKA have proven themselves time and time again to be masters of the medium. They haven't had a movie since Missing Link in 2019, so anticipation for Wildwood is through the roof. It's helmed by studio head Travis Knight, who also directed my favorite from the studio, Kubo and the Two Strings. Wildwood, adapted from Colin Meloy's novel, follows Prue McKeel and her friend Curtis, who are on a quest to save Prue's baby brother from a mysterious woman named Alexandra and the crows who do her bidding. It sounds like a cool horror-tinged tale, and the voice cast is stacked: Peyton Elizabeth Lee, Jacob Tremblay, Carey Mulligan, Mahershala Ali, Angela Bassett, and on and on. I have a feeling this is about to be one of my favorite movies of the year. 

Wildwood