Lesbian Space Princess is a 2025 Australian adult animated science fiction comedy film written and directed by Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese in their directorial debuts. It features the voices of Shabana Azeez, Bernie Van Tiel, Gemma Chua-Tran, Richard Roxburgh, Kween Kong and comedy troupe Aunty Donna.
The film had its world premiere at the 75th Berlin International Film Festival on 16 February 2025, where the film won the Teddy Award, and was released in Australia on 11 September 2025. The film received positive reviews from critics.
Plot
Anxious and introverted protagonist Saira lives a sheltered life on the planet of Clitopolis, where she is princess, daughter of two neglectful lesbian queens. After she is devastated by a break-up with Kiki, her partner of two weeks, Kiki is kidnapped by Straight White Maliens, who intend to use her as ransom to steal Saira's labrys in order to power their "chick magnet", realising a 24-hour time limit before they would drop Kiki into acidic "homebrew". Unlike other royal lesbians of Clitopolis, Saira, to her parents' disappointment, has been unable to summon her labrys, a symbol of lesbian power.
Saira steals a "Problematic Ship" to embark on a quest across the galaxy to save Kiki. Along the way, she crashes into a moon after the Ship becomes visibly low on moon crystals. There, she falls into an abandoned moon crystal mine and takes a central crystal. She meets Willow, a former gay-pop idol who left their band because Gay Pop Planet imprisoned them from making indie music. A pink sludge grows as they talk, soon trapping Saira and stabbing her leg. Willow gives encouragement to her, as the sludge is exacerbated by her lack of self-worth. The two narrowly escape after dropping the crystal into what soon devolves into a completely engulfed moon.
The pair then travel to meet a drag queen named Blade, who is on a throne, in hopes of her helping Saira to summon her labrys. Willow tries to find ways to sneak her way into getting Blade's attention, yet Saira scours the party. After talking to a woman who had gone through a similar break-up to her own, she musters the confidence to shout for Blade to lower herself down. Reluctantly, Blade agrees, and helps her learn to be kind to herself. Saira enters her subconscious, and faces disturbing entities stemming from her experiences with neglect and self-loathing, but she overcomes them and summons her labrys through her crotch. Blade tries to steal Saira's labrys, but is stopped when Willow and Saira fight back. Saira decapitates her with the labrys, yet she falls unconscious.
Willow confesses romantic feelings for Saira through a song, and the two have sex. Their romance is short-lived, though, as they break up after the Maliens lower her time limit to save Kiki, with Saira believing that she needs to prioritise saving her. Therefore, Willow teleported out of the Ship. While nearing the planet of the Straight White Maliens, Saira encounters a giant metal structure resembling testicles and a penis that guns down the Ship with semen. Beaten and with the Ship in bad condition, Saira reaches the surface of the planet and gives the Maliens her labrys to rescue Kiki. When Kiki refuses to re-enter a relationship with her, Saira's self-doubts re-emerge, causing her labrys to dematerialise.
This causes the Maliens to attack her, but she overcomes her doubts again, and uses the re-summoned labrys to power the Maliens' chick magnet. The chick magnet does not work, instead killing a random woman, and the Maliens realise that they overvalued their desire for attention from women, and decide to date each other as a throuple. Kiki is left on the planet, as Saira returns to Clitopolis, happily single, having learnt to love herself. The end credits showcase her being more social, going with her mothers to Blade (who is still alive despite being decapitated) for family therapy, receiving Willow's hit album about her and going on new adventures with the Ship (who is no longer problematic, instead being an ally).
Voice cast
Shabana Azeez as Saira, an introverted princess of Clitopolis who is in a relationship with Kiki, who breaks up with her for being "too needy" Bernie Van Tiel as Kiki, a bounty hunter who is kidnapped by villains naming themselves the Straight White Maliens, so they can get Saira to use her Royal Labrys in their "chick magnet" Gemma Chua-Tran as Willow, a non-binary goth singer, songwriter, and spacefarer, who Saira is romantically attracted to during her journey to save Kiki from kidnappers. Willow uses they/them pronouns. Richard Roxburgh as Problematic Ship, the vessel Saira takes to try to save Kiki Aunty Donna as the Straight White Maliens, the villains who kidnap Kiki Mark Bonanno as the Leader, leader of the Straight White Maliens Zachary Ruane as Larry, one of the members of the Straight White Maliens Broden Kelly as Josh, one of the members of the Straight White Maliens Jordan Raskopoulos as Queen Leanne, one of the mothers of Saira Madeleine Sami as Queen Anne, one of the mothers of Saira Kween Kong as Blade, a drag queen, and owner of a club, who acts like she is going to help Saira and helps summon her Royal Labrys, but ends up betraying her, trying to seize this precious part of Saira for herself Demi Lardner as the DNM Girl, who Saira meets in the bathroom of a club Reuben Kaye as Safety Bubble, that protects Clitopolis from danger
Production The film was greenlit for production under the South Australian Film Corporation and Adelaide Film Festival's Film Lab: New Voices mentoring and funding initiative, following the inaugural round of the scheme in 2021, which led to sci-fi thriller Monolith premiering at the 2022 Adelaide Film Festival and enjoying international success. The Lesbian Space Princess team were eligible for up to in screen production grant funding for their script.
