The Day The Earth Blew Up May Be Getting Great Reviews, But I'm So Annoyed By The Latest Update About The Looney Tunes

The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie is among the latest releases on the 2025 movies schedule, with this marking the first fully-animated and theatrically released flick from the franchise. While The Day the Earth Blew Up didn’t exactly make waves at the box office, it has been getting a lot of positive critical reception, including CinemaBlend’s The Day the Earth Blew Up review stamping it with 4 out of 5 stars. Unfortunately, this success has also been accompanied by some unfortunate news about the Looney Tunes that’s seriously annoying me.

For those of you who’ve used your Max subscription to stream the classic Looney Tunes shorts since the Warner. Bros Discovery-owned streaming platform launched as HBO Max in 2020, sorry, that’s done. All the franchise’s shorts released from 1930 to 1969 have been removed from Max. According to Deadline, this is part of a plan to have Max prioritize adult and family programming over straightforward children’s content. That includes Looney Tunes and Sesame Street, the latter of which is now airing its last season on the streamer.

While it is a shame that the Sesame Street/Max deal is coming to an end since it still has yet to be announced what the new distribution plan will be for the beloved children’s TV show, this Looney Tunes decision just infuriates me. Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig and the rest of these wacky characters have been Warner Bros. staples for nearly a century. It was one thing to remove select shorts from Max, but to not have any of these classics available is just wrong.

Max: Plans start from $9.99 a month
In addition to select Looney Tunes content, this is also home to fellow classic shows like Friends, The Wire, and The Sopranos, as well as more recent hits such as Succession, Euphoria, and The Last of Us. Pay from $9.99 a month for its With Ads plan, now with three tiers available to those after a Max subscription. Prepay for a year and save up 20%.

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Now, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that Max won’t be entirely devoid of Looney Tunes content. As Deadline’s article mentions, there are select seasons/episodes of shows like Looney Tunes Cartoons, New Looney Tunes, Baby Looney Tunes and more. Nevertheless, not having any of the classic Looney Tunes shorts is a glaring omission. Assuming this course of action isn’t reversed someday, I can only hope that these shorts can find a streaming home elsewhere, as these deserve to be accessible online for the people who don’t want to invest in physical collections.

Still, I shouldn’t be entirely surprised by this move considering how Warner Bros. Discovery has treated the Looney Tunes franchise in recent years. The scrapping of Coyote vs. Acme for a tax write-off still stings, and while at least The Day the Earth Blew Up got to see the light of day, Ketchup Entertainment handled releasing the movie stateside. Hopefully the great word-of-mouth that movie is getting will lead to Warner Bros. being willing to show these zany characters more of the respect they deserve.

Meanwhile, don’t forget that Space Jam, which paired the Looney Tunes with Michael Jordan in 1996, can currently be streamed with a Netflix subscription. The LeBron James-led Space Jam: A New Legacy, on the other hand, can only be purchased or rented digitally as of this writing.