Blade Runner 2049 creators sue Elon Musk, Tesla and Warner Bros over robotaxi event

A Blade Runner 2049 production company has officially filed a lawsuit against Tesla, Warner Bros. Discovery and Elon Musk over the recent robotaxi event held at a Warner Bros. studio.

SEE THE GALLERY – 2 IMAGES

The lawsuit was filed in Federal and state court Elon Musk and his electric vehicle company hijacked the film’s branding with promotional materials used at the company’s recent robotaxi event. That company is Alcon Entertainment, and according to reports, it specifically rejected a request to use any material from the film at the recent Tesla event. However, according to the lawsuit, the marketing materials used affiliated robotaxis with Blade Runner 2049.

The lawsuit conjures up a specific image of a male figure wearing a trench coat as he overlooks what appears to be a ruined city shrouded in an orange hue. The lawsuit states: “the image was clearly intended to be read visually” like a natural steel from Blade Runner 2049, particularly the scene where Ryan Gosling’s character overlooks a ruined Las Vegas. Alcon Entertainment claims that Tesla took the original image from Blade Runner 2049, fed it into a generator of AI images and requested the sophisticated software to create a similar image to avoid copyright infringement.

“Any cautious brand considering a partnership with Tesla must take into account Musk’s massively amplified, highly politicized, capricious and arbitrary behavior, which at times veers into hate speech.” the complaint states. “Alcon did not want BR2049 to be affiliated with Musk.“

The complaint states that Musksk wanted to associate the event with Blade Runner 2049, which was distributed by Warner Bros. Discovery when it was released. Specifically, Musk wanted to use a still from the film, which spurred communication between Alcon Entertainment, Tesla and Warner Bros to have the rights released. However, the film’s producers denied the request, which the lawsuit claims led to the creation of the purported AI-generated images.

“All defendants participated in its creation and display during presentation at the event, from a building and studio owned by WBDI, on video screens owned by WBDI and otherwise using infrastructure technology owned, operated by or in conjunction with WBDI. with Tesla employees, all acting in whole or in part under the direction and control of Musk,” the complaint states