The Wild Robot Will Channel Hayao Miyazaki, Classic Disney Titles

The Wild Robot is going to be a major adaptation for Dreamworks Animation, and the director behind it all revealed some surprising influences the new film will channel. Peter Brown’s The Wild Robot has been a massive bestseller title since it first released several years ago as fans fell in love with the story of a robot who crash lands on an isolated island and learns to live in this new environment while bonding with the animals that lived there. Coming to theaters later this Fall, very little of the new film has been revealed in motion as of the time of this publication. 

The Wild Robot debuted an unfinished bit of new footage during CinemaCon 2024 not long ago during Universal’s presentation, (which was attended by ComicBook.com), The Wild Robot director Chris Sandlers (who was behind films such as How to Train Your Dragon, Lilo & Stitch, and more) revealed that the film takes some inspiration from classic Disney films and the legendary Studio Ghibli works from Hayao Miyazaki,  even noting that the finished project has a visual style described as “a Monet painting in a Miyazaki forest.”

What Is The Wild Robot?

The Wild Robot will be releasing in theaters beginning on September 20th. Written and directed by Chris Sandlers (How to Train Your Dragon, Lilo & Stitch, The Croods) and produced by Jeff Hermann (DreamWorks Animation’s The Boss Baby 2: Family Business, Kung Fu Panda 3), The Wild Robot is based on Peter Brown’s original novel of the same name. The film stars Lupita Nyong’o (Black Panther) as the main character, Roz, as she leads a cast that also includes the likes of Pedro Pascal as Fink and Catherine O’ Hara as Pinktail. 

The voice cast also includes the likes of Bill Nighy as Longneck, Kit Connor as Brightbill, Stephanie Hsu as Vontra, Mark Hamill, Matt Berry, and Ving Rhames. As for what to expect from The Wild Robot, Dreamworks Animation teases the film as such, “From DreamWorks Animation comes a new adaptation of a literary sensation, Peter Brown’s beloved, award-winning, #1 New York Times bestseller, The Wild Robot.The epic adventure follows the journey of a robot—ROZZUM unit 7134, ‘Roz’ for short — that is shipwrecked on an uninhabited island and must learn to adapt to the harsh surroundings, gradually building relationships with the animals on the island and becoming the adoptive parent of an orphaned gosling.”

How are you liking the look of The Wild Robot so far? Let us know all of your thoughts about it in the comments! You can even reach out to me directly about all things animation and other cool stuff @Valdezology on X (formerly known as Twitter)!