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Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 getting major update at Anime Expo 2026. The return to Night City edges closer... Get ready, chooms! It's time to head back to Night City. Netflix, CD PROJEKT RED, and Studio TRIGGER are returning to Anime Expo this July to give us our first real look at the highly anticipated Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2. If you've been itching for more neon-soaked, high-octane anime action since the massive success of the original series in 2022, your wait is almost over. Following up on last year's massive announcement at Anime Expo 2025 - where the renewal was officially confirmed with a teaser poster and logo - the creators are heading back to Los Angeles to show off what they've been cooking up. Of course, Netflix first teased a universe expansion in September 2024 during Geeked Week. Here is everything you need to know about the upcoming Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 panel and what we can expect to see. When and where is the Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 panel? CD PROJEKT RED has confirmed that a massive panel dedicated to the anime's second installment will take place during Anime Expo 2026. * Date: Friday, July 3, 2026 * Time: 7:30 PM PT * Location: Crypto.com Arena, Los Angeles The panel will be hosted by popular content creator Danny Motta and will feature some of the heavy hitters behind the series. Joining him on stage will be showrunner Bartosz Sztybor and executive producer Saya Elder from CD PROJEKT RED, alongside series director Kai Ikarashi from legendary animation studio TRIGGER. According to the official press release, guests and press will dive deep into the origins and reception of the first Edgerunners series before shifting focus to the creative process behind the new season. But the biggest news? Fans in attendance will be treated to an "exclusive closer look" at the new story. Whether this means a teaser trailer, character designs, or a full-blown first-look clip remains to be seen, but it's guaranteed to be the biggest update on the series since its initial announcement. To date, we still don't know exactly when this series will be hitting our screens, although it could easily be 2027 depending on what this update entails. The official Cyberpunk: Edgerunners X account hyped up the upcoming panel, teasing the introduction of the new standalone story: Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 is coming to @AnimeExpo 2026! Join us for a first look at the next standalone story from Night City, plus a behind-the-scenes discussion with the creators bringing it to life. Hosted by Danny Motta, featuring Director Kai Ikarashi, Showrunner Bartosz Sztybor, Executive Producer Saya Elder, and special guests. We'll see you at Anime Expo on July 3 at 7:30 PM PT at Crypto.com Arena. What is Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 about? While the title carries the Edgerunners name, CD PROJEKT RED and TRIGGER have made it clear that this new installment is a standalone story. The original 2022 series famously followed David Martinez, a street kid who rises through the ranks of Night City's mercenary underworld. Without diving into spoiler territory for the uninitiated, David's story was a complete, contained narrative. We'll be keeping a close eye on Anime Expo 2026 and will bring you all the latest trailers, casting announcements, and release date news for Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 as soon as it breaks. Are you excited to return to Night City? What do you hope to see from the new standalone story? Let us know in the comments down below!

Remembering 'Max'; Netflix's old "AI" Search before AI was even A thing. A trip down memory lane to remember one of Netflix's early and most interesting experiments to help you find what to watch next. If you were streaming on a PlayStation 3 back in 2013, you might remember an incredibly quirky feature popping up on your screen. Over the years, Netflix has experimented with a much more interactive approach to solving choice paralysis and while AI search is currently in testing, we wanted to revisit a feature that's over 10 years old and didn't last forever, but helped you decide what to watch next. They called it Max. No, not HBO Max, just Max, presumably to help you get the MAXimum out of Netflix. Part virtual assistant, part game-show host, Max was an attempt to make deciding what to watch feel like less of a chore and more of an event. Let's take a trip down memory lane and look at one of Netflix's strangest and, sadly, short-lived experiments. According to one write-up, it was developed by Jackbox Games, a games studio that recently teamed up with Netflix Games division to bring a special collection of their Jackbox Party games to the streamer. When did Max launch? Max officially rolled out on June 28, 2013. At the time, it was exclusive to the PlayStation 3 app - which made sense, as the PS3 was the most popular Netflix streaming device in the world back then, though it was among the numerous devices that got discontinued with the most recent Netflix UI overhaul. The idea was to test it on the PS3 first, with the promise that if it performed well, Netflix would expand Max to other devices like the iPad. (Spoiler alert: That didn't quite pan out.) "If Max performs at the level he promises, we'll expand his repertoire and make him available on other devices in the future, likely the iPad next," Todd Yellin, VP of product innovation at Netflix (who was with the company through December 2022), wrote in a blog post announcing the feature, which is no longer online. What did Max actually do? Max was essentially a comedic recommendation engine designed to gamify finding what to watch next. If you didn't know what you wanted to watch, Max would swoop in with some quirky dialogue and guide you through a few mini-games to figure out your mood. If you remember the irreverent trivia game series You Don't Know Jack, Max's vibe will sound incredibly familiar - and for good reason. Netflix actually partnered with Jellyvision (the creators of You Don't Know Jack) to build the interface. When you engaged with Max, he would offer you a few different ways to find a show or movie: * The Rating Game: Max would show you a few titles and ask you to rate them on a 5-star scale. Based on your ratings, he would calculate a personalized suggestion. * The Celebrity Mood Ring: Max would show you two actors (e.g., Bruce Willis and Michelle Williams) and ask who you'd rather watch. He would then suggest a title featuring the actor you chose. * The "Either/Or" Genre Pick: You'd be asked to choose between two comically specific, polar-opposite genres - like "Talking Animals" or "Tortured Genius." * Max's Mystery Call: If you were feeling completely indecisive (or adventurous), you could just let Max pick something blindly for you. A digital gift box would appear on screen, and