Looney Tunes

[Matt]

In another brilliant move by David Zaslav's Discovery/WB, they have removed all Looney Tunes shorts from Max, on the same weekend as the new Looney Tunes film premiered.

This might be connected to WBD exploring a potential sale of the Looney Tunes franchise

How utterly grotesque, but who knows, maybe it will go to someone who will release everything in a sensible way.

Or it can go to Disney where they'll lock everything up in the vault with the rest of their cartoons.

[beamish14]

In another brilliant move by David Zaslav's Discovery/WB, they have removed all Looney Tunes shorts from Max, on the same weekend as the new Looney Tunes film premiered.

Ketchup Entertainment released The Day the Earth Blew Up, not WB. They might also take on Coyote V. Acme

[dx23]

In another brilliant move by David Zaslav's Discovery/WB, they have removed all Looney Tunes shorts from Max, on the same weekend as the new Looney Tunes film premiered.

This might be connected to WBD exploring a potential sale of the Looney Tunes franchise

How utterly grotesque, but who knows, maybe it will go to someone who will release everything in a sensible way.

Or it can go to Disney where they'll lock everything up in the vault with the rest of their cartoons.

Not surprised if this happens. The whole AT&T purchase of WB and then the subsequent purchase by Discovery has worked like a hedge fund buying any property. They have acquired a conglomerate just to sell it in scrap parts. Wouldn't be surprise if everything at WB is for sale at the right price, from Looney Tunes, to Hanna Barbera properties, to DC Comics, to each of their networks. The funniest thing is that Zaslav and his group,are just content producers derived from their years peddling shitty reality TV. For Zaslav, it has to be cheap and fast. Nothing at WB is like that, so it's the main reason as to why he keeps cutting cost at every division except reality TV and pushes his shit on Max over anything else.

Wouldn't be surprised if Disney buys them, along with DC Comics, just for the sake of having it, but like Matt said, it would go straight to the vault. As much as I commend Disney's board for continuing their diversity, association with the LGBTQ community and have somewhat of a stance against the MAGA/GOP racist bullshit, their over sensitivity to art, in films, TV shows and other media, makes me think that the moment they get Looney Tunes, they would sanitize the property to the point that it's not recognizable, and won't know what to do with it like they don't know what to do with the Muppets. What made Looney Tunes stand out is that almost everyone in their roster is the complete opposite of a Disney character. The only Disney character that would fit in the Looney Tunes world would be Donald, and maybe Chip and Dale.

On the other hand, a company who could certainly buy Looney Tunes and do something big with them is Universal. They have been on the short end of the stick when mergers and shakeups happen in the industry and how it affects their big theme park business. Most of Universal rides have change from their IPs (Back to the Future, King Kong, Jaws) to third party licensing (Marvel, Harry Potter, Simpsons, Men In Black, King's Feature, Nintendo, Dr Seuss) Two of these properties have become now part of Disney (Marvel/Simpsons) and the rides/areas can't be updated or improved. For everything else, Universal is either overpaying to have (Harry Potter World/Nintendo/Transformers) or has become somewhat irrelevant in the eyes of the consumer (Kings Feature, Men in Black, Dr. Seuss). So far, the only own IP's they continue to use is How to Train Your Dragon, Minions, Shrek, Universal Monsters, and to lesser extent, Fast and Furious, ET and Woody Woodpecker. By getting Looney Tunes, Universal could certainly do what Six Flags never achieved. On the flip side, Universal could treat Looney Tunes in the same way they have treated other acquisitions like all the Harvey Cartoons (Casper, Richie Rich, Little Wendy), the UPA lineup (Mr Magoo, Gerald McBoing Boing), the Gold Key characters (Turok, Magnus Robot Fighter, Solar, Mighty Samson) or Felix the Cat, Little Lulu, and the dozens more classic characters they own that have disappeared from the public eye since the 90's.

In another brilliant move by David Zaslav's Discovery/WB, they have removed all Looney Tunes shorts from Max, on the same weekend as the new Looney Tunes film premiered.

Ketchup Entertainment released The Day the Earth Blew Up, not WB. They might also take on Coyote V. Acme

I know. Still, you would think that WB would get eyeballs in their product if they had it on Max at the same time one of their properties hit the theaters. My kids wanted to see Looney Tunes shorts after we came back from the theater. Instead of being able to watch them on Max, we had to hit Youtube and get some of the BD/DVD sets I have to see them. It's like we are going back to the physical media era since MAX keeps taking more and more stuff off that they own.

