Screenshot of AI-generated video in Sora
On Thursday, Disney announced a groundbreaking partnership with OpenAI that will license the company's iconic characters and properties to generate clips with OpenAI's video generation app Sora starting in 2026.
This is the first major licensing agreement between OpenAI and a major Hollywood studio and will include over 200 Disney, Marvel, Star Wars, and Pixar characters. But while it's consequential, it's just rubber stamping what's already happening on the app.
Since launch, Sora users have been gleefully churning out absurdist, dark short clips that spoof Disney's intellectual property, especially those created by animation studio Pixar, which mimic its familiar aesthetic and frequently prominently flash Disney and Pixar logos.
It doesn't bode well for how fans will utilize this collaboration once it goes online. One of Sora's most popular trends is producing Disney-style trailers built on very dark humor.
One video shows a Pixar version of the 2008 Holocaust film “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas,” in which Pixar's Hitler sends the young protagonists into gas chambers. Or, if your tastes lean toward current events, how about a Pixar-esque story about Jeffrey Epstein inviting children to his “wonderful” island? Or is it the other way around, a fun adventure movie about kids trying to escape from Epstein's lair? Or was an anthropomorphic folder labeled “Epstein Files” buried alive? Maybe we should make Epstein the main character!
Other original works include the trailer for “Towers.” It's a montage of, you guessed it, a young man piloting a passenger plane into two skyscrapers. This is just one example of a popular subgenre of Sora videos in which Pixar-style characters carry out the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Many of them are clearly racist and promote stereotypes targeting Indians and black people. There are also many cruel gags about people with Down syndrome.
Don't get me wrong, we've only scratched the surface. There's already a full-length compilation of Sora's “Disney” trailers out there, as well as its own little ecosystem of reaction YouTubers howling at Pixar-style depictions of child labor and George Floyd's death as punchlines.
This trend should raise questions about Disney's decision to so closely associate a brand that is a family friend with an app that primarily seems to produce only offensive jokes and that also happens to have a blatant disregard for copyright law. This is especially strange considering Disney is clearly being cautious about other aspects of the deal. Both companies emphasized that the actors' faces and voices were not part of the licensing agreement, which is almost certainly due to copyright issues.
And now that Disney has officially licensed its IP to OpenAI, it seems very likely that Disney's AI deluge will get even worse. It's clear that OpenAI is failing to police existing Disney content, but how will Disney and OpenAI coordinate how Disney's IP is used? This is perhaps an even more pressing question, given that Disney has said that fans will be offered a “curated selection” of Sora videos on its streaming service Disney+.
Learn more about AI: OpenAI's Sora lets teens create videos of school shootings
