“This world, it’s a clenched, feculent sphincter. It cries out for a savior. It cries out for … me.”
Those are the words of a cat, a very evil-looking cat, that viewers will encounter as part of the brand-new season of the unhinged, wildly inventive, and beautifully animated brain-melter known as Love, Death + Robots. Netflix’s most gloriously NSFW animated anthology series is dropping Volume 4 (aka Season 4) on May 15, and once again, it’s got everything: From killer robots to sci-fi horror, fantasy mayhem, gladiator dinosaurs, existential dread — and even scheming house cats that wax poetic about planetary plundering.
Created for the streaming giant by Tim Miller and executive produced by David Fincher, LDR isn’t just a “show” — it’s a genre-hopping, jaw-dropping parade of visual chaos. Each short film comes from a different team of artists and animators around the world, which means no two episodes ever look or feel the same. What ties them together? That delicious mix of sci-fi, horror, and fantasy that Miller says he’s constantly curating like a madman with access to unlimited rendering power.
Volume 4 will include 10 brand-new original shorts that feature T. rex gladiator battles and even overworked household appliances just trying to unionize before their circuits fry. One second you’re watching a sentient washing machine spiral into madness, and the next you’re witnessing a galactic bloodbath in hyper-stylized, high-frame-rate glory. It’s unpredictable, gorgeous, and exactly what you’d expect from a show that once gave us sentient yogurt.
Fincher and Miller have always treated LDR as a sandbox for the world’s best animators to break the rules and go nuts. “One of my biggest joys in making LDR — and I think David shares this feeling — is when artists or directors make choices you would never make,” Miller says. “Their ideas, shot choices, angles, sense of timing — whatever — is something foreign to your visual language but also awesome.”
That’s the magic of this show: Every episode is a surprise. They can be funny, horrifying, deeply moving, or just mind-melting in the best way. And it never overstays its welcome — most stories clock in under 20 minutes, giving you high-concept world-building with the efficiency of a perfectly sharpened blade to the brainstem. It’s the kind of show, along with other hidden gems we’ve likewise praised, that quietly justifies your entire Netflix subscription — bold, brilliant, and criminally underrated.
