After a chaotic corporate merger and a sale to a small distributor, this movie is finally getting its day in the limelight. The first ever fully animated Looney Tunes film in the nearly 100 years of the franchise’s existence is here. As someone who has had a deep connection to the classic shorts for most of my life, this was a movie that excited me greatly. Not just getting a new Looney Tunes movie, but one that was fundamentally made with the same mindset of cartoonist freedom that made the original shorts great. No forced celebrities, no basketball, no crossovers, no live-action, no CGI. Just simple hand-drawn shenanigans that feel right at home with the old shorts. And honestly, it lived up to my expectations in terms of being a fun and well-animated film that treats these characters with far more respect than they have gotten in years.

The film’s story and plot are relatively simple and, honestly, mostly a vessel for the jokes. Porky and Daffy are adoptive brothers who grew up being raised by a man named Farmer Jim. They inherit his home and have to find a job to fix a hole in their roof or face losing it. When they get a job at the local gum factory, they discover a conspiracy involving the new product rollout that involves aliens and mind control. With the help of Petunia Pig, a flavor tester at the factory, the duo has to work together to save the world from this fittingly loony threat.

At a fundamental level, this is all a Looney Tunes movie needs to be. Setting up a simple story that involves the characters and having them react to and off of the situation. The alien backdrop feels very much like a chaotically goofy version of films like They Live or The Thing. While there is a throughline of character focus with Porky and Daffy’s relationship and Porky’s budding romance with Petunia, they are mostly window dressing for the comedy. That is, these are well put together elements to help the story move forward and are satisfying to see play out, but they aren’t the main focus compared to the comedy and animation. The important thing is that the relationships and character focus feel natural and not forced. Remember when Space Jam 2 gave Bugs a fake-out death scene where he says “That’s all Folks’”? Yeah, having a simple and traditional approach is probably a better way to put these characters into a larger story.

Comedy is the most important thing to get right with a series like Looney Tunes. Do it correctly, and a project soars. Do it wrong, and it crashes and burns. Thankfully, not only is this film genuinely hilarious, it might be the best approach the series has taken in melding the classic humor with a more modern sensibility. This doesn’t mean the route of references or modern vernacular like most films try to do. Rather, it takes small elements and tweaks them. Introducing a few modern cultural elements in the background, like social media, coffee shops, and boba tea, but not placing things that directly reference a modern trend or something that is a flash in the pan. Unlike something like Ralph Breaks the Internet, which references stuff like Chewbacca Mom or ancient Fortnite dances, this film uses modern things as more of a garnish and both keeps the focus on the more timeless elements of the comedy and doesn’t dip into elements that will feel dated in a few years. A lot of the comedy is the usual fare of slapstick and personality clashing, but even if it’s somewhat familiar, the execution of it ensures that it feels new. Since the animation is high quality, the slapstick and execution of certain jokes are on point. Not to mention that there’s a feeling of nonsensicality when it comes to logic and focus with certain elements, which is very much welcome. When the twist with the alien was revealed, I found it both so stupid and genuinely hilarious because it fits with the logic a character would have in this world.

As someone who loves animation and feels that Hand-Drawn work has been treated extremely poorly in this country, it’s great to not only see a theatrical film with high-quality 2D animation, but featuring characters who don’t often get the chance to have this level of quality anymore. Fluidity is something of a lost art with 2D animation since stiffer animation has been prioritized by most projects for cost. Here, with more time and money, the artists put out work that is right in line with the classic shorts of the early to mid-40s that they aimed to emulate, especially the work of Bob Clampett. Sometimes, the animation can elevate the comedy due to movement or exaggeration. There is one sequence involving Daffy that is him going on an insane tangent to the public. That alone is funny, but the exaggeration and the wild and fluid expressions elevate both the emotions expressed and how goofy the situation is. Even simple expressions and concepts can be amusing. Farmer Jim is animated mostly as a still painting, and the workarounds done to make him move around are genuinely hilarious. Plus, some designs and drawings do a good job of tastefully referencing prior shorts. Honestly, this movie is worth watching in theaters if only to see animation like this on the big screen. The Looney Tunes were originally made to be shown in theaters, so this is practically a return to a lost tradition.

Another thing that helps the films is that, unlike a lot of Looney Tunes projects, the characters are limited to a few of the main ones. Most projects tend to stuff themselves with almost every single major star character without really justifying why any outside of Bugs and maybe Daffy need to be there. Fortunately, this is the Daffy and Porky show, and aside from Petunia, who does serve a purpose story and comedy-wise, there are no forced cameos. Only background references to a few minor characters and a background appearance from a one-off character from the Daffy short, who doesn’t speak. This is beneficial to the film since it allows the film to feel cleaner and less cluttered in giving attention to multiple characters. Only focusing on a few not only makes the plot simpler, but it also allows the character dynamics to be stronger. Daffy and Porky both have that classic dynamic from the older shorts, but there’s an added layer of brotherly interactions in regards to both affection and irritation that’s welcome. Porky and Petunia, while not a complex romance, is cute and amusing. And honestly, that’s all you need. The shorts were driven by a similar approach of simple personalities clashing off of each other, so maintaining that here helps this film immensely. So many kids’ movies like to overindulge on plot threads and characters even when they aren’t needed (hello Despicable Me sequels), so it’s great to get a film that’s refreshingly simple in its approach.

Characterizing Petunia is also something the film does well. Daffy and Porky’s personalities are very set in stone due to years of work, but Petunia has sort of been slotted as the latter’s girlfriend and not much else. She’s still in that role, but the film gives her more quirky traits about her taking her job very seriously and being as much of a goofball as the other two. I know that the history of female characters has been sort of contentious with this series. I mean, the shorts being originally developed by guys mostly in their 20s and 30s, so I don’t expect it to hit that mark all the time. Even so, unlike Lola Bunny, who was more positioned as a marketing figure and the token girl trope from the 90s rather than a character that properly fits in the world of the Looney Tunes, this film makes Petunia work so well by being more in line with the types of personalities the franchise thrives on. It’s not groundbreaking, but appreciated given that the series does deserve a few more female characters who feel right at home with the series. I mean, the only other options are what, Granny and Witch Hazel?

All in all, I’m genuinely happy this got to see the light of day. The state of animation in general in America is dire due to job losses and a lack of opportunities. So many projects have been canned due to studio cutbacks. A hand-drawn film being in theaters at all is something we only see every few years or so, and we need to savor that. At this point, I’ll take what I can get with this getting released and new Looney Tunes Blu-rays still rolling out. Heck, the other Looney Tunes film in development that WB wrote off last year, Coyote vs Acme, might end up being saved by the same distributors that picked this up. This film is the best celebration not just of the Looney Tunes, but of classical animation I’ve seen in a while. Probably the best comparison I can make is that it’s The SpongeBob Movie of this decade in terms of being a wild and free expression of the medium’s strengths and artistry while also just being fun. It’s a simple movie, hence why there isn’t a lot of depth to go into, but what it does, it does exceedingly well. The fact that this came out around the same time as the sterile live-action Snow White remake is a great contrast. That film represents how Hollywood treats animation with no respect and will gladly drain it of its strengths to repackage it with bland realism and sell it again. This film embraces the medium and feels far more alive in its efforts to be over the top and weird. I am so glad I got to see this in theaters and support. It’s not likely we will see many more films like it anytime soon, but I’m happy we got this either way.