Netflix released the second trailer for “Ray Gunn” on Thursday, November 12th, 2026. It runs two minutes and 42 seconds on Netflix’s YouTube channel, and the September cut ran two minutes and 37 seconds. Brad Bird directs this animated noir, in which private eye Raymond Gunn (Sam Rockwell) is drawn into a case involving aliens, murder and a multimedia star named Venus Nova (Scarlett Johansson). The film opens in select theaters, including limited 70mm engagements, on Friday, December 4th, 2026, and starts streaming on Netflix on Friday, December 18th, 2026. The new cut keeps the premise and changes the rest.
The first trailer was about Ray. This one is about everyone with an opinion on Venus Nova. A first trailer can sell a mood, but a second one has to show what the movie does with it. Warning beyond this point there are spoilers for “Ray Gunn” and everything shown in its trailers.
This one is about everyone with an opinion on Venus Nova.”
The new cut opens somewhere the September cut never went: a gun shop. A heavyset shopkeeper in glasses holds up a silver ray gun, and Ray takes it in hand. The captions read “What’s so special about it?” and then “Nathan!” The shopkeeper aims across the shop at a boy reading in a corner, and a green flash fills the screen. The captions add “No!” and “Holy crap!” before the punch line, “Relax, he’s my nephew. Where do you want him?” ComicBook.com calls it a teleportation ray gun. What’s On Netflix, describing a first-look still of Ray sizing up a new blaster, says Netflix’s production notes describe an A113 particle blaster with a green energy no other weapon in the film shares. Ray ends the scene looking over the gun in his hand, and the captions read “How much?”
The Netflix logo hits, and the cut moves out into Metropia. An elevated train line crowded with people goes by, then a man in an orange jacket with a briefcase. The captions read “Welcome. Welcome to the future.” The second half of that line is a September holdover, but the picture is new. September ran it under a glowing hologram of a woman beside a welcome sign. The Skydance Animation card that followed the Netflix logo in September is gone.
A neon crime-scene tape glows. The captions read “Your client? Hope you got paid up front.” as a woman in a purple suit and a photographer with a flash camera stand with Ray in a doorway. Eye-Ra (Tom Waits), the one-eyed alien partner, rides beside Ray in a car. “What are we doing wrong, Eye-Ra?” the captions ask. The line that follows is another September holdover: “It’s hard being the only honest players in a crooked game.” It runs over the same shot of the pair on a wooden deck that September used. Then a hand grabs Ray’s shoulder in a room with red curtains, and a moment later he is sprawled on the pavement outside a pink building as the captions read “Okay. Still got it!”
The Brad Bird credit comes over a camera move through the city at night. The card reads “From Academy Award winner Brad Bird.” The next cards name “The Incredibles” and “Ratatouille”, with an “and” before the second. September’s list also named “The Iron Giant”, and it put “Academy Award winner Sam Rockwell” and “Academy Award nominee Scarlett Johansson” on cards of their own. The new cut has no cards for either star.
Venus Nova gets an introduction instead. “Ladies and gentlemen, Venus Nova!” the captions read, and then “Venus Nova is about to launch her biggest album.” The footage shows an arena exterior under an “Innocent Tour” sign, a shot recycled from September. The September captions name her once, in a line that begins “Venus Nova’s a big star.” Ray looks up at posters that read “Innocent in Concert” as the captions read “I’m hiring you, Gunn.” A man in glasses and a red neckerchief grins across a table from him. “Keep her out of trouble, and you’ll be a very rich man.” September had that sentence too. This cut runs it over a blur of a crowded club and follows it with a hand fanning green banknotes. What’s On Netflix says the job comes from Venus Nova’s fourth husband, Arnold Dom (Bobby Cannavale), who wants to know whether she is having an affair. The captions never say “husband” or “affair”.
