Hank Hill (Mike Judge) may no longer be working for Strickland Propane, but he is still a firm believer in good old combustion engines and American machinery. So when he finds a strange electric truck parked right outside of his home, all hell breaks loose.
This is the premise of an episode of Season 15 of “King of the Hill” which screened for audiences at the 2026 Annecy Animation Festival ahead of the July 20 season premiere on Hulu.
Alongside the episode, audiences got a chance to watch the trailer for Season 15, which teases storylines of Bobby (Pamela Adlon) branching out at his restaurant job and starting a relationship with Connie (Lauren Tom), while Peggy (Kathy Najimy) gets really competitive in a new hobby.
Co-creator Mike Judge was in Annecy to present the episode, as well as to receive an Honorary Crystal Award for his contributions to animation. Annecy artistic director Marcel Jean introduced him by saying he long ago gave an interview saying Judge was the one guest he hadn’t had at Annecy but desperately wanted to bring. “Finally, he’s here,” he said.
The award was presented by Titmouse Inc. co-founder Chris Prynoski, who Judge joked had never been seen in public “without his Budweiser hat on” until now. In his acceptance speech, Judge recalled first getting into animation at age 7 when watching “Gumby” and becoming curious about how the characters move. He would go on to take a class at the YMCA and became obsessed with flip book animation, but eventually grew out of it and got an engineering job. It wasn’t until he read an article about an animator from Texas named Paul Claerhout (“Jimmy Neutron,” “Bob’s Burgers”) that Judge decided to give the medium another go.
“Animators are a unique breed,” Judge said in his speech. “It takes a certain type of weirdo to make a film, one frame at a time, and I found that those are my people. So thank you to all the weirdos like myself.”
The episode mostly deals with Hank’s freakout over the electric truck and panicking over what his friends and neighbors would think of him owning such a monstrosity. Ever open-minded, the moment Hank starts reading about the truck’s features to try and figure out who owns it, he gets a little curious and almost changes his mind about the technology. This doesn’t last long, because his friends immediately force him to shut down those thoughts, eliciting big laughs from the festival audience. Meanwhile, Bobby is soft-launching his relationship, which leads to Chane punishing Bobby by firing his restaurant partner, the Goose to Bobby’s Maverick.
Following the screening, Judge took the stage again with co-creator Greg Daniels and showrunner Saladin K. Patterson for a brief Q&A session about the “King of the Hill” revival. When asked about observational humor and getting ideas for episodes, Patterson revealed this particular episode was partially inspired by him driving a Tesla.
“I used to show off by letting it come and drive itself to come pick me up,” the showrunner said. “The writers loved that joke, and it got turned into the episode.”
When asked about the lasting impact of the series and whether it represents America, Judge agreed, partially. “I suppose it does represent a certain part of America. It’s set in Texas, but I think anywhere you have these kinds of guys and engines and lawnmowers. Hank is everybody’s uncle.”
Part of the unique appeal of the show, particularly the revival, is seeing the characters age and evolve over time. For Daniels, the decades since the show aired has made him relate to Hank Hill in unexpected ways. “Without sharing too much, I thought it was very funny to give Hank something called narrow urethra, which I thought we’d made up. Now I see it’s actually very real,” he said with a laugh. That being said, though the creators spoke about having long-term plans for the series, and despite the success of this revival, don’t expect “King of the Hill” to age up the characters again. “I don’t think we’re ever going to have them get into a nursing home,” Judge said.
When the subject of a feature film came up, Judge recalled that conversations did happen in the ‘90s about doing a possible “King of the Hill” movie, but they never materialized. “It took ‘The Simpsons’ all the way until like 2007, so it takes time. I hope the people from Disney and Hulu are listening.”
Leave a Reply