DreamWorks Animation released the first trailer for Forgotten Island on Wednesday, and it is unlike anything the studio has put out before.
Set in the 1990s and rooted in Filipino mythology, the film follows two best friends on the verge of going their separate ways after high school, until a magical portal pulls them into the world they grew up hearing about.
The trailer dropped at DreamWorks headquarters in Glendale, with the directors and both lead voice actors in the room.
The film opens in theaters September 25, 2026, distributed by Universal Pictures.
It is DreamWorks’ 50th animated feature film and its first wholly original property in years, not a sequel, not a franchise extension.
That matters. The studio’s recent slate has leaned heavily on existing IP. The Bad Guys 2, Gabby’s Dollhouse: The Movie, Dog Man, and the How to Train Your Dragon remake all preceded this one.
Forgotten Island is the first time in a long time DreamWorks has built a world from scratch.
Who Is Directing Forgotten Island?
Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado are co-directing, and their working relationship stretches back more than a decade. They first met on Kung Fu Panda 2.
“We very quickly found out we have very similar sensibilities,” Mercado said at Wednesday’s event. Crawford previously directed The Croods: A New Age and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, the latter widely regarded as one of the best-reviewed animated films of the last decade.
Mercado served as co-director on The Last Wish and as head of story on The Croods: A New Age. This is his directorial debut as a co-lead, and the subject matter is personal.
Forgotten Island draws on Filipino mythology, and Mercado’s own Filipino heritage is woven directly into the material.
Filipino-American composer Nathan Matthew David, whose credits include Tenet and The Mandalorian, is scoring the film.
The Story Behind The Film
Jo (voiced by H.E.R.) and Raissa (voiced by Liza Soberano) have been best friends their entire lives. As high school ends, they face the reality of separating, Jo staying, Raissa leaving for college, and spend their last night together eating junk food and singing karaoke.
Then they find a portal that drops them into Nakali, the forgotten island of Filipino folklore. Shapeshifters, demons, witches, monsters.
The only way back home may cost them something they cannot replace: their memories of each other.
The full logline is unambiguous about what the film is actually about: “What if your lifelong best friend just forgot all about you? Forgot all the love, the joy, the pain, all of the memories and experiences you once shared.”
That question is the engine. Lea Salonga, Tony Award-winning Broadway icon and most recently heard in KPop Demon Hunters, voices the Dreaded Manananggal, drawn from actual Filipino mythology and described as the island’s most feared creature.
Dave Franco voices Raww, a well-meaning weredog who joins the two friends on their journey through Nakali.
The rest of the voice cast includes Manny Jacinto, Jenny Slate, Jo Koy, Dolly de Leon, Ronny Chieng, and Amielynn Abellera.
Why H.E.R. Said Yes
Grammy and Academy Award-winning artist H.E.R., born Gabi Wilson, has Filipino heritage on her mother’s side, and the role marks her first foray into voice acting and animation.
When she received the script, she did not hesitate. “I was so excited. You have no idea,” she said Wednesday. “We were in the Philippines in 2019, and my mom was trying to scare us about all these stories.
I literally grew up on them. I get to share a piece of my childhood in this work and with the world.”
That is not a press circuit answer. That is someone describing a direct line between her mother, her childhood, and a DreamWorks film, and being handed the opportunity to put those stories in front of a global audience through a major studio for the first time.
Soberano, the Filipino-American actress, brought her own version of that weight to the room.
“It’s been a long-time dream of mine to be able to be in a project that really represented the Philippines in a very accurate way, but at the same time, is universal enough for people to be able to relate to,” she said.
“To have Filipino culture showcased by a major studio is very exciting.” Soberano is one of the most recognizable faces in Philippine entertainment internationally, and her casting as Raissa places her at the center of a film that treats Filipino cultural identity as the foundation rather than the decoration.
Why Is The Film Set In The 1990s?
Setting the film in the 1990s was a deliberate structural choice rather than nostalgia for its own sake. Crawford and Mercado were specific about what that era does for the story’s emotional stakes.
“It was telling a story about friends growing apart and feeling like it’s going to be final when a friend is going off to college, will you see them again? Will they forget? You can’t just FaceTime,” Mercado said.
“Polaroids are a big part of this movie. Think about a Polaroid pack, you’ve got 12 pictures, and you’re going to be very specific how you use them. Versus now, we have phones and you take a bunch of pictures, and do you ever look at them again? So a lot of those things in the ’90s are really about tapping into nostalgia, but also reinforcing the stakes of this movie, which are about moments and memories.”
Pre-smartphone separation was real separation. When Raissa leaves for college in 1990s Philippines, she is not just going somewhere far, she is going somewhere that cannot be bridged by a quick call or a photo sent instantly.
The technology of the era makes the central fear of the film feel earned.
The Animation Style
Crawford and Mercado pushed the animation deliberately away from convention. They drew from anime’s approach to action sequences and expressive character work while layering in the hand-drawn, painterly textures developed on Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.
“There are ties to anime in terms of action or pushing character expressions,” Crawford said. Mercado added that the cinematography is treated like actual film production, “There are wider lenses. There’s a light that leaks into the camera, and it is all connected to the theme of memories, nostalgia and the pictures we take.”
Forgotten Island opens September 25, 2026.
