DreamWorks Animation announced a film adaptation of Dog Man in December 2020, with Hastings set as director after his experience with Pilkey's works from The Epic Tales of Captain Underpants (2018–20). Karen Foster joined as a producer in January 2024, and the cast was announced that September.
Dog Man premiered at the 2025 Festival de l'Alpe d'Huez in Alpe d'Huez, France on January 15, 2025, and was theatrically released in the United States on January 31 by Universal Pictures. The film received positive reviews from critics and grossed $145.6 million worldwide. A sequel is in development.
Plot
A villainous orange cat named Petey constantly terrorizes Ohkay City, with one of his schemes involving planting a bomb to destroy an abandoned warehouse. Famed cop Officer Knight and his dog Greg arrive to defuse the bomb, but Knight cuts the wrong wire and it explodes, killing Knight by head injury and paralyzing Greg's body. The surgeons save Greg by transplanting his head onto Knight's body and rename him Dog Man. Dog Man inherits Knight's job and quickly becomes beloved for his repeated arrests of Petey, but Petey always escapes. Dog Man becomes lonely and depressed due to the loss of Knight and the abandonment of his girlfriend Alice, who sells their house. He takes a tennis ball he used to play with as his only memory of his former life and moves into a doghouse on the city outskirts.
After firing his assistant, Petey decides to clone himself to create an assistant just like him. However, it creates a newborn copy of him with no interest in evildoing, whom he calls Li'l Petey. Petey steals the corpse of an evil telekinetic fish named Flippy and plans to use Living Spray to resurrect him and defeat Dog Man, but Li'l Petey interferes. Petey decides to abandon him in a cardboard box in the middle of the city, where Dog Man finds and decides to adopt him. The two begin to bond as they spend time together in Dog Man's home.
At his lair, Petey discovers a picture book drawn by Li'l Petey depicting both of them as a family, making him feel guilty for abandoning him. Learning from his former assistant that Li'l Petey was adopted by Dog Man, Petey uses his orb-shaped mech, 80-HD, to retrieve him. Dog Man realizes that Li'l Petey is nowhere to be seen, and he and news reporter Sarah Hatoff begin to look for him, but they realize that he is gone. Meanwhile, Petey reveals to his "son" that his abusive father abandoned him as a child. In an attempt to cheer him up, Li'l Petey uses 80-HD to bring Petey's father, called Grampa by Li'l Petey, to his lair. Grampa immediately starts berating Petey, revealing that he has not changed despite Li'l Petey's hopes.
Flippy is resurrected at the Living Spray factory after being mishandled by the factory employees, which also causes the factory itself to come to life. Having been reprogrammed by Petey to destroy all good people, he targets Dog Man and his friends, who fight an army of buildings affected by the Living Spray. A remorseful Petey reluctantly decides to team up with Dog Man, swapping out Li'l Petey inside 80-HD with himself. Realizing that his reviver is redeemed, Flippy decides to drop Petey into an active volcano to kill him, but Li'l Petey arrives and shows him a comic book depicting them as friends, redeeming him and disabling his telekinetic powers, dropping Petey above the volcano. Dog Man uses his tennis ball to knock Petey from falling in the lava, and Flippy is arrested.
Petey is pardoned by the mayor, but refusing to be considered a do-gooder, he and Li'l Petey return to their lair to find that Grampa took everything except for Li'l Petey's books. After a talk with his clone, Petey decides to share custody of his son with Dog Man, and gives him a new ball. He then heads back to his lair with a new outlook on life.
