Somewhere on this fall’s release calendar, a wicker man is built to serve as a husband. That is a genuine plot summary, and it is not even the oddest thing arriving in cinemas between now and the close of 2026.
Autumn tends to belong to the sofa. A blanket pulled up, cider going warm, something nostalgic or goofy or frightening playing. Halloween is nearly here, winter follows close behind, and every passing week makes staying in look smarter.
That calculus shifted this year. Below are the 10 films we think justify the drive, the ticket price and the wildly expensive popcorn.
A Disney witch tale aiming squarely at the KPop Demon Hunters void
Animation remains the format where magic can genuinely look magical, be it a musical number or light catching a blade. Disney’s Hexed centers on Billie (Hailee Steinfeld), a defiant teenager whose abilities drag her into Hexe, a witches’ realm.
Directing duties belong to Fawn Veerasunthorn, previously behind Raya and the Last Dragon. Anyone still recovering from a KPop Demon Hunters hangover already knows the pitch: bonds between women, buried family history, and animation with enough style to know it has an audience.
Olivia Colman orders a husband made of wicker
There is always something peculiar going on in a small medieval town. Wicker, from directors Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson, pushes far beyond peculiar.
Drawn from a short story by Ursula Wills, the film follows a solitary fisherwoman (Colman) shunned for years by her village simply because she never married. Her answer is to commission a husband built out of wicker.
And the thing actually works. Her wicker spouse (Alexander Skarsgard) proves so sincere and so romantic that the village unravels around them. Richard E. Grant and Peter Dinklage fill out the town.
This year, Santa lands on the naughty list
Tommy Wirkola follows up his mercenary Santa picture in December, and the setup is a joke delivered with real timing. Saint Nick (David Harbour) has grown comfortable in the role. He has also earned a spot on the naughty list.
With the job itself on the line, Santa must rediscover what Christmas means while taking apart a fresh crew of thugs tormenting a small community. He has backup: Mrs. Claus (Kristen Bell), who looks even more unhinged and more vengeful than her husband.
Whether that rediscovered meaning of Christmas turns out to be violence is the question Violent Night 2 exists to answer.
Jason Momoa plays Blanka, and that really is the entire pitch
Game adaptations sell tickets, and Street Fighter is under no illusions about it. The 1994 version starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and Raul Julia was magnificently camp and nowhere near faithful to Capcom’s source material.
Kitao Sakurai’s 2026 action-comedy appears tuned to the same frequency, with more breathing room for the roster: Chun-Li (Callina Liang), Ken Masters (Noah Centineo), Ryu (Andrew Koji). The supporting lineup is ridiculous in exactly the right way. Momoa as Blanka. Wrestler Cody Rhodes as Guile. Curtis ’50 Cent’ Jackson as Balrog.
Twice the tributes, twice the corpses
Should you want to watch young people funneled into a public-entertainment meat grinder once more, The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping obliges.
Adapted from the novel, this prequel unfolds 24 years ahead of the original trilogy and tracks Haymitch Abernathy (Joseph Zada) as a tribute. His reaping is for the 50th Hunger Games, an edition with its own brutal math: double the tributes, double the deaths.
The Avengers and the X-Men share a room at last
Marvel and Disney have been packing cinemas with superheroes since 2008’s Iron Man. Eighteen years later, Anthony and Joe Russo return for Avengers: Doomsday, a multiverse-spanning alliance pointed at Doctor Doom.
Universes crashing together means casts crashing together too. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Captain America (Anthony Mackie) represent the MCU, joined by Fox’s X-Men mainstays Magneto (Ian McKellen) and Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart). If this is the crossover you have been waiting years for, buy the ticket.
Body horror comes to Gotham, and it starts with a face
James Watkins directed Eden Lake and The Woman in Black. Mike Flanagan is attached. DC Studios’ Clayface was engineered to get under your skin.
Matt Hagen (Tom Rhys Harries) is a film star who submits to experimental surgery in order to reclaim his original face, then learns what the side effects are. He becomes clay.
Batman devotees get the Gotham backdrop plus a nod to one of the finest episodes Batman: The Animated Series ever made. The stronger hook, though, is the idea beneath all of it: what it costs, emotionally and physically, to stop recognizing your own face and body.
Resident Evil hands the franchise to the Weapons director
Capcom’s Resident Evil is a cornerstone of gaming entertainment, and Zach Cregger, the filmmaker behind Weapons, intends for that to be true onscreen as well.
What he is making is a complete reboot that runs alongside Resident Evil 2. Instead of Leon Kennedy and Claire Redfield navigating the T-virus outbreak in Raccoon City, the lead is Bryan (Austin Abrams), a medical courier.
Building the film around original characters risks letting game fans down. It also hands Cregger room to make something personal out of a 30-year-old property. After how poorly earlier adaptations fared, Resident Evil could use a victory.
Godzilla heads for New York
Following the worldwide success of Godzilla Minus One, writer-director Takashi Yamazaki comes back with Godzilla Minus Zero.
The year is 1949, two years on from the events that came close to wiping out Japan and from the Shikishima family the first film introduced. The nation is still working to rebuild what it lost. Then a new menace appears on the horizon, endangering what hope survives.
Godzilla, however, has his sights set somewhere else this round: New York City.
Paul Atreides was never the hero of this story
Denis Villeneuve won everyone over with the opening two installments of his Frank Herbert adaptation, and there is little cause to doubt the conclusion.
Dune: Part 3 picks up 17 years after Part 2 — a departure from the 12 in the books — and offers no gentle on-ramp. It takes the notion of Paul Atreides (Timothee Chalamet) as a selfless liberator and takes it apart, recasting him as a merciless imperialist dictator.
His jihad has nearly subjugated the universe. Power on that scale carries a price, and it may exceed what Paul or those he loves can withstand.
Ten movies, a single season. Somewhere in December, David Harbour is throwing punches in a Santa suit, Olivia Colman is falling for a man assembled from sticks, and Timothee Chalamet is seated on a throne that was never meant to be his.