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15 Most Anticipated Movies Everyone Will Be Talking About in the Second Half of 2026

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Ignacio Weil

Entertainment - September 3rd 2026, 21:45 GMT+2

1. The Dog Stars (August 28, 2026)

Ridley Scott returns to science fiction without aliens, androids or anyone making the fatal mistake of touching a mysterious egg. Adapted from Peter Heller’s novel, *The Dog Stars* stars Jacob Elordi as a pilot living at an abandoned Colorado airport after a pandemic devastates humanity. Josh Brolin plays his heavily armed companion, while a distant radio transmission offers the possibility of other survivors. Scott directing aircraft, desolate landscapes and desperate people is already compelling; the story’s stubborn optimism makes it even more intriguing. | © 20th Century Studios

Coyote vs acme cropped processed by imagy — 2. Coyote vs. Acme (August 28, 2026)

*Coyote vs. Acme* already has the kind of behind-the-scenes saga most movies would kill for: shelved, nearly written off, rescued, and turned into a symbol of fan frustration with studio decision-making. The actual premise is even better than the drama, with Wile E. Coyote taking Acme to court after years of defective cartoon violence. If the movie lands, it could become both a Looney Tunes comeback and the rare industry rescue story with an actual punchline. | © Ketchup Entertainment

3. Practical Magic 2 (September 11, 2026)

The original *Practical Magic* became the kind of movie people keep close, not because it was perfect, but because its mix of sisterhood, grief, romance, witchcraft, and midnight margaritas had its own spell. *Practical Magic 2* brings Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman back to the Owens family, with a new generation now caught in the same magical mess. Nostalgia will get people through the door, but the sequel has to prove the curse still has bite. | © Warner Bros. Pictures

Resident Evil 2026 — 4. Resident Evil (September 18, 2026)

Another *Resident Evil* reboot would normally inspire the enthusiasm of finding an empty typewriter ribbon. This one has Zach Cregger behind the camera, however, and the director of *Barbarian* and *Weapons* is building an original horror story within the game universe instead of forcing familiar characters through another loose reenactment. Austin Abrams leads the cast, joined by Paul Walter Hauser and Kali Reis. After several adaptations treated the series as generic action material, Cregger’s apparent interest in fear, escalation and rotten architecture feels overdue. | © Sony Pictures

Digger 2026 — 5. Digger (October 2, 2026)

Tom Cruise stepping away from franchises is unusual enough; doing it for an Alejandro G. Iñárritu black comedy makes *Digger* one of the year’s most unpredictable releases. Cruise plays Digger Rockwell, an immensely powerful businessman scrambling to prove he can save humanity from a catastrophe he caused himself. Sandra Hüller, Jesse Plemons, Riz Ahmed, John Goodman and Emma D’Arcy surround him in what has been described as a comedy of catastrophic proportions. Expect fewer motorcycles and considerably more ego-driven existential collapse. | © Warner Bros. Pictures

6. The Social Reckoning (October 9, 2026)

Aaron Sorkin going back to the world of *The Social Network* sounds almost unfairly timed, because the internet has only become messier, angrier, and more politically explosive since that first film. *The Social Reckoning* shifts toward Facebook, whistleblowing, and the consequences of platforms that stopped feeling like harmless dorm-room inventions a long time ago. With Jeremy Strong as Mark Zuckerberg and Mikey Madison as Frances Haugen, this has awards-season polish and argument-starting energy built into the same machine. | © Columbia Pictures

Street Fighter 2026 — 7. Street Fighter (October 16, 2026)

Video game adaptations have improved enough that another live-action *Street Fighter* no longer sounds like a threat. Set during the 1990s, the film reunites estranged fighters Ryu and Ken, played by Andrew Koji and Noah Centineo, after Chun-Li recruits them for the World Warrior Tournament. Director Kitao Sakurai has a bizarrely eclectic ensemble and an entire arcade’s worth of recognizable combatants at his disposal. If it embraces the games’ theatrical absurdity instead of apologizing for it, this could finally land the cinematic Hadouken fans have waited decades to see. | © Legendary Pictures

Cropped Clayface 2026 — 8. Clayface (October 23, 2026)

A standalone *Clayface* movie is such an odd DC move that it instantly becomes more interesting than another polished superhero origin story. The character’s body-horror roots give the film a chance to feel tragic, grotesque, and genuinely uncomfortable, especially with a disfigured actor becoming a monster made of clay. If DC Studios lets this lean into the ugly psychology of fame, identity, and physical transformation, Gotham might finally produce something closer to *The Fly* than a cape commercial. | © DC Studios

Wildwood 2026 — 9. Wildwood (October 23, 2026)

