Forgotten Island: Release Date, Story, Cast, Filipino Mythology, and Everything We Know

Forgotten Island is shaping up to be one of DreamWorks Animation’s most distinctive original movies in years. Rather than returning to an established franchise, the studio is introducing audiences to a completely new world inspired by Filipino culture, Southeast Asian mythology, 1990s nostalgia, and lifelong friendship.

The animated fantasy adventure follows two best friends, Jo and Raissa, whose lives are moving in different directions. During what is supposed to be their final night together, they discover a mysterious portal and are transported to Nakali, an island populated by creatures from the stories their Filipino families told them as children.

Escaping the island will not be simple. The longer Jo and Raissa remain in Nakali, the more they risk losing the memories that connect them. Their way home may ultimately cost them the entire history of their friendship.

Written and directed by Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado, the creative team behind Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, Forgotten Island combines a personal coming-of-age story with colorful fantasy, comedy, music, and Filipino folklore.

Forgotten Island Movie Details

• Movie title: Forgotten Island
• Release date: September 25, 2026
• Studio: DreamWorks Animation
• Distributor: Universal Pictures
• Directors: Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado
• Writers: Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado
• Producer: Mark Swift
• Composer: Nathan Matthew David
• Runtime: 1 hour and 49 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Genre: Animation, fantasy, adventure, comedy, and family
• Main characters: Jo and Raissa
• Setting: The Philippines during the 1990s and the mythical island of Nakali

DreamWorks confirms that the film will open in theaters on September 25, 2026. Its official description presents the movie as an emotional story about two lifelong friends who must reconnect before their changing lives pull them apart permanently. DreamWorks’ official Forgotten Island website provides the release date, central premise, cast, and creative team.

What Is Forgotten Island About?

At the center of Forgotten Island are Jo and Raissa, two girls who have been best friends since grade school. After graduating from high school, they are preparing to begin separate chapters of their lives.

Raissa appears ready to follow a more carefully planned path, while Jo is less willing to accept that their childhood is ending. Like many close friends approaching adulthood, they face an uncomfortable truth: caring about someone does not guarantee that life will keep them in the same place.

While celebrating their last night together, Jo and Raissa come across a mysterious portal. It transports them to Nakali, a fantastical island filled with creatures they recognize from the myths and stories shared by their Filipino families.

Some of the island’s inhabitants offer friendship and guidance. Others are dangerous, unpredictable, or far more complicated than the girls expected. Jo and Raissa eventually learn that Nakali does not simply trap visitors physically. It gradually takes their memories.

Their shared experiences, private jokes, arguments, promises, and childhood adventures begin to disappear. If they remain on the island too long, they may forget why they ever mattered to each other.

That idea gives the movie a surprisingly emotional foundation. The central question is not simply whether Jo and Raissa can escape. It is whether their friendship can survive when the memories holding it together begin to vanish.

Why Memory Is So Important to the Story

The premise of Forgotten Island turns a common fear about growing up into a literal fantasy threat.

Close friends often promise that nothing will change between them. However, graduation, relocation, family expectations, careers, and new relationships can create distance. People may still care about one another while gradually forgetting the small moments that once made their connection feel unbreakable.

Nakali appears to transform that natural emotional process into something visible. Memories are not merely background information in this story. They are part of the characters’ identities.

If Jo forgets Raissa, she may also lose an important piece of herself. The same is true for Raissa. Their friendship has influenced who they have become, even if they are now heading toward different futures.

The filmmakers have said that the movie was partly inspired by their own friendship and the idea of chosen family. According to an interview with the directors, the story draws from their personal relationships, Filipino families, and experiences of maintaining meaningful connections over time. Animation Magazine also reports that the 1990s setting was selected because separation felt more permanent before smartphones and constant online communication.

Who Voices Jo and Raissa?

Grammy- and Academy Award-winning artist H.E.R., whose full name is Gabriella Sarmiento Wilson, voices Jo.

Jo appears to be the more impulsive and chaotic member of the friendship. She does not want to lose the person who has been beside her throughout childhood, and that fear may influence some of her decisions during their final night together.

Liza Soberano voices Raissa. She is preparing to move forward with her life, but that does not mean leaving Jo behind is easy. Her journey appears to involve balancing family expectations, personal ambitions, and the emotional weight of saying goodbye.

Casting H.E.R. and Soberano gives the film two performers with strong Filipino roots. Their involvement also supports the movie’s larger goal of telling a culturally specific story through voices connected to the community being represented.

