Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt haven’t reunited on screen, but a 15-second fake fight between their AI-generated doubles just rattled Hollywood. The short clip, created by Irish director Ruairi Robinson using Seedance 2.0—an advanced video tool from TikTok owner ByteDance—looks eerily like a real studio production, complete with sweeping shots, white-knuckle stunts, and polished sound effects, per the New York Times. Made from a two-line text prompt, it was convincing enough to spark alarm from major industry players.
The Motion Picture Association accused ByteDance of mass copyright infringement, while advocacy group Human Artistry Campaign called the unauthorized likenesses a violation of personal autonomy. Disney sent a cease-and-desist demand, alleging Seedance was trained on a “pirated” trove of its characters. ByteDance, for its part, says it respects intellectual property and is tightening safeguards. Variety reached out regarding the specifics of those safeguards, but there was no immediate response.
The uproar lands as Hollywood is still digesting recent writers’ and actors’ strikes, which focused heavily on AI protections. SAG-AFTRA says similar videos couldn’t be made by studios under its contracts without explicit consent, per the Times. Some creatives remain unimpressed, calling the content derivative “garbage,” but others, like Deadpool writer Rhett Reese, see another looming threat: cheaper, faster AI standing in for human work. “If I could wave my magic wand and make AI go away … I would absolutely wave the wand,” he says.