Street Fighter has a new trailer. Paramount Pictures posted the 2-minute-49-second promo to its own YouTube channel on September 1, 2026, and it’s the second full trailer for Kitao Sakurai’s live-action Capcom adaptation. The film is set in 1993 and hits cinemas on October 16, 2026.
Trailer via Paramount Pictures on YouTube.
Street Fighter (2026): The Quick Facts
| Detail | What we know |
|---|---|
| Release date | October 16, 2026 (theatrical) |
| Director | Kitao Sakurai |
| Screenplay | T.J. Fixman and Kitao Sakurai; story by Dalan Musson and Gary Dauberman |
| Studios | Legendary Pictures (production), Paramount Pictures (distribution) |
| Setting | 1993 |
| Runtime | 119 minutes |
| Rating | PG-13, shown on the trailer’s end card |
| Format | “Filmed for IMAX,” per the same end card |
| Principal cast | Andrew Koji (Ryu), Noah Centineo (Ken Masters), Callina Liang (Chun-Li), David Dastmalchian (M. Bison), Jason Momoa (Blanka), Cody Rhodes (Guile), Roman Reigns (Akuma), 50 Cent (Balrog), Olivier Richters (Zangief), Mel Jarnson (Cammy), Hirooki Goto (E. Honda), Vidyut Jammwal (Dhalsim), Orville Peck (Vega), Andrew Schulz (Dan Hibiki), Eric André (Don Sauvage) |
| This trailer | 2 minutes 49 seconds, posted to Paramount Pictures’ YouTube channel on September 1, 2026 |
The Banner Says “II” for a Reason
Early on, the camera cranes past a tower block draped in an enormous cloth banner. You can read it: 1993 · WORLD WARRIOR TOURNAMENT · II, with a Roman numeral II in a medallion at the bottom, a Greek-key border around the edge, and a painted portrait of a caped officer in military dress with a skull on his belt buckle.
That banner does two jobs. It tells you this is the second World Warrior Tournament, which matches Paramount’s synopsis about Chun-Li recruiting Ryu and Ken for “the next World Warrior Tournament.” And it’s a joke for the fans: the game being adapted is Street Fighter II, so the film gets to be a faithful adaptation and an in-story sequel at once.
And look at that portrait. Before anyone names the villain, the tournament’s own publicity is a picture of a man in a peaked cap and cape. The film is telling you who owns this event.
A Cold Open Before the Logos
The Paramount, Legendary and Capcom logos don’t show up until about 20 seconds in. Before that, it’s a cold open: a rain-slicked alley in blue, a body on wet ground, a fight in hard red light, and a face in magenta light with glowing eyes.
That’s actually quicker than last time. The first trailer held its logos back until nearly the one-minute mark.
The Car Bonus Stage Has a Working Clock
Yes, the Street Fighter II bonus round where you smash up a car is in the movie. It was in the first trailer too, so it’s not a new reveal, but look closer. Behind the car, a countdown display ticks from 36 to 35 in a chunky arcade-style pixel font. It’s a real, running timer, just like the bonus stage has.
The whole sequence is also made to look like camcorder video, with colour fringing, smeared verticals and a bystander holding a video camera. It plays like home-video footage of a 1993 party.
The Bathhouse Is the Big New Thing
Around the middle of the trailer, things move into a steam-filled Japanese bathhouse and stay there for about 25 seconds. That’s close to 15% of the whole trailer, by far the longest it lingers anywhere. A heavyset man with a chonmage topknot turns into frame.
A sumo wrestler in a public bath isn’t a random choice. E. Honda’s stage in Street Fighter II is a bathhouse, and the cast list has former sumo wrestler Hirooki Goto playing him. The trailer itself doesn’t name the character, but the setting and the build line up.
There’s no bathhouse anywhere in the first trailer, so this is the biggest chunk of new footage in trailer two.
Which Fighters Can You Actually Spot?
The back third of the trailer turns into a rapid-fire character parade. Some fighters are obvious at a glance. Others aren’t.
Blanka shows up twice, in two separate scenes the trailer cuts together: rolling through a concrete stairwell trailing yellow electricity, and throwing men in orange around that alley.
Chun-Li gets two looks: the ox-horn buns, and a red dress in a corridor lined with armed men. The red dress turns up again on a hillside, where she fights a man with a long staff beside a helicopter.
The Fighters the Trailer Doesn’t Name
Early on, a fighter walks through a crowd in a pink hooded entrance robe with a Greek-key trim. Pink is Dan Hibiki’s colour in the games, and Andrew Schulz is cast as Dan, but you never get a clear look at the face. The same pink robe comes back in the closing gag.
A few others go unnamed too: the boxer in red gloves who trades blows with Ken, the bald tattooed fighter Ken faces in the arena, a blond performer in a white tracksuit on a neon stage, an enormous bearded man posing for a camera crew beside a horse, and a lean figure crouching in blue mist.
Wait, Flying Cars in 1993?
Late in the trailer there’s a skyline of neon towers with aircraft banking between them over a bay. It doesn’t look like 1993, or like any real city in 1993.
This shot was in the first trailer too, and the trailer doesn’t explain it. It would fit with Shadaloo’s territory being its own place rather than a real one, which is roughly how the games have always treated it.