Forgotten Island Voice Cast and Characters

The movie brings together Filipino, Filipino-American, and international performers. The confirmed voice cast includes:

• H.E.R. as Jo: One of the two lifelong friends at the center of the story.
• Liza Soberano as Raissa: Jo’s best friend, whose life is about to follow a different path.
• Dave Franco as Raww: A well-meaning but accident-prone were-aspin, or were-dog, who joins the girls on their journey.
• Jenny Slate as Batiba: A magical tree spirit connected to Nakali’s strange mythology.
• Manny Jacinto as Bungi Tiyanak: A mischievous, centuries-old demon baby inspired by the tiyanak of Filipino folklore.
• Dolly de Leon as Lola Fatima: Jo’s grandmother and an important connection to the family stories surrounding Nakali.
• Jo Koy as Datu: A supporting figure within the island adventure.
• Ronny Chieng as King Truffle Wuffle: One of the movie’s more unusual fantasy characters.
• Lea Salonga as the Dreaded Manananggal: The most feared creature on Nakali and the film’s primary antagonist.
• Kevin McCann as Mermahn: A prince belonging to the Kataw people.

The character names and major roles are listed through Apple TV’s Forgotten Island cast page, while the filmmakers have provided additional details about the mythological characters and their place in the story.

How Forgotten Island Uses Filipino Mythology

One of the movie’s biggest attractions is its use of Philippine mythology, which rarely receives this level of attention in mainstream Hollywood animation.

The most important mythological figure revealed so far is the manananggal, voiced by Lea Salonga. In Filipino folklore, a manananggal is traditionally portrayed as a frightening, shape-shifting creature capable of separating its upper body from its lower half and flying through the night.

Forgotten Island appears to reinterpret the creature for a family-oriented fantasy adventure while preserving its unsettling qualities. The filmmakers have also connected the manananggal’s physical separation to the movie’s larger theme of emotional distance.

Another creature is the tiyanak, represented by Manny Jacinto’s character, Bungi. Traditional stories describe the tiyanak as a dangerous supernatural creature that can take the appearance of a baby. The movie transforms that frightening legend into a mischievous fantasy character suitable for its comedic adventure.

Raww is described as a were-aspin. “Aspin” is a term commonly used for native or mixed-breed dogs in the Philippines. Instead of using a familiar European werewolf, the movie gives the idea a specifically Filipino identity.

Other cultural and mythological references reportedly include the sarimanok, spirits, shape-shifters, witches, and the Kataw, beings associated with the sea. These elements allow Nakali to feel like a complete fantasy world rather than a generic magical island with Filipino decorations added afterward.

What Is the Island of Nakali?

Nakali is the mysterious fantasy world into which Jo and Raissa are transported. It is filled with strange communities, magical landscapes, forgotten stories, and creatures that the girls previously knew only through their families.

The exact history of Nakali has intentionally been kept mysterious. However, the trailers and official descriptions suggest that the island is closely connected to memory. People who remain there begin to forget their past, their relationships, and possibly their original reasons for wanting to leave.

That makes Nakali both beautiful and threatening. It offers adventure, freedom, and wonder, but those experiences come with a serious cost.

The island may also represent the cultural memories passed between generations. Jo and Raissa enter a place built from stories they heard while growing up. To find their way home, they may have to understand why those stories—and the people who shared them—remain important.

The 1990s Setting Gives the Movie More Meaning

Forgotten Island takes place in the Philippines during the 1990s. That choice is more than an excuse for colorful fashion, old music, and nostalgic references.

Before smartphones, video calls, and social media, moving away from a close friend could create genuine uncertainty. Long-distance communication required more effort, and people could not follow every part of each other’s daily lives online.

For Jo and Raissa, separation therefore feels permanent. They cannot simply promise to send messages every day through an app. Once their lives move in different directions, their relationship could gradually disappear.

The era also gives the filmmakers room to celebrate 1990s Filipino life through music, street details, family traditions, transportation, clothing, and personal collections. Early promotional material includes references to jeepneys, anik-anik trinkets, Filipino food, and family storytelling.

Animation Style and Visual Direction

Forgotten Island continues the stylistic experimentation seen in modern DreamWorks movies such as The Bad Guys, The Wild Robot, and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.

Instead of aiming for perfectly smooth, realistic computer animation, the film uses a more expressive visual language. The filmmakers have described it as a blend of CG animation and 2D techniques, with different styles appearing during memories and personal retellings.

The real-world Philippines is presented with a romantic, painterly quality. Once Jo and Raissa enter Nakali, the colors become brighter, stranger, and more energetic.