[knives]

In another brilliant move by David Zaslav's Discovery/WB, they have removed all Looney Tunes shorts from Max, on the same weekend as the new Looney Tunes film premiered.

This might be connected to WBD exploring a potential sale of the Looney Tunes franchise

How utterly grotesque, but who knows, maybe it will go to someone who will release everything in a sensible way.

Or it can go to Disney where they'll lock everything up in the vault with the rest of their cartoons.

Please don’t curse me that way.

[Matt]

You couldn't make it up: Zaslav is literally tearing down Termite Terrace.

[beamish14]

You couldn't make it up: Zaslav is literally tearing down Termite Terrace.

This is not the original Termite Terrace, but it’s still of immense historical significance

[dx23]

I still can't understand how a guy who has taken the valuation of the company from $71 a share to $9 since he took over as CEO is still in a position of power. By every metric, from Wall Street to actual profitability, the guy has tanked one of the biggest media companies in the world and still dismantling the history of the company from the inside.

[pistolwink]

Yeah, but he did greenlight The Alto Knights!

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

I still can't understand how a guy who has taken the valuation of the company from $71 a share to $9 since he took over as CEO is still in a position of power. By every metric, from Wall Street to actual profitability, the guy has tanked one of the biggest media companies in the world and still dismantling the history of the company from the inside.

Not to sound like a knee-jerk Zaslav defender or anything, but the $77 peak in 2021 was connected to a hedge fund scam and nobody at the time actually thought the stock was worth anything close to that. Discovery stock had generally been between $20-30 in the years prior (and very quickly returned to that level after the fund imploded) and obviously going from that to its current level isn't anything to be proud of.

[hearthesilence]

Looking it up, it looks like the original Termite Terrace was torn down in the 1940s and replaced by another building, but that was also when it was located at Warner's Sunset lot. It finally relocated to Burbank in 1955, arguably during its prime as within a few years after the move the unit would produce What's Opera, Doc? and later the only Bugs Bunny short to win an Oscar. Pretty hectic time accoring to Wikipedia:

With the advent of the 3-D film craze in 1953, Warner Bros. shut its cartoon studio down in June of that year, fearing that 3-D cartoon production would be too expensive (only one Warner Bros. cartoon was ever produced in 3-D, Jones' Lumber Jack-Rabbit starring Bugs Bunny). The creative staff dispersed (Jones, for example, went to work at Disney on Sleeping Beauty, Maltese went to Walter Lantz Productions, and Freleng went into commercial work). Warner Bros. Cartoons re-opened five months after its close, following the end of the 3-D craze. In 1955, the staff moved into a brand new facility on the main Warner Bros. lot in Burbank. KTLA television took over the old studio location on Van Ness; the old Warner Sunset Studios is today called Sunset Bronson Studios.

[captveg]

Zaslav did initially recommit to theaters after the fallout from Kilar's 2021 day-and-date streaming decision for new theatrical films. Possibly his only thoroughly good decision - and sending a few recent films to Max has undercut it.

[dx23]

Max is practically empty, with a heavy load of their catalogue being licensed to Tubi of all places. I really don't know why Max still exist other than to serve the same purpose that HBOGO had before it dissipated into the night with the advent of HBOMAX

[soundchaser]

Warner Bros. sells Coyote vs. Acme to Ketchup Entertainment. I was mixed on The Day the Earth Blew Up, but this one has always seemed promising. I'm glad, if nothing else, that it'll be seeing the light of day, even if the method by which it had to do so is somewhat infuriating.

[captveg]

I'll be seeing it in theaters. Will Forte & Wile E. Coyote seem like a comedy duo that is to my sensibilities.

[dx23]

Didn't WBDiscovery get tax breaks for Coyote vs Acme, Batgirl and Scoob 2? Weren't all these films supposed to be destroyed?

[captveg]

Didn't WBDiscovery get tax breaks for Coyote vs Acme, Batgirl and Scoob 2? Weren't all these films supposed to be destroyed?

Not for Coyote vs. Acme. Batgirl & Scoob 2 were canceled in August 2022 before post-production finished, with the tax credit occurring in early 2023 (for 2022).

Coyote vs. Acme had its release canceled in November 2023 with the intention of being a tax write-off. However, as it was already finished through post-production the studio acquiesced to shopping the film instead of writing it off. It never appeared as a line item on tax write-offs, allowing it to finally now be sold.