The production
schedule seems to align again for the master of hyper-realistic landscapes.
Through a message of celebration for the New Year, director Makoto
Shinkai confirmed that 2026 will be the year chosen
to formally reveal the concrete details of his next film, breaking
the silence after the global success of his latest film.
The statement came
directly from his official account on December 31. Shinkai expressed his wish
for this to be a year of happiness and added a key piece of information for the
industry: "It seems that it will be the year when I can finally concretely
announce the new film that I have been preparing for a long time." The
filmmaker assured that the production team is creating the work with fun and
asked fans to look forward to it.
A constant
production cycle
This move follows the usual roadmap of the director and his team at CoMix Wave Films. In December 2024, Shinkai had already announced that he dedicated that entire year to developing "a completely new world". Looking at its history of recent releases — Your Name (2016), Weathering With You (2019), and Suzume (2022) — the three- to four-year interval suggests that the project is entering definitive stages, pointing to a possible release between the end of 2026 or 2027.
The Recent
Legacy
Shinkai has
established himself as one of the pillars of contemporary animation, making his
original works compete at the box office with established franchises. After
wrapping up what many fans called its "disaster trilogy," reports
suggest that this new story could move away from that theme to explore fresh
narratives, while maintaining its signature visual stamp of dramatic skies and
teenage emotions.