Voice cast
Peter Hastings as Dog Man, a Golden Retriever whose head is transplanted onto his owner Officer Knight's body following an accident. Keeping in line with the source material, Dog Man does not speak, although Hastings still provides his barks and expressions[6]
Hastings also voices Officer Knight, Dog Man's police officer owner whose body is given to Dog Man following his death
Pete Davidson as Petey, a quick-witted and arrogant orange cat who is Dog Man's archenemy and the self-proclaimed "world's most evilest cat"[7][8]
Lucas Hopkins Calderon as Li'l Petey, a kind-hearted kitten clone of Petey and Dog Man's adopted son and sidekick[6]
Lil Rel Howery as Chief, the irritable yet supportive police chief of the station Dog Man works at[7][8]
Stephen Root as Grampa, an elderly and grumpy orange cat who is Petey's abusive father who abandoned his son as a child, and Li'l Petey's grandfather.[8]
Poppy Liu as Butler, a Zoomer-style girl who is Petey's former assistant[8]
In May 2024, Jakks Pacific and its costume division Disguise entered into a partnership with Dav Pilkey to make merchandise based on the Dog Man film along with the comic book series. A book featuring the art of the film was released on December 10, 2024, published by Abrams Books.[17] Universal's marketing campaign for the film began in September 2024 with a trailer on YouTube that accumulated 102 million views. Theatrical trailers were paired with screenings of Transformers One, The Wild Robot, Moana 2, and Sonic the Hedgehog 3. Television advertisements targeted families during the holidays (Thanksgiving and Christmas) during airings of the National Dog Show, holiday specials, New Year's Eve programming, show premieres and finales, and major sports events. The push extended to Amazon devices, Hulu, Peacock, and Hallmark. On January 20, Dog Man was integrated into the Food Network's Kids Baking Championship, with a film-themed baking challenge, sets, and custom animation. Social media analytics firm RelishMix reported that online marketing led to 246.6 million interactions across social media platforms, attracting both fans of the graphic novels and newcomers intrigued by the animation style.[18]
Release
Theatrical
Dog Man had its world premiere during the 2025 edition of the Festival de l'Alpe d'Huez in Alpe d'Huez, France on January 15, 2025, and was released theatrically in the United States on January 31.[1][12] On January 24, 2025, a week before release, DreamWorks announced that the short film Little Lies and Alibis, a short connected to DWA's film The Bad Guys, would run before Dog Man in theaters; the film also serves as a promotional feature for DWA's following film, The Bad Guys 2, which released on August 1.[19]
Home media
Dog Man was made available for purchase and rent on digital streaming services on February 18, 2025.[20][21] The film was released on April 1 on DVD and Blu-ray.[22] As part of a long-term deal with Netflix for Universal's animated films, the film began streaming on Peacock on May 30, 2025[23] and will move to Netflix for the next ten months, starting on September 30,[24] before returning to Peacock for the remaining four.[25][26]
Reception
Box office
As of July13,2025[update], Dog Man has grossed $97 million in the United States and Canada, and $47.5 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $145.6 million.[4][5]
In the United States and Canada, Dog Man was released alongside Companion and Valiant One and was projected to gross $20–30 million from 3,800 theaters in its opening weekend, with some estimates going as high as $40 million.[3][27] It made $10.8 million on its first day, including an estimated $1.36 million from Thursday night previews. It debuted to $36 million, topping the box office. The opening was the second biggest for animated films released in January after DreamWorks Animation's Kung Fu Panda 3 (2016; $41.8 million) and the third consecutive box office-topping debut for DreamWorks after Kung Fu Panda 4 and The Wild Robot (both 2024). Exit polling indicated that 45% of attendees saw the film because it looked "fun" and "entertaining" and a third bought tickets because they were fans of the IP. Men accounted for 52% of the opening weekend audience, with those under 35 comprising 70% and premium large format screens contributing 22%.[18] During Super Bowl weekend, in which movies in the United States regularly perform below average, the film grossed $13.8million, dropping a bigger-than-expected 61.6% while remaining atop the box office.[28][29] During its four-day third weekend, it made $13.4million and finished in third place.[30][31]Dog Man dropped out of the box office top ten in its ninth weekend.[32]
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 80% of 97 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.6/10.The website's consensus reads: "Realizing Dav Pilkey's canine creation with a frenzied energy that never lets up, Dog Man will delight kids while throwing their parents a bone."[33]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 66 out of 100, based on 22 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[34] Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.[18]
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