Laika’s Wildwood Highlights Human Craft Over Generative AI

What changed

Laika’s Wildwood took five years to complete, making it the studio’s most ambitious film yet. More than 1,000 artists contributed, with 49 animators bringing more than 230 puppets to life; the central character, Prue, required 36 puppets alone.

Why it matters

The film is a useful rebuttal to the idea that faster production automatically means better production. Generative AI promises instant progress. Laika’s process shows the opposite model: progress measured in carefully made objects, repeated movement and thousands of human decisions.

That matters because the studio’s work turns labor into something visible. A puppet is not just an asset waiting to be generated. It is one physical piece in a chain of choices, and Wildwood multiplied that chain across characters, scenes and years.

The report does not establish whether Laika will use AI in future productions. But Wildwood makes the contrast hard to miss: some creative work gets its meaning from the time and people embedded in it.