Avengers director Joe Russo thinks we’ll see a fully AI movie in the next two years

Directors Joe and Anthony Russo have helmed some of the biggest films of all time, including Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame for Marvel Studios. Those movies both used an incredible amount of technology to bring their characters, battles, and settings to life, so it should be no surprise that they have some opinions about AI.

In particular, Joe Russo recently did a roundtable interview with Epic Games’ Donald Mustard over at Collider, during which the director made some comments about his vision for the future of AI which have raised more than a few eyebrows. Russo called the conundrum of how humans will adapt to AI a “mind-bending question,” but overall sounds far more excited than nervous about the prospect:

"So potentially, what you could do with it is obviously use it to engineer storytelling and change storytelling. So you have a constantly evolving story, either in a game or in a movie, or a TV show. You could walk into your house and save the AI on your streaming platform. “Hey, I want a movie starring my photoreal avatar and Marilyn Monroe’s photoreal avatar. I want it to be a rom-com because I’ve had a rough day,” and it renders a very competent story with dialogue that mimics your voice. It mimics your voice, and suddenly now you have a rom-com starring you that’s 90 minutes long. So you can curate your story specifically to you."

Joe Russo: AI will lead to “the democratization of storytelling”

Russo isn’t oblivious to the dangers of AI as well; one question that came up was whether there was a need for protections with AI, given how many people are out there who would happily use it for misinformation and other dubious tasks. Speaking from his experience “on the board of a few AI companies,” Russo said that “there are AI companies that are developing AI to protect you from AI. And unfortunately, we’re in that world, and you will need an AI in your life because whether we want to see it developed or not, people who are not friendly to us may develop it anyways. So, we’re going to be in that future.”

But it seems like that caution doesn’t really extend to creative spaces, despite concern from organizations like the Writers Guild of America about how AI will effect creators. Mustard mused that “the TVs that Samsung and a lot of companies are making now, they already have enough processing power just in the TV itself where we’re just not very far off, where you could render anything in real-time,” which would allow a viewer to insert themself into movies like, say, Avengers: Endgame, to which Russo joked “Make me Doctor Strange.”

He went on to say that he expects to see a fully AI-generated movie in the next two years or so, while Mustard is of the opinion it’ll likely be even less time.

“But the value of it is the democratization of storytelling,” Russo said. “That’s incredibly valuable. That means that anyone in this room could tell a story, or make a game at scale, with the help of a photoreal engine or an engine and AI tools. That, I think, is what excites me about it most.”

So will AI democratize storytelling? And what does that even mean?

Personally, anytime I see the “AI will democratize storytelling” argument, my skepticism immediately rises. Because on the one hand, it makes the concept of storytelling sound like this elite thing with a lot of barriers preventing people from doing it — which, in terms of the industries themselves, can absolutely be true. The act of storytelling though? That’s been around since people were living in caves, and the idea that AI is going to drastically make it more accessible for people feels kind of ridiculous. What Russo is talking about here isn’t necessarily removing boundaries from allowing people to tell stories, or breaking down the gatekeeping in those industries. