Warner Bros. Expanding Animation Enterprise

[Mandalorian]

"Warner Bros. Creates Animation Think Tank"

Warner Bros. is now diving in head first into the world of animation, assembling an animation think tank to create what the studio calls high-end animated motion pictures.

Coming aboard the initiative are John Requa and Glenn Ficarra, who directed Crazy, Stupid, Love for Warners, as well as Phil Lord and Chris Miller, known for their work on Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and the studio's upcoming LEGO: Piece of Resistance. Nicholas Stoller (The Muppets) and Jared Stern (Mr. Popper’s Penguins) are also joining the initiative.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Warner Bros. hopes that once the process takes off, they'll be able to release one animated feature per year. However, the studio will not be creating a new animation division, so the films will still be released under the Warner Bros. Pictures banner. Development will take place at the studio's Burbank HQ, with the actual animation produced at an established animation house.

Beginning in 2015, Warners plans to follow up the LEGO movie with Storks, a project written by Stoller and Doug Sweetland, who directed Pixar's Oscar-winning short film Presto. From there, the studio will release Smallfoot, written by Requa and Ficarra, which has a release date set for 2016.

LEGO: Piece of Resistance, meanwhile, is slated for February 7, 2014

Written by Max Nicholson of IGN

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[Mandalorian]

I'm excited about the prospect of regularly scheduled theatrical animation releases from them. More DC animation on the big screen? I hope so...

[EricJ]

Originally Posted by RJ Smoove

Warner Bros. is now diving in head first into the world of animation, assembling an animation think tank to create what the studio calls high-end animated motion pictures.

Meaning "Let's make sure 'Osmosis Jones', 'Cats Don't Dance' and 'Looney Tunes: Back in Action' don't bankrupt our animation division THIS time."

[Foggy]

Hey, they can finally got back on track with that Hong Kong Phooey and Martin the Martian films. After the great reception from the test footage of those, they'd be crazy not to go ahead.

[Mandalorian]

Originally Posted by Foggy

Hey, they can finally got back on track with that Hong Kong Phooey and Martin the Martian films. After the great reception from the test footage of those, they'd be crazy not to go ahead.

But those were live action with CG characters. Not the same department.