Stop-motion animation on this scale is practically an act of defiance. Adapted from Colin Meloy and Carson Ellis’s novel, *Wildwood* follows Prue and Curtis into a magical forest near Portland after a murder of crows kidnaps Prue’s infant brother. Travis Knight directs LAIKA’s first feature since *Missing Link*, using 136 sets and more than 230 puppets to stage enormous battles and aerial sequences. With Carey Mulligan, Mahershala Ali, Angela Bassett and Tom Waits in the voice cast, it looks handmade in the most spectacular sense. | © LAIKA

The Cat in the Hat 2026 — 10. The Cat in the Hat (November 6, 2026)

The previous big-screen Cat left a generation with questions that Dr. Seuss never intended children to ask. Fortunately, this fully animated *The Cat in the Hat* starts fresh, casting Bill Hader as the chaos merchant employed by an organization devoted to imagination and inspiration. Quinta Brunson, Matt Berry, Xochitl Gomez and Giancarlo Esposito round out an unusually strong voice cast. The expanded Seussian world could become delightful or exhausting within minutes, but Hader is exactly the performer capable of making carefully controlled nonsense sound spontaneous. | © Warner Bros. Pictures Animation

The Hunger Games Sunrise on the Reaping 2026 cropped processed by imagy — 11. The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping (November 20, 2026)

The *Hunger Games* universe keeps finding fresh wounds to reopen, and *Sunrise on the Reaping* goes straight for one of its most haunting backstories: Haymitch Abernathy’s Games. Set around the 50th Hunger Games, this prequel has the advantage of a familiar survivor whose bitterness already made sense, but whose full trauma still has room to hurt. It also gives the franchise another chance to show Panem as spectacle, propaganda, and cruelty dressed up as prime-time entertainment. | © Lionsgate

12. Hexed (November 25, 2026)

Disney Animation is betting on an original fantasy rather than digging through another familiar toy chest. In *Hexed*, unconventional teenager Billie discovers magical abilities that catapult her from suburbia into Hexe, a sprawling hidden civilization of witches. Hailee Steinfeld voices Billie, with Rashida Jones playing the cautious mother forced to accompany her through a family mystery capable of reshaping that world. Magical-realm stories are hardly endangered, but the mother-daughter pairing gives this one a more personal engine than the usual chosen-child checklist. | © Walt Disney Animation Studios

Avengers doomsday — 13. Avengers: Doomsday (December 18, 2026)

The MCU does not get to play this card casually: *Avengers: Doomsday* brings back the Russo brothers and turns Robert Downey Jr. into Doctor Doom, which is either genius, madness, or a very expensive combination of both. After years of uneven Marvel momentum, this is being positioned as the next giant crossover earthquake. Add the Fantastic Four, multiverse baggage, and the shadow of *Endgame*, and the discourse is basically guaranteed to arrive wearing armor. | © Marvel Studios

Cropped Dune Part 2 — 14. Dune: Part Three (December 18, 2026)

Denis Villeneuve already turned *Dune* into the rare sci-fi blockbuster that felt massive without sanding off its weirdness, and *Dune: Part Three* should only get thornier. This next chapter moves into the fallout of Paul Atreides’ rise, which means less chosen-one triumph and more political rot, prophecy, guilt, and sand-covered regret. Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya returning keeps the emotional spine intact, but the real excitement is watching a blockbuster franchise get stranger instead of safer. | © Warner Bros. Pictures

Werwulf 2026 cropped processed by imagy — 15. Werwulf (December 25, 2026)

Robert Eggers has built a career out of making history feel damp, haunted, and slightly hostile, so *Werwulf* fits him almost too perfectly. A gothic werewolf story set in 13th-century England gives him all the mud, candlelight, folklore, and Old World dread he could possibly need. Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Lily-Rose Depp, Willem Dafoe, and Ralph Ineson also make this feel less like a standard creature feature and more like a nightmare someone found buried under a ruined monastery. | © Focus Features

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The first half of 2026 may be behind us, but studios have saved plenty of their biggest swings for the months ahead. Long-awaited sequels, risky franchise revivals and filmmaker-driven wild cards are all fighting for a place in the year-end conversation. Not every one of them will survive the hype intact, naturally, but these are the 15 most anticipated movies set to dominate the second half of 2026.

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The first half of 2026 may be behind us, but studios have saved plenty of their biggest swings for the months ahead. Long-awaited sequels, risky franchise revivals and filmmaker-driven wild cards are all fighting for a place in the year-end conversation. Not every one of them will survive the hype intact, naturally, but these are the 15 most anticipated movies set to dominate the second half of 2026.