“Mr. Gunn, I keep thinking there are no nice surprises anymore. And then you show up.” September had this line without the opening “Mr. Gunn,” over the same handshake and smile. A blonde woman shakes Ray’s hand in an office lined with gold records, and Ray smiles at her. “Be careful, Ray.” plays over a black frame and then over a blonde woman standing close to Ray. September gave the same warning to a green hand resting on Ray’s shoulder.
The Venus lines come fast after that. “Nova’s a tortured artist. The art is expensive, but the torture… is free.” A man in a fedora sprawls in the back of a car as the line begins, and he is back on screen with his arms flung wide when it ends. Between those shots come a spotlit arena with a lone figure on the stage and a blonde woman in a red sequined dress and devil horns snarling at a wall of photographers. September had the photographers in a longer scene.
Then Ray climbs. “Come, boy. Come along. I trust you’re housebroken.” A blonde woman in black looks down from a glass-roofed spiral staircase and leans over the rail. Ray climbs toward her as the captions read “But I’m rethinking it.” The glass-roofed staircase is new. “Venus Nova is crazy.” “I have information on Venus that could sink her.” “My gut says this is much bigger than I thought.” That last line lands on a green blanket with Ray’s hands resting on it. September showed only a hand pulling the blanket up.
“Who are we watching?” “Everyone.” A long-necked alien clerk in a bow tie takes a white business card from Ray’s hand, and a heavyset man in a fez raises a pistol. A small red-eyed robot scuttles along a dark corridor floor. Netflix’s Tudum site says much of a private detective’s legwork in Metropia now goes to tiny “pry bots”.
The next run is the city’s confession. “This city… has corruption… secrets and murder.” A toothy gunman firing a pink blast in front of a rack of guns fills the line, and September had him too, from a tighter angle. Then “It’s my job to discover the truth” and “Find him.” A silver-haired woman and Ray lean in for a kiss. A man kicks open a door. A hoverbike with two riders passes a building sign that begins “MEGA”. Ray hits the ground in a brick alley under purple blasts from a hulking man in a flat cap. Apart from the gunman, none of that stretch is in September’s cut.
The cut ends on a joke. “We should ask for more money.” plays over Ray holding a half-eaten sandwich and Eye-Ra beside a projector. It is the same shot September used, and the same line, which September spent in the middle of its cut. Then the title card comes. September played its title and kept going into “I like you, Gunn. You’re a real throwback.” The new cut puts the title last. “In select theaters December 4” and “And on Netflix December 18” follow, with the PG rating box. September’s end card carried the same dates and the same box.
September’s heavier moments did not come back. The talk of photographs and the shades of gray between light and dark is gone. So is the “What are you looking for, Ray?” exchange. The scene at Ray’s door that opens on “Mr. Gunn, I presume?” is gone. So is the “How about murder?” exchange. The elevator-shaft fight and the “Raymond Gunn Discreet Investigations” door are gone too. What’s On Netflix calls the new cut “easily the most comprehensive look” at the plot so far, and says it finally lays out the case at the heart of the movie. The spoken lines say less than that. The case here is a hire, a warning and a long line of people talking about Venus Nova. That is enough to sell a noir, but it is not a plot.
Bird has carried this idea for more than 30 years. He pitched it as “The Maltese Falcon” meets “Buck Rogers”, and the new trailer leans on both halves: a detective with a case on one side, a shop that sells ray guns on the other. Netflix’s Tudum site quotes him on why the tone runs grown-up: “Animation is too fun a medium, and too interesting, to limit what kind of stories can be told.” ComicBook.com points out that the streaming date is also the day “Avengers: Doomsday” opens in theaters. Netflix opens “Ray Gunn” in select theaters two weeks before that.
The September cut sold a detective. This one sells a city full of people who want something from the same woman. The job is on the table and the warning is in the air. The trailer never says who ends up in trouble, and that is left for December.
What Do You Think? Does a gun shop gag open a noir better than September’s talk of light, dark and truth? Is a trailer built around what other people say about Venus Nova stronger than one built around the detective? And would you rather catch “Ray Gunn” in a limited 70mm run on December 4th or wait for Netflix on December 18th?
See you on the next binge!
