At first glance, "Daffy Duck and Porky Pig get jobs at a bubblegum factory to pay off their mortgage" sounds like classic Looney Tunes material. But throw in mind-control gum, zombie townsfolk, and a monstrous alien plot, and you land somewhere closer to a 1980s sci-fi horror flick. That strange mashup is exactly where The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie takes audiences — and it turns out to be a perfect fit.
Voiced by Eric Bauza, Daffy and Porky's latest misadventure begins when they stumble into a sinister plot by an alien overlord known as The Invader (voiced by Peter MacNicol). The Invader's weapon of choice: sentient bubblegum capable of enslaving the minds of everyone in their town. When Petunia Pig (Candi Milo) tries to study a piece of the strange gum, it mutates into a nightmarish creature straight out of John Carpenter's The Thing — complete with writhing tentacles, eyestalks, and an unsettling hunger for destruction. Thankfully, Petunia happens to keep a flamethrower in her lab, because fire is just about the only thing that can stop it.
Director Peter Browngardt leans heavily into body horror with loving attention, drawing clear inspiration from Carpenter's 1982 cult classic. Longtime fans might be startled by just how intense some scenes are — from the grotesque transformations to the creeping dread of not knowing who's still themselves. Parents expecting a lighthearted family romp might find some of these sequences surprisingly intense for a Looney Tunes film.
Still, horror has always had a strange home in the world of Looney Tunes. Dating back to the 1950s, episodes like Satan's Waitin' and Hyde and Hare played with dark, even macabre themes. In the 1991 short Box-Office Bunny, Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, and Daffy Duck accidentally crash a slasher movie screening, complete with chainsaw-wielding maniacs — a reminder that the franchise isn't a stranger to horror tropes.
Even earlier, cartoons like Invasion of the Bunny Snatchers (1992) and Dr. Devil and Mr. Hare (1964) leaned into horror's unsettling undercurrents, blending goofy antics with surprisingly existential fears. Characters face death, lose their identities, or battle terrifying doppelgängers — all under the banner of slapstick humor.
With The Day the Earth Blew Up, Browngardt pays homage to that tradition while pushing it further than ever before. The film's creature design, atmospheric tension, and clever visual gags showcase an understanding of both horror and comedy, merging them in a way that feels natural rather than forced.
In the end, Looney Tunes has always been about chaos — and few genres thrive on chaos like horror does. This new movie doesn't just dip a toe into the horror pool; it dives in headfirst, all while maintaining the elastic energy and irreverent spirit that made Looney Tunes a cultural icon in the first place.