whatever was inside would immediately start playing. If Max gave you a suggestion, you could ask him for a quick "30-second pitch" where he would playfully explain why you should watch it before you hit play. Celebrity Mood Ring on Max - Ironically, if you selected either of these as of right now, they'd return zero results A video explaining the feature, presented by then Pedro Freitas, Senior Manager of Product Innovation (who we found an inactive Twitter account for but couldn't find out if he's still working at Netflix), diving into the feature, and boy, is it a blast to the past. Many of the features, and even the titles, presented in the UI are long gone. This was back when Netflix let you rate things out of five rather than the thumbs-up, double-thumbs-up, and down we have now. This was back when Disney titles were streaming, so you could watch The Avengers, Brother Bear 2, and Cars. You can also see a Popular on Facebook row from when Netflix (and most apps back then) encouraged you to link to your Facebook so you could share with your friends, and even had your avatar as your Facebook profile picture. Why was Max discontinued? Despite being a fun, novel idea, Max just didn't catch on with the wider subscriber base. It required too much active participation when most people just wanted to hit a button and zone out. Plus, as one user pointed out on Reddit years later, the feature had its flaws. If you used Max multiple times, you'd often end up seeing the same small pool of movies and shows. It felt a bit rigid compared to the seamless, data-driven recommendation algorithms Netflix was perfecting behind the scenes. By May 2015, users started noticing that Max had quietly vanished from their PS3 apps. Netflix customer service reps at the time confirmed that the feature was officially retired because it simply never gained the traction executives had hoped for. The legacy of Max. While Max is long gone, the problem he/it was trying to solve - the endless scrolling and choice paralysis - is something Netflix has continued to tackle. Max's spiritual successors can be seen in features like the short-lived "Surprise Me" (or Play Something) shuffle button, which Netflix introduced in 2021 and quietly discontinued in early 2023. The latest iteration to help you is their vertical video feed, which shows you a preview of popular clips from various Netflix shows or movies in the hope you jump over. Do you remember Max? Do you wish Netflix would bring it back somehow? Let us know in the comments down below.

The creator playbook goes corporate: the tiktok-ification of everything. May 18, 2026 On April 30, 2026, Netflix rolled out "Clips," a personalized, swipeable, vertical video feed inside its mobile app. The company pitched it as a curated highlight reel to help members decide what to watch next without endless scrolling. Five years ago, the wave of TikTok clones was easy to dismiss as a passing imitation cycle. But today, it has become the prerequisite for attention; LinkedIn, sports leagues, retailers, CPG brands, and now streamers have all converged on the same interface, and on the same distribution logic. This is what the creator playbook looks like: vertical, personalized, and scalable. Streaming and broadcast. The pattern across "big streaming" in 2026 is consistent: build a TikTok style discovery layer inside an app originally designed for the living room Netflix Clips, launched April 30, 2026. Image: Netflix Netflix. Netflix Clips ships as a discovery tool. It's an in-app highlight reel of trailers and moments from existing originals. CTO Elizabeth Stone has been explicit that Netflix isn't trying to be TikTok. It's trying to solve the discovery problem TikTok exposed. Disney Verts, launched March 12, 2026. Image: Disney+ Disney+. Disney+ is following close behind. At CES 2026, the company announced plans to roll out Verts. The new feed is expected to mix original short form content, repurposed social clips, and scenes adapted from existing films and series. Tubi Scenes, launched November, 2024. Image: Tubi Peacock and Tubi. Peacock and Tubi have added their own vertical surfaces, with Tubi's "Scenes" feature live since 2024. Fox. Fox Entertainment launched Fox Creator Studios, a digital first division that partners directly with creators on formats and IP, opening with food content from Gordon Ramsay, Rosanna Pansino, Jolly, Sorted Food, Food Theorists, and Little Remy Food. The legacy distribution moat, owning the home screen, the cable bundle, the linear schedule, has been eroded by viewers who now spend hours a day inside vertical feeds. If the streamer can't surface its own content in a format the audience already prefers, the audience will find something else inside TikTok or Shorts that they like just as much. | Company | Product | Launched | Content type | | Tubi | Scenes | 2024 | Short clips from movies and TV shows | | Peacock | Can't Miss Clips | 2025 | Highlights and can't-miss moments | | Netflix | Clips | April 2026 | Trailers, moments from originals | | Disney+ | Verts | March 2026 | Original short form content, repurposed social clips, and adapted scenes. | | Fox Entertainment | Fox Creator Studios | Later 2026 | Food content from Gordon Ramsay, Rosanna Pansino, Jolly etc. | The legacy distribution moat has been eroded by viewers who now spend hours a day inside vertical feeds. Publishers and revenue. If streamers are playing defense on attention, publishers are playing offense on ad dollars. If publishers can match creator economy ad formats with creator economy content surfaces, they can recapture some of the spend that has been migrating to TikTok, Reels, and Shorts. Whether the audience returns the visit is a separate question, but the inventory has to exist before the dollars can. What these examples have in common: the operating principles. Across streaming, publishing, professional networking, and CPG, the same set of principles keeps surfacing. Together, they read as a working definition of the creator playbook applied at corporate scale. Build the vertical surface inside your own product. Netflix Clips, Disney+'s upcoming feed, Tubi Scenes, LinkedIn's video tab, and Time's "Bytes" are all the same thing: a 9:16 feed embedded inside an app the company already owns. Treat distribution as the algorithm. The era of linear schedules and curated homepages is over. Personalized feeds have taken their place, and they need far more content to function. Native voice beats production value. Audiences and algorithms punish content that feels overproduced, generic, or obviously synthetic. What wins is AI for speed paired with a specific, imperfect, human voice. The real story of vertical video in 2026 is which companies are willing to take on the operating model that built TikTok: small autonomous teams, native voice, and scale. The creator playbook is the content strategy of the decade. The brands willing to actually run it are the ones everyone else will be studying in 2027 and beyond.