Anime-inspired sequences, bold 1990s colors, hand-drawn effects, and exaggerated character movement help distinguish the fantasy world. The changing visual styles also support the story’s interest in memory. People do not remember the past like a perfectly recorded video; they remember it through emotion, personality, and imagination.

Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado previously worked together on Kung Fu Panda 2, The Croods: A New Age, and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. Their experience on those productions is visible in Forgotten Island’s combination of fast comedy, emotional storytelling, and stylized action.

Music and the Forgotten Island Soundtrack

Music plays a significant part in the movie’s Filipino identity and 1990s atmosphere.

The original score was composed by Nathan Matthew David, a Peabody Award-winning and Emmy-nominated composer who is the child of Filipino immigrants. His score reportedly combines orchestral music, modular synthesis, Filipino musical traditions, and sounds associated with 1980s and 1990s pop.

The soundtrack also features Filipino and Filipino-American performers, including:

• H.E.R.
• Liza Soberano
• Lea Salonga
• BINI
• SB19
• Ruby Ibarra
• Carl Angelo
• Sophia Laforteza of KATSEYE

H.E.R. and Liza Soberano perform “BRB,” a bilingual original song containing Tagalog lyrics. BINI contributes “A Parallel World,” while Sophia Laforteza performs a new version of INXS’s “Never Tear Us Apart.”

These songs are not included simply to create a marketable soundtrack. They are intended to reflect the changing relationship between Jo and Raissa and reinforce the themes of identity, belonging, and separation.

Is Forgotten Island Suitable for Children?

Forgotten Island is rated PG for thematic elements, rude humor, language, brief tobacco imagery, scary action, and some violence. It has a confirmed runtime of approximately one hour and 49 minutes. These details are listed on the movie’s current Rotten Tomatoes information page.

The PG rating suggests that the film is designed for families, but younger or particularly sensitive children may find certain creatures frightening. The Dreaded Manananggal, the tiyanak, and other supernatural beings are based on legends traditionally intended to be unsettling.

The emotional idea of losing memories may also feel intense for some children. However, DreamWorks appears to balance those darker elements with comedy, colorful characters, music, and a hopeful friendship story.

Is Forgotten Island Based on a Book?

Forgotten Island is an original DreamWorks Animation story. It is not officially based on a novel, comic book, television series, video game, or earlier film.

Its mythology comes from traditional Filipino folklore, but Jo, Raissa, Nakali, and the central memory-based adventure were created for the movie.

That makes the project particularly notable at a time when major animated releases are often sequels, remakes, or adaptations. The filmmakers are asking audiences to enter a world without relying on characters they already know.

When and Where Can You Watch Forgotten Island?

Forgotten Island will be released in theaters on September 25, 2026. Universal Pictures is handling distribution.

A home streaming date has not yet been officially announced. Because the movie is a Universal and DreamWorks release, it is expected to follow the companies’ established theatrical and streaming arrangements, but viewers should wait for a formal announcement before treating any online date as confirmed.

The theatrical presentation may be especially valuable for this movie because its wide fantasy landscapes, bright colors, layered animation, and music were created for a large screen and immersive sound.

What Are the Early Reviews Saying?

As of mid-September 2026, the movie has begun receiving a small number of early reviews, but the wider critical and audience response will not be clear until its theatrical release.

The first published reactions have generally highlighted the film’s emotional friendship story, energetic animation, humor, and use of Filipino folklore. Some reviewers have also suggested that the amount of visual activity and comedy may feel overwhelming to certain viewers.

Because only a limited number of reviews are currently available, any early score should be considered temporary. The full critical consensus and verified audience rating will develop after September 25.

Why Forgotten Island Could Be Important

Representation alone does not automatically make a movie successful. A culturally specific film still needs memorable characters, a compelling story, strong humor, and genuine emotion.

Forgotten Island appears promising because its Filipino influences are connected directly to its narrative. The myths create the dangers of Nakali. Family stories connect the girls to the island. Music shapes the emotional experience. Even the central fear of forgetting reflects the importance of preserving relationships and cultural memory.

The film also places the friendship between two young women at the center of a major fantasy adventure. Their relationship is not treated as a minor subplot supporting another hero’s journey. Jo and Raissa are the story.

DreamWorks has described the movie with the line, “Your best friendship is worth fighting for.” That message captures why the film may reach viewers far beyond the Filipino community. Growing up, moving away, and fearing that an important relationship will fade are universal experiences.

With its original world, impressive voice cast, expressive animation, Filipino mythology, and emotionally meaningful premise, Forgotten Island has the ingredients to become much more than a colorful family adventure. It could be a moving story about the memories that shape us—and the people we choose not to forget.