30 best Netflix movies and shows coming in 2021

Best Netflix movies of 2021: 28. Apollo 10​½

Release Year: 2021

Directed By: Richard Linklater

Starring: Glen Powell, Jack Black, Zachary Levi, Josh Wiggins, Milo Coy, Lee Eddy, Bill Wise, Natalie L’Amoreaux, Jessica Brynn Cohen, Sam Chipman, Danielle Guilbot

Release Date: TBA

There are quite a few working filmmakers today whose work warrants a fair amount of anticipation. Just hearing their name, and the typically all-star cast they have assembled, opens the door for cinephiles and critics alike to have high expectations for the inevitable buzzy release. This year, we have a new Richard Linklater film to look forward, but it’s not the one he’s working on with Ben Platt and Beanie Feldstein over a long period of time. It’s the animated science fiction film Apollo 10​½, which is already a highly anticipated 2021 release on Netflix.

Taking place in the midst of the 1969 moon landing of the Apollo 11, the film tells an interweaving story about from the astronaut and mission control perspective and an inspired child’s perspective. Linklater received inspiration for the film from his own childhood growing up in Houston and fantasizing about going on a mission to the moon. While computer-animated, Apollo 10​½ also features live-action elements that have been in turn animated, much like Linklater’s past forays into animation.

Apollo 10​½ comes from writer-director Richard Linklater, who also directed such award-winning, fan-favorite films as The Before Trilogy, Dazed and Confused, School of Rock, Boyhood and more. The animated sci-fi movie marks Linklater’s first release since 2019’s Where’d You Go, Bernadette and his first animated effort since 2001’s Waking Life and 2006’s A Scanner Darkly. Currently, a release date has not been set for the movie by Netflix. Without a doubt, this will be one film to receive plenty of conversation, and it’s not one to be missed.