What’s Actually New Compared to the First Trailer
A lot of trailer two is reused footage. Here’s how the two stack up.
| First trailer | This trailer (September 1) | |
|---|---|---|
| Length | 2 minutes 53 seconds | 2 minutes 49 seconds |
| Studio logos appear | Nearly a minute in | About 20 seconds in |
| Mid-trailer date card | “THIS OCTOBER” | “ON OCTOBER 16” |
| Bathhouse sequence | Absent | About 25 seconds |
| MPA rating on the end card | None shown | PG-13, with the full content descriptor |
| “Filmed for IMAX” | Not shown | On the end card |
| Closing credit block | Full cast billing plus story, screenplay and director credits | Dropped — ends on the date card |
| Car bonus stage | Present | Present (same sequence) |
| Banner, Blanka, Cammy, Guile, the neon skyline | All present | All present again |
So the real news is the bathhouse, the rating and the IMAX line. The rating is a genuine milestone: a film only carries an MPA rating in its marketing once it has been rated, and the first trailer didn’t have one.
That list is worth a second look. “Bloody images” and “partial nudity” on a PG-13 video game movie suggests a film pushing the top of its rating, not sitting comfortably in the middle. The bathhouse sequence probably accounts for at least one of those.
What the Trailer Doesn’t Show
There’s no clear mask this time. The first trailer had a clear shot of a pale mask in a doorway, and nothing like it appears here. There’s no clear Dhalsim either (no bald head, no skull necklace, no stretched-out limbs) even though Vidyut Jammwal is cast. You can’t clearly pick out Akuma, Roman Reigns’ character, and there’s no sure sighting of Zangief.
There’s also no clear hadouken. You get purple energy in a pair of hands and a purple flash in a cage, but both look like the villain’s power rather than Ryu’s.
And for a story about two estranged friends, Ryu and Ken share exactly one clean moment: shoulder to shoulder at the end of a corridor, fists up, facing a squad of men in dark uniforms and red berets. That shot is the reconciliation. They’re fighting the same people, not each other, and it lasts under two seconds.
The trailer also never explains the tournament’s stakes, never names the conspiracy from Paramount’s synopsis, and never gives any character a line long enough to tell you who they are. It’s a texture reel, not a story reel.
Why Capcom Is Being So Careful
Street Fighter is not a small licence being cashed in. Capcom’s own Platinum Titles list, as of June 30, 2026, puts Street Fighter 6 at 7.20 million units and Street Fighter V at 8.00 million (Capcom Platinum Titles).
The same list explains the choice of year. Street Fighter II sits at 6.30 million units from its June 1992 release, and Capcom followed it with Street Fighter II Turbo in July 1993 (4.10 million) and Street Fighter II’ Special Champion Edition in September 1993 (1.65 million). So 1993 isn’t generic “nineties” nostalgia. It’s the twelve months when Capcom put out two more Street Fighter II releases and the game was at its cultural peak. That banner with “1993” and “II” on it is doing more work than it looks like.
There’s also a bad memory to shake off. The 1994 live-action film made $99.4 million worldwide on a $35 million budget and sits at 11% on Rotten Tomatoes.
| Street Fighter (1994) | Street Fighter (2026) | |
|---|---|---|
| Director | Steven E. de Souza | Kitao Sakurai |
| Top billing | Jean-Claude Van Damme as Guile | Andrew Koji as Ryu, Noah Centineo as Ken |
| Setting | Contemporary Shadaloo | 1993 |
| Runtime | 102 minutes | 119 minutes |
| Rating | PG-13 (cut from R to G, then raised to PG-13 by adding one expletive in post) | PG-13 (violence/action, bloody images, strong language, sexual references, partial nudity, brief smoking) |
| Distributor | Universal | Paramount |
| Budget | $35 million | Not disclosed |
| Worldwide gross | $99.4 million | Unreleased |
| Rotten Tomatoes | 11% | Unreleased |
Look at that rating row: the same PG-13, reached from opposite directions.
Capcom has also been closer to this one. Takayuki Nakayama, game director on Street Fighter at Capcom, visited the set and said: “I think they’ve managed to accomplish something very difficult in a really smart way. This is the Street Fighter I know.” He also noted that “the director and everyone else involved in the production all love Street Fighter, and are fans, just like us” (via JoBlo).
That’s a promotional quote, so take it as one. But the banner backs it up: numbering the tournament II is a joke that only lands if you’ve played the game, and nobody makes that joke by accident.
Read Next
We broke down Capcom’s other live-action adaptation in our Mega Man: Dual Override trailer breakdown, and another arcade classic heading to the screen in our Golden Axe trailer breakdown. For the bigger picture on how these adaptations tend to go, see the best and worst comic book video games of all time.
Frequently Asked Questions
When does the Street Fighter movie come out?
October 16, 2026, in cinemas. The trailer’s end card reads “only in theatres October 16” and adds “filmed for IMAX.”
Is this the first Street Fighter trailer?
No. It is the second full trailer. Paramount’s YouTube channel also has a 46-second Game Awards sneak peek, a 2-minute-53-second first official trailer, and a 59-second Blanka vs. Ryu special look.
What is the Street Fighter movie rated?
PG-13. The rating block on the trailer’s end card cites violence/action, bloody images, strong language, sexual references, partial nudity and brief smoking.
Which characters appear in the new trailer?
Ryu, Ken Masters, Chun-Li, Guile, Cammy, Blanka and a commander in the red uniform from the tournament banner are all easy to spot. Several other fighters appear, but the trailer doesn’t make clear who they are.
Is the car bonus stage from Street Fighter II in the movie?
Yes. It’s in both trailers. In this one, a countdown display behind the car ticks from 36 to 35, and the whole sequence is made to look like camcorder footage.
Who is directing the Street Fighter movie?
Kitao Sakurai, best known for The Eric Andre Show and Bad Trip. The screenplay is by T.J. Fixman and Sakurai, from a story by Dalan Musson and Gary Dauberman — credits that appear in the closing credit block of the first trailer.
Last updated: September 1, 2026.
