Bass X Machina Release Date, Teaser and Cast

Netflix Anime posted the official teaser for Bass X Machina on August 20. The date on the card is firm this time. The series premieres November 3, 2026.

That is not a Japanese TV slot and it is not a manga adaptation. It is original adult animation from Seoul’s Studio Mir, created by LeSean Thomas, the showrunner behind Yasuke and Cannon Busters. Brian Tyree Henry voices Bass and produces.

Key Takeaways

• Bass X Machina premieres November 3, 2026 on Netflix. The window moved off October 6 at Annecy.
• Studio Mir animates. Netflix’s own teaser calls it the studio behind Devil May Cry.
• LeSean Thomas created it. This is his third Netflix series after Cannon Busters and Yasuke.
• Brian Tyree Henry stars as Bass and executive produces.
• No episode count, rating, or weekly-versus-binge plan has been posted.

When Does Bass X Machina Come Out?#

Tuesday, November 3, 2026. The official teaser on the Netflix Anime channel says “premieres November 3rd, only on Netflix.” That is the date to use.

Netflix has not published a local clock time on the title page. If it follows the usual global drop, that is midnight Pacific on November 3.

It Was Dated October 6 First#

What’s on Netflix reported that the series was first dated October 6, 2026. At the 2026 Annecy International Animation Film Festival, the premiere moved a month later, to November 3. That is a one-month slide, not a year-long stall. It still matters if you had October circled.

Animation World’s earlier write-up still carried October 6 after the shift. Outlet copy lags. The August teaser does not mention October at all. Treat any leftover October 6 listing as stale. The YouTube description is the current primary source.

What Netflix Has Not Posted#

Episode count is blank. Runtime is blank. A maturity label has not gone up on the title page. Netflix files the show under Adult Animation, Sci-Fi, and Fantasy, and tags it Violent and Western.

That is enough to expect an adult drop, not a kids’ western. It is not enough to invent a TV-MA badge or a 10-episode claim. Those numbers are not out.

What the Official Teaser Shows#

The clip runs 75 seconds. Netflix Anime uploaded it on August 20, 2026, at 4:30 p.m. Pacific, during the Anime NYC window. Three days later it had 127,018 views and 8,116 likes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtSScsTJoVY

Netflix’s description is two lines. “From the studio that brought you Devil May Cry, Brian Tyree Henry is Bass X Machina.” Then the November 3 date. That is the whole pitch.

ComingSoon’s write-up of the same clip quotes Bass as a bounty hunter. “Out here, you do whatever you have to do to survive.” Hovering trains and a mechanical arm do most of the selling. The west in the footage does not look like a history textbook.

The Five Minutes at Anime NYC#

The YouTube teaser is not the longest look anyone has had. What’s on Netflix reported that Netflix opened its Anime NYC main-stage panel with the first five minutes, with Henry on stage.

That footage, per that report, starts on a winter train heist. Bass tells a pair of brothers he is not a lawman. He is a bounty hunter. A mechanical arm, a nine-barrel gun, and a hip-hop cue close the sequence. Opening credits then run over a theme called “Sand.”

That five-minute reel is a panel exclusive so far. Do not expect the YouTube teaser to contain all of it. The public clip is the 75-second cut above.

Is Bass X Machina Anime?#

It depends who you ask, and the honest answer is the production chain, not the marketing label.

Netflix posted the teaser on its Anime channel. Thomas’s last two Netflix series, Cannon Busters and Yasuke, were original TV anime. Yasuke was animated at MAPPA. Studio Mir is a Seoul studio, not a Tokyo one.

Why the Distinction Matters#

Polygon covered the Annecy first look. It put the series in the same bucket as Blue Eye Samurai: Netflix adult animation that borrows anime grammar without being a weekly Japanese broadcast. Jermaine Turner, Netflix’s director of adult animated series, introduced the clip there.

