I have discussed quite a lot about the recent trends in Hollywood and how most of their focus has been on older films and series. Sequels, reboots, prequels, or spinoffs have been the MO of the business recently and the quality of said output has been mixed to put it charitably. As such, it’s to be expected that if there is something you remember from the past, it’s likely that the prospect of bringing it back has been discussed at some point. However, there is one franchise that comes to my mind in terms of its studio trying to constantly bring it back to relevance even before the recent trends and that is the Looney Tunes.
I’ve made it no secret that I have a deep love for these characters and the original shorts they starred in. They were formative to both my sense of humor and my love for animation in general. Because of that, I am wary of the prospect of any reimagining or reboot that Warner Bros wants to pump out. For every genuinely good project made with these characters in the past few decades, there are dozens of others that are just trend chasers that slap the Looney Tunes brand on top of it. Space Jam, Baby Looney Tunes, Loonatics Unleashed, pick your poison. Even more recently, the brand has been in flux due to the recent Warner Discovery merger. Projects were either canceled, under-promoted, or in the infamous case of the completed film Coyote Vs Acme, thrown out for tax returns. All of this is to say that I don’t trust Warner to treat these characters with the proper respect they deserve.
However, that raises the question, how would I pitch a potential revival or film project for the Looney Tunes? Warner has said that they have a new plan in place for the brand to start by 2028 (even though they had a solid lineup of projects they canned or undervalued so why trust them now). So, a new movie with Bugs or other characters is inevitable. From my vantage point, the most important thing to focus on for a new film is to make something true to the spirit of these characters. While something like Space Jam was profitable, it was also something that never really understood the Looney Tunes outside of distilling the cliches of the shorts and inserting them into a generic family film template. My main rule would be to make a film that focuses only on a Looney Tunes character as a lead. Whether Bugs, Daffy, or whoever else would be suitable, they will be the main characters and not sidekicks to whatever trendy celebrity WB would want to attach.
However, the mention of celebrities moves to my second point, using the Muppet films as a template. The Muppets are similar in a lot of ways to the Looney Tunes in being a troupe of characters that have struggled to maintain relevance with their parent company not understanding how to use them. However, the conceit of either placing the Looney Tunes as performers in-universe or playing different characters in an isolated story in a similar way to the Muppets is an approach that I feel would play to similar strengths. The Looney Tunes have used the conceit of Bugs and the rest being performers in the real world has been used before, so why don’t fix what isn’t broken? Not to mention that since the Looney Tunes have always had a Hollywood feel both in satire and their general sensibilities, cameos of celebrities wouldn’t feel out of place as long as they are tasteful or funny. Supporting characters can be human and played by known actors too, but they should be supporters of the main cartoon characters rather than taking too much attention away.
I also believe that the Looney Tunes should be hand-drawn animated or in very stylized 3D animation. These characters look the best in the way they were created and trying to shove a character designed in the principles of one style into another is difficult. That’s not to say that it can’t be done since a few 3D animated shorts were made in the early 2010s that effectivity used the techniques of 2D in a 3D environment. However, I still feel that hand-drawn is the way to go. Space Jam: A New Legacy showed the nadir of the opposite approach where the characters were made to look super realistic in CGI and it clashes with their basic designs while looking a bit uncanny. I also think that the series is due for more fully animated films as well. While I feel a Roger Rabbit-style hybrid of live-action and animation would work as it did in the past, we are only getting the first fully original and fully animated Looney Tunes movie now with The Day the Earth Blew Up (which WB sold to a small distributor for some bizarre reason). Not only is animation the basic ground for these characters, but allowing them to be animated with a larger budget would make them look as good as they did back in the 40s. We haven’t gotten many animated projects with these characters that could take advantage of a larger budget so allowing that would be beneficial.
All in all, I feel that what I think a Looney Tunes film should be is simple in all honestly. Make it animated, focus on the Looney Tunes with no forced gimmicks or trends, and emulate the story or setup approaches that the Muppet films have taken since they are similar in a lot of ways. I sincerely doubt that we will get a film like this though. Not only because of Warner not being in the best mindset creatively when it comes to a lot of things but with how they have treated the Looney Tunes with such disregard. It feels like the current management only threw out what the previous group greenlit out of spite and a desire to put their vision forward even if said prior direction was going on a good path. Space Jam: A New Legacy had its original director thrown out because he wanted to make a more satirical film about brands and how studios focus too much on them, and WB changed it so that the angle was played completely straight. Even so, I still feel there are plenty of creative minds that want to do these characters justice. The fact that the films they were featured in still resonate after decades and that these characters are still somewhat visible in the public eye is comforting. I know that the right opportunity to give them a great movie is around the corner. It’s just a matter of if the situation is right and if the right people are given the reins. Even with the instability of Warner and the animation industry right now, stranger things have happened before I suppose.
