Lawsuit tracker
Warner Bros. v. Midjourney
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. et al. v. Midjourney, Inc. (C.D. Cal.), consolidated with No. 2:25-cv-05275
| Plaintiffs | Warner Bros. Entertainment, DC Comics and other Warner Bros. Discovery entities |
|---|---|
| Defendants | Midjourney, Inc. |
| Court | U.S. District Court for the Central District of California |
| Filed | 2025-09-04 |
| Status | Active |
| Content type | film & TV |
| Last updated | 2026-07-21 |
The claims
Copyright infringement over training and over image and video outputs of Warner characters; seeks damages, disgorgement of profits and an injunction
What has happened
Warner Bros. Discovery entities, including DC Comics, sued Midjourney in Los Angeles federal court in early September 2025, becoming the third major studio group to do so. The complaint alleges Midjourney willfully generates images and videos of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Tom and Jerry, and Scooby-Doo, and that even generic prompts like "classic comic book superhero battle" return recognizable DC characters. It also alleges Midjourney removed guardrails that had blocked infringing video generation after launching its video service. Midjourney answered with the same defenses raised in the Disney case, led by fair use, and reportedly added an unclean-hands defense. On November 4, 2025, the court consolidated the case into the Disney and Universal action, with the Disney case as lead.
Key developments
- 2025-09-04 — Warner Bros. Discovery entities filed suit in C.D. Cal., alleging infringing image and video outputs of DC, Looney Tunes and Hanna-Barbera characters and the removal of video guardrails.
- 2025-11-04 — The court consolidated the case with the Disney and Universal action against Midjourney, with the Disney case designated lead.
Why it matters for training data
The Warner complaint sharpened two points the earlier studio suits only gestured at: video outputs are now squarely in scope, and removing safety guardrails is being framed as evidence of willfulness, which multiplies statutory damages. Suppliers of video training data and operators of video models should assume character-level output audits will be litigation exhibits. The consolidation also shows studios coordinating rather than settling one-off, which raises the cost of an unlicensed-data strategy.
Sources
- The Hollywood Reporter on the filing
- TechCrunch on the complaint
- Variety on the suit
- Techweez on the consolidated litigation (July 2026)
Deeper analysis
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