Craig Mazin’s career trajectory remains one of the most fascinating in Hollywood. From penning spoofs (Scary Movie 3, 4, and Superhero Movie) and middling B-comedies (The Hangover Part 2, Identity Theft) to the smash-hit miniseries Chernobyl and HBO’s acclaimed The Last of Us, Mazin consistently keeps audiences guessing about his next move. And barnyard whodunnit, The Sheep Detectives, another left-field turn from the writer, is set to do the same.
George Hardy (Hugh Jackman) lives a quiet life on the outskirts of the fictional village of Denbrook, tending to his sheep and reading them murder mysteries every night. When he is found dead under mysterious circumstances, and a late will turns up leaving £30 million to his estranged daughter Rebecca (Molly Gordon), the local police officer (Nicholas Braun) rounds up the town’s assortment of characters as suspects. But the investigation quickly stalls, which prompts George’s unusually perceptive flock to take matters into their own hooves and solve the crime themselves.
The Sheep Detectives adapts the 2005 novel Three Bags Full, and animated director Kyle Balda helms this with the boisterous spirit of the films he cut his teeth making (Minions, Despicable Me 3). It’s full of wit and energy, and the stacked ensemble – Nicholas Galitzine and Emma Thompson round off the human characters alongside Jackman, Gordon, and Braun – which features voice work from Bryan Cranston, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Chris O’Dowd, Brett Goldstein, and Patrick Stewart, amongst others, are all game for the bit too. There’s a great deal of fun to be had following these ovine sleuths putting their investigative skills to work and stirring up chaos in Denbrook in the process.
A climactic scene involving Lily (Louis-Dreyfus), Mopple (O’Dowd), and Sebastian (Cranston) stumbling upon a slaughterhouse is dark, existential stuff for a family film, but it deftly explores its themes in a moving and heartfelt way. It’s a summation of the script as a whole: cartoonish and fun in its ideas, yet incredibly tangible, authentic, and human in its emotions.
The whodunnit does come as more of an afterthought, but there are still some surprises in the third-act reveals. The investigation itself and suspect interrogation, however, leave something to be desired for those looking for a real knotty and twisty crime caper. Billed as “Knives Out meets Babe,” it definitely leans more into the latter than the former, with shades of Chicken Run’s existential and vegetarianistic ideology thrown in for good measure and flashes of Pixar’s coming-of-age elegance in there as well. When all is said and done, though, few expected the Sheep Whodunnit film to be as poignant as it is. Silly and cute? Yes. A saccharine and fairy-tale portrayal of rural British life? Sure. But with some deep questions on morality to boot.
The Sheep Detectives is out in UK cinemas from May 8th, 2026.
The Sheep Detectives
Summary
Ewe’ll be hard pressed to find a more baa-rilliant murder mystery than The Sheep Detectives this year. It’s a woolly good time.
