Warner Bros. Reveals First Look At New Looney Tunes Cartoons

Warner Bros. is bringing back one of its most famous franchises in Looney Tunes, and now we’ve got our first look at the finished short ahead of its Monday premiere. The full short will debut on Monday as part of the Annecy International Animation Festival, followed by a deep dive into the process of creating it on Wednesday. That will be led by executive producer Peter Browngardt and supervising director Alex Kirwan, who will also show storyboards, animatics, and a few more completed shorts at the presentation (via Variety).

The first photo gives us an idea of what the new animated shorts are aiming to capture, showing Elmer Fudd attempting to cleave Bugs Bunny, though thankfully Bugs is one step ahead. The image has a rather vintage feel, and that isn’t just regarding the visual style. It also pertains to the process of creating the new shorts, which went back to the original process of animation first and writing second.

First, the animators craft jokes and gags while they are creating the episode, creating scenarios that are funny to them and pack a visual punch, and then the narrative stems from that. “I feel like that is what made the classic Looney Tunes so fantastic,” Browngardt said. “It wasn’t screenwriters. They were thinking completely visual all the time. I feel like the best cartoon animation comes from that process.”

As you can see in the image above, the shorts aim to capture that classic quality of the characters, though there is some modernization in the dialogue. The method seems to have worked, as Warner Bros. showed off an in-progress short at last year’s Warners animation showcase and it received quite a bit of praise. Since then Warner Bros has already finished 20 more shorts and aims to have around 200 plus once all is said and done, and hopes are high that they will receive just as enthusiastic a response from the crowd once they are revealed.

“Annecy is going to be a blast,” Browngardt said. “This is my fifth year going and it’s one of the coolest places around. It’s beautiful. They love the art, and you see that every day you’re there. It’s just a wonderful thing.”

Are you excited for more Looney Tunes? Let us know in the comments!