If you came here from Jump trailers, this is a different pipeline. No manga. No cour split. No Japanese TV Tokyo timeslot. It still belongs on an anime slate because Netflix is putting it there, and because Thomas has been making original series in that lane since 2019.

What the Story Is#

Netflix’s logline, as printed by The Playlist and What’s on Netflix, is a father in a lawless steampunk West. Outlaws, machines, and supernatural threats share the same dirt. He becomes judge, jury, and executioner to protect his family, and that work may cost him the people he is trying to save.

Netflix’s title page lists the show as explosive, violent, western, bounty hunter, and cyborgs and robots. The fantasy is the point. This is not a courtroom drama with a steam filter.

Bounty Hunter, Not Marshal#

The Anime NYC footage makes the job title a line of dialogue. Bass tells the twins he is not a lawman. He is a bounty hunter. The historical Reeves was a commissioned deputy marshal. The series is already rewriting the badge.

That rewrite is the show, not a mistake. A marshal works for a court. A bounty hunter works for a purse. Netflix’s logline about judge, jury, and executioner only makes sense if the badge is gone.

The Real Bass Reeves#

The name is not invented. Bass Reeves (1838–1910) was an Arkansas native and one of the first Black federal lawmen west of the Mississippi River. The Encyclopedia of Arkansas records that he was born enslaved in Crawford County in July 1838. He later found refuge in Indian Territory. In 1875 he was commissioned a deputy US marshal under Judge Isaac C. Parker at Fort Smith.

He worked Indian Territory until Oklahoma statehood in 1907, then served as a Muskogee city policeman. He died on January 12, 1910. Settlers told stories about his shooting and his habit of bringing fugitives in by the dozen. Encyclopedia of Arkansas notes that Belle Starr turned herself in at Fort Smith when she learned Reeves had the warrant. That is the historical spine. Cyborg arms are not on it.

Fantasy, Not a Biopic#

Henry told the Anime NYC audience he did not want a conventional historical series and still wanted to honor Reeves. He also said Reeves inspired the Lone Ranger. That Lone Ranger link is a popular claim in pop writing. Historians treat it as unproven. The show should not be used as a documentary either way.

Paramount+ already made a straighter version. Lawmen: Bass Reeves, with David Oyelowo, premiered in November 2023. Encyclopedia of Arkansas lists that series among the recent pop-culture treatments, alongside The Harder They Fall and HBO’s Watchmen. Bass X Machina is the one with machines.

Who Is in the Cast?#

Netflix’s title page currently lists six names. Panel coverage and several outlets add Janelle Monáe as Glory. Henry discussed her on stage at Anime NYC as Bass’s wife and as the singer of the opening theme.

• Bass: Brian Tyree Henry
• Glory: Janelle Monáe
• Dana: Tati Gabrielle
• Ahni: Cree Summer
• Lighthorse: Chaske Spencer
• Rivenbark: Currie Graham
• Etta: Starletta DuPois

Brian Tyree Henry#

Henry is the lead and an executive producer. Viewers will know him from Atlanta, the Spider-Verse films, and Transformers One. What’s on Netflix’s earlier cast rundown also flags Bullet Train.

At Anime NYC he described the show as a punk-rock western. He said Black and brown cowboys are usually missing from the genre. So are Indigenous people on the frontier. He wanted the series to put them on screen without turning into a lecture.

The Rest of the Voice Cast#

Monáe voices Glory. Gabrielle, from The Last of Us and You, voices Dana. Cree Summer voices Ahni. Summer also worked on Studio Mir’s Voltron: Legendary Defender, which is a neat studio echo and not proof of a shared universe.

Chaske Spencer voices Lighthorse. Currie Graham voices Rivenbark. Starletta DuPois voices Etta. Character sheets beyond those names have not been published. English is the production language. No Japanese dub cast has been announced.

Who Is Making Bass X Machina?#

LeSean Thomas created the series. Studio Mir is producing the animation in Seoul. That pairing is the whole production story in one line, and it is more interesting than a generic “Netflix original” stamp.