Lesbian Space Princess is the debut feature film for Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese, who wrote and directed the film. Hough Hobbs is an artist, and writer/director Varghese a former award-winner at Tropfest. The film was produced by Tom Phillips of We Made A Thing Studios. The story is inspired by the filmmakers' own lives. The graphic artists who worked on the film used Toon Boom Harmony, VFX, and high-end compositing. The production team worked at Artisan Post Group's space at Lot Fourteen, Adelaide, who worked on post-production of the Netflix series Stateless and ABC series Aftertaste, among others. The film's soundtrack was composed by Michael Darren and Matthew Hadley, while Ben Fernandez contributed to its editing.
In May 2024, Adelaide Film Festival launched its "Adelaide Film Festival Goes to Cannes" program, partnering with Cannes Film Festival's film market, the Marché du Film, to showcase five local projects in an official presentation; Lesbian Space Princess was one of the five chosen, and Leela Varghese joined nine other emerging filmmakers at Cannes. Booklet
In November 2025, in an interview with JoySauce, Varghese and Hobbs said they had been dating one another and applied to an initiative for first-time directors, and were surprised they got picked, with Varghese praising Azeez's talent and voice as "magnetic," noting Azeez had been in "every single short film" she had ever made, and found the film's ascent exciting, "empowering", and "enriching." When asked about awareness of transphobia in feminism when writing the film, Varghese noted that she was painfully aware and was not "afraid for it to be a source of conversation", while calling transphobia in the UK as "really scary." Hughes said she, and Varghese, were conscious of the symbology around the labrys, saying it "used to be a TERF symbol" and that they debated including it, but added it in because "it should belong to all lesbians, including trans lesbians," while noting that Queen Leanne, a trans woman, summons "the labrys in trans colors" and felt that the "positive representation of inclusion was more powerful" than possible negatives. Hughes also said that the film looked like a cartoon but felt "like an anime," calling it a mix of Invader Zim and Adventure Time, with "a really queer lens on it."
Release Lesbian Space Princess had four sold-out preview screenings at the Adelaide Film Festival on 27 October 2024. In December 2024, it was announced that the film would have its world premiere at the 75th Berlin International Film Festival in the Panorama program on 16 February 2025. It later screened on 5 June 2025 at the 72nd Sydney Film Festival, where it won the Audience Award for "Best Australian Feature".
The film was released in Australian cinemas on 11 September 2025, by Umbrella Entertainment. The film also sold to the United States (Fandor), Canada (Renaissance Media), Germany (Salzgeber), Spain (), Singapore (Anticipate Pictures), Ukraine (KyivMusicFilm), and the United Kingdom and Ireland (Peccadillo Pictures). It was released in the US on 31 October 2025 and in the UK and Ireland on 19 June 2026, after being previously scheduled to be released on 22 May. The film premiered on various video on demand platforms on 18 November, including Prime Video.
Reception
Cassie Tongue, writing in The Guardian, gave the film four out of five stars, saying its script is "sly and witty", but that the film's "real power... is that it's a world where both light touches and deep feelings can coexist". Steve Erickson of Gay City News described the film as "delightful" by having a hero triumphing "over heartbreak and sexism" and young adult sensibility, and called it a "splendid comedy" influenced by Revolutionary Girl Utena and Neon Genesis Evangelion, which is "casually multicultural and sex-positive" while focusing on the importance of self-love. Juan Barquin of MovieWeb praised the film for its "charm" and humour, noted the influence of Sailor Moon, Twilight, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Steven Universe, BoJack Horseman, and Rick and Morty (as well as other Adult Swim series) with "overt queerness" and an "irreverent tone", with sequences inspired by anime, and said that the film is designed for viewers "who once thrived on Tumblr and/or AO3", calling it a "terminally online" film.
The National Film and Sound Archive described the film as reframing "science fiction as a space for queer self‑determination" and being campy in such a way that it "blends space opera spectacle with offbeat humour and queer coming-of-age charm," or Prague Reporter describing the film as "sometimes...a little too on-the-nose" but it has a "lot of heart, and takes its axe to queer culture right alongside mainstream sensibilities". Skwigly described the film as a "laugh-out-loud adventure through the far reaches of queer outer space" and a "riotous, candy-coloured joy from start to finish...that embraces LGBTQIA+ and culturally diverse voices". Tara Brady of The Irish Times called the film "scrappy", "funny" and a "small miracle of invention" considering the small budget; he also described the film as "somewhere between Sailor Moon and Rick and Morty", with each frame packed with "visual jokes, LGBTQ references and pop-cultural detours" while imagining a universe where being queer is "simply the chaotic and colourful norm". Brady praised the animation as having a "rough-hewn, heartfelt charm" and stated that even though not every joke works, "the generous, camp sensibility buoys the material".