Summary
- 2027 is blockbuster-packed: Secret Wars anchors a crowded year of major franchise films.
- Non-Marvel tentpoles—Zelda, Star Wars, Shrek, Frozen, LOTR—provide heavy counterprogramming.
- Animation and family fare dominate: Shrek, Minecraft, Simpsons, Frozen and more fuel a busy 2027.
Avengers: Secret Wars already gives 2027 one of the year’s most obvious blockbuster events. Marvel has spent years dominating lists of the highest-grossing superhero movies ever, and another Avengers movie arriving in December guarantees plenty of attention will once again be aimed at the MCU.
The rest of Hollywood has assembled a remarkably strong counterprogramming slate. Nintendo is finally bringing The Legend of Zelda to live-action, Star Wars is putting Ryan Gosling behind the controls of a starfighter, and several franchises audiences have not seen on the big screen in years are making major returns.
Animation should be particularly competitive. DreamWorks has Shrek 5, Disney has Frozen III, and Warner Bros. is wasting little time following up one of its biggest recent family hits. That’s before getting into Godzilla x Kong: Supernova, A Quiet Place Part III, or several other 2027 releases that could easily have made this list.
These 10 are arranged by release date rather than projected box office. One clarification also matters: Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse is not included. Sony may distribute it, but Spider-Man remains a Marvel character. If the promise is non-Marvel, we’re keeping it clean.
Sonic The Hedgehog 4 — March 19, 2027
All the Sonic movies and shows have turned what once looked like a risky video game adaptation into one of Paramount’s most dependable family franchises. Sonic the Hedgehog 4 brings Ben Schwartz back as the blue speedster, with Jeff Fowler returning after directing the first three installments.
The previous movies kept expanding the roster, and the fourth already has another fan favorite to work with after Amy Rose’s arrival. Sonic also enters 2027 at a moment when video game movies have become legitimate theatrical heavyweights rather than novelty releases. That trend will become even more obvious only weeks later.
The Legend Of Zelda — April 30, 2027
Nintendo has already proved with Super Mario that its games can translate into enormous theatrical events. The Legend of Zelda presents a very different challenge. Wes Ball’s live-action adaptation stars Benjamin Evan Ainsworth as Link and Bo Bragason as Zelda, bringing Hyrule to theaters after decades of fan speculation.
The property also carries enough history to appeal well beyond younger Nintendo players. ScreenRant recently offered 10 movies to watch while waiting for The Legend of Zelda, which speaks to how much anticipation already surrounds the fantasy adventure. If Ball gets the scale right, Zelda could become one of 2027’s defining new movie franchises.
Star Wars: Starfighter — May 28, 2027
Star Wars: Starfighter has something recent theatrical Star Wars movies rarely enjoyed: the chance to start relatively fresh. Shawn Levy directs Ryan Gosling in a standalone story set after The Rise of Skywalker, with the movie scheduled to arrive almost exactly 50 years after the original Star Wars opened.
That alone makes its release feel like an event. The franchise has helped turn space opera into mainstream blockbuster entertainment, but its recent years have been dominated by television. Gosling leading a new theatrical story gives Starfighter an opportunity to remind audiences what Star Wars looks like when it owns the big screen.
Shrek 5 — June 30, 2027
It will have been 17 years since Shrek Forever After when Shrek, Fiona, and Donkey finally return for another mainline movie. Mike Myers, Cameron Diaz, and Eddie Murphy are all back, while Zendaya joins the franchise as Shrek and Fiona’s daughter Felicia.
DreamWorks also returns at a time when animation outside Disney has been thriving. ScreenRant’s look at the greatest non-Disney animated movies of the last five years shows how broad that field has become. Yet few animated properties possess Shrek’s combination of nostalgia and cross-generational recognition.
Man Of Tomorrow — July 9, 2027
Marvel may have Secret Wars, but DC has its own enormous superhero movie waiting in 2027. James Gunn’s Man of Tomorrow follows his 2025 Superman, bringing David Corenswet’s Clark Kent and Nicholas Hoult’s Lex Luthor back for the next major chapter of the DCU.
The film also arrives as DC attempts to build one of the best superhero movie franchises launched in the last 10 years. Superman successfully established Gunn’s new universe, so Man of Tomorrow has the more difficult job: proving that audiences want to keep following it.
A Minecraft Movie: Squared — July 23, 2027
Warner Bros. had little reason to wait around after A Minecraft Movie became a massive theatrical success. A Minecraft Movie: Squared returns to the Overworld in summer 2027, with Jared Hess again directing and Jason Momoa and Jack Black among the returning stars. Kirsten Dunst joins the sequel as Alex.
The title may still sound ridiculous, but the first movie demonstrated the scale of the audience waiting for this material. Minecraft has existed for years as something far bigger than a single game, and another theatrical adventure gives Warner Bros. a family franchise capable of competing with traditional animation during one of the busiest summers in recent memory.
The New Simpsons Movie — September 3, 2027
Homer Simpson is heading back to theaters 20 years after The Simpsons Movie. The sequel, now titled The New Simpsons Movie, has the advantage of being based on characters who never actually went away. The Simpsons has remained on television throughout the two-decade wait, making this less a revival than a very overdue return to the big screen.
The first movie proved Springfield could support a feature-length theatrical story without feeling like an extended television episode. The larger question is whether audiences will still turn the Simpson family into a box-office event in 2027. Two decades of nostalgia certainly gives Fox and Disney plenty to work with.
The Mummy 4 — October 15, 2027
Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz back together as Rick and Evelyn O’Connell may be enough to sell this one by itself. The Mummy 4 reunites the pair for the first time since The Mummy Returns, with John Hannah and several other familiar faces also returning.
The timing feels particularly good for the kind of swashbuckling adventure the original movies delivered. Fraser’s Mummy remains one of the titles that makes ’90s adventure movies such essential viewing, even if its 1999 release barely sneaked into the decade. Recreating that chemistry matters more than simply resurrecting another recognizable title.
Frozen III — November 24, 2027
The Frozen series needs very little introduction as a box-office force. Elsa and Anna return eight years after Frozen II, with Idina Menzel and Kristen Bell again leading Disney’s animated juggernaut. Jennifer Lee is returning to write the third installment, which opens over Thanksgiving.
Disney has plenty of movies worth revisiting before their upcoming sequels, but few carry the commercial expectations attached to Frozen III. Both previous movies became cultural events, and the long gap could work in the sequel’s favor as the children who grew up with Elsa introduce Arendelle to another generation.
The Lord Of The Rings: The Hunt For Gollum — December 17, 2027
- Release Date
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December 17, 2027
- Writers
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Arty Papageorgiou, Phoebe Gittins, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, J.R.R. Tolkien
Perhaps the boldest release date on the entire calendar belongs to The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum. Andy Serkis directs and returns as Gollum, while Peter Jackson is involved as a producer. The movie sends audiences back to Middle-earth more than a decade after the final Hobbit installment.
That return carries enormous expectations because Jackson’s original trilogy remains a benchmark for large-scale fantasy filmmaking. It also currently shares its December 17 release date with Avengers: Secret Wars. Whether both movies actually stay there remains to be seen, but the scheduling alone says plenty about how seriously Warner Bros. views Middle-earth’s return.
Marvel will have no shortage of attention in 2027, especially once Secret Wars arrives. Still, looking at this slate makes the year feel much larger than one superhero event. Some of Hollywood’s most recognizable worlds are coming back, while Zelda is finally getting its first serious shot at becoming a live-action movie franchise.