• Creator: LeSean Thomas
• Animation: Studio Mir
• Executive producers: Brian Tyree Henry, LeSean Thomas, Jennifer Wiley-Moxley, Chad Handley
• Music: Roman GianArthur and Nate Wonder, Wondaland
• Opening theme: “Sand” by Janelle Monáe

LeSean Thomas’s Third Netflix Series#

Thomas’s own site lists him as a South Bronx native working out of Meguro, Tokyo. He created, executive produced, and showran Yasuke and Cannon Busters for Netflix. Before that he was supervising director on Adult Swim’s Black Dynamite. He boarded The Legend of Korra Book 1. He was director and lead character designer on seasons 1 and 2 of The Boondocks.

Cannon Busters arrived in 2019. Yasuke arrived in 2021, animated at MAPPA, with Lakeith Stanfield in the lead. That series took the historical African samurai who served Oda Nobunaga and built original fantasy around him. Bass X Machina is doing a similar move with a western lawman. It is the third Netflix title, and the first of the three at Studio Mir.

Polygon reported that Turner said the style comes from Thomas growing up on both anime and American animation. That tracks with the resume. Korra and Boondocks on one side. MAPPA and Satelight on the other. Mir in the middle.

Studio Mir#

Studio Mir is the Seoul house behind large chunks of The Legend of Korra. It also animated Voltron: Legendary Defender, X-Men ’97, My Adventures with Superman, and Netflix’s Devil May Cry. The teaser wants you to hear Devil May Cry first. That is the adult-action association they are buying.

Thomas already has history with the studio. He boarded Korra Book 1 there. Bringing a western he created back to Mir is a closed loop, not a random Netflix assignment.

The Music Is Part of the Pitch#

What’s on Netflix listed Roman GianArthur and Nate Wonder of Wondaland as composers when the November date landed. Henry repeated those names at Anime NYC and tied them to Monáe’s team.

He also said Monáe was the only person he wanted for the opening. The panel report names that theme “Sand.” Netflix’s title page tags the series “Notable Soundtrack,” which is a catalog label, not a chart prediction.

Why the Sound Matters Here#

Polygon’s Annecy clip was scored to a hip-hop beat, not a Morricone pastiche. If the finished series follows that, the west in this show will sound like Wondaland, not like a studio orchestra pretending it is 1875.

The Road to November 3#

The public trail is short. Annecy in June moved the date and showed a first look. Anime NYC in August put Henry on a stage and put a teaser on YouTube. November is the drop.

How Long the Wait Is From Yasuke#

Yasuke dropped on April 29, 2021. Bass X Machina is 5 years and 6 months later. That is a long gap for a creator who already had two Netflix originals on the board.

Two Shows, Then a Long Silence#

Cannon Busters to Yasuke was about two years. Yasuke to this western is more than double that. The extra time is not explained in the teaser. It is just the calendar.

Where It Sits on the Netflix Anime Slate#

The teaser went up the same Anime NYC day as the third Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 teaser and the SAKAMOTO DAYS Season 2 character trailer. Netflix is stacking adult animation through the fall. Three very different shows shared a stage and a YouTube drop date.

Edgerunners 2 lands first, on October 20. Bass X Machina follows two weeks later. SAKAMOTO DAYS Season 2 is January 2027.

What to Watch Before November#

Nothing is required. If you want Thomas’s earlier Netflix work, Yasuke is the closer cousin: a historical Black lead pulled into original fantasy, not a page-one adaptation of a weekly manga.

Devil May Cry is the studio comparison Netflix wants. Same Korean house, different creator, much louder supernatural action. Blue Eye Samurai is the tone comparison Polygon used at Annecy, and Season 2 of that show is also on the 2027 board.

November 3 is the date that matters. Our 2026 anime hub tracks the rest of the fall slate. The anime news feed will catch the episode count and rating when Netflix posts them.