Erik Matti’s long-awaited follow-up to 2018’s Buybust has begun shooting.

Anne Curtis returns alongside Gerald Anderson in a bigger, darker, and bloodier chapter.
Photo courtesy of Netflix
The first look at the expanded world of BuyBust: The Undesirables was unveiled today at JAFF Creative Asia 2025 in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Acclaimed Filipino director Erik Matti, together with Indonesia’s Joko Anwar, took center stage at today’s Creator-to-Creator session to spotlight Netflix’s continued commitment to investing in original content for the region’s library and exploring the brand’s role in the ever-evolving opportunities available to creatives across the region.

The filmmakers’ session served as the perfect platform to announce Netflix’s first collaboration with Matti, whose creative direction and meticulous character exploration in BuyBust: The Undesirables make the project one to watch out for. The clip offered a glimpse into the depth of Matti’s world-building and reintroduced viewers to several returning characters from the 2018 film, including Anne Curtis and the addition of Gerald Anderson, alongside a slate of new characters and an even bolder narrative that pushes the original story to new heights.

During his panel at JAFF, Matti shared that shortly after the film’s release in 2018, they partnered with Netflix Philippines to expand the original Buybust universe through a 9-episode series set to be released sometime in 2026. When asked about the expanded universe of BuyBust on Netflix and what it will focus on, he said “We moved on from the drug war story and we made it about rich and poor — the powerful and the powerless. We wanted to talk about the Philippines as a country and whether it was impossible to ‘clean it up’ without going political. We are focusing on real characters and the real conflicts of each of them.”

BuyBust: The Undesirables is poised to underscore not only Netflix’s ongoing commitment to expanding its repository of robust original Southeast Asian titles, but also the brand’s dedication to elevating the most compelling and distinctive creative voices in the region.

A vengeful ex-cop (Curtis) and a haunted corporate outcast (Anderson) are drawn together by the murder of a senator’s daughter and a citywide manhunt for the mysterious drug lord known only as “Judas.” When the trail leads to Matungao, an anarchic exile zone outside the Capital where the rule of law has long been abandoned, the two unlikely allies must navigate betrayal at every turn, unmask the real Judas, and decide how much of themselves they’re willing to sacrifice in a society that treats human life as disposable.