Disney+ Secures Worldwide Release for Aardman’s Pokémon Stop-Motion Series

The official Pokémon YouTube channel released a trailer for Pokémon Tales: The Misadventures of Sirfetch'd and Pichu on Friday. The Pokémon Company also announced Friday that Disney+ will exclusively stream the stop-motion series worldwide.

The trailer is available worldwide, including India. Whether JioHotstar will carry the series remains unclear.

The series launches in 2027, with Disney XD handling its North American television debut. It pairs the Pokémon franchise with independent studio Aardman, known for Wallace & Gromit and Shaun the Sheep.

The release falls under a global distribution agreement between Disney+ and The Pokémon Company International. That agreement also covers Pokémon the Series: The Beginning, the anime’s original Indigo League season.

That season already streams on JioHotstar in India, alongside 17 other seasons of the anime.

Aardman cofounder and creative director Peter Lord said the new series takes place in a region with a special personal connection for the studio. The trailer offers glimpses of Wooloo and Sirfetch'd.

Both Pokémon first appeared in the Pokémon Sword/Shield games. Those games take place in Galar, a region modeled on the U.K.

The series’ creative staff includes:

• Tom Parkinson as director
• Natalie McKay as creative director
• James Young as creative lead

Pokémon Concierge, another stop-motion series in the franchise, launched on Netflix with four episodes in December 2023. India received the series simultaneously in Japanese, with dubs in:

• English
• Hindi
• Tamil
• Telugu

Stop-motion production company dwarf studios, known for Rilakkuma and Kaoru, animated the episodes released so far. Additional episodes arrived in September 2025.

The Pokémon Horizons: The Series anime began airing in Japan in April 2023 with an hour-long premiere special. Its Japanese broadcast slot is Fridays at 6:55 p.m. JST.

The anime reached Indian television through Hungama in May 2024. That broadcast featured new original opening and ending songs, performed by Armaan Malik and Shirley Setia and composed by Vishal-Sheykhar.

Pokémon Asia’s YouTube channels began releasing the anime’s respective local-language dubs in July 2024 through its:

• Hindi channel
• Tamil channel
• Telugu channel
• Bengali channel

Netflix launched the second season, Pokémon Horizons: The Series—The Search for Laqua, in North America in February 2025. Pokémon South Asia’s English YouTube channel began streaming that season’s English dub on December 19.

Netflix added Pokémon Horizons: Season 3—Rising Hope in North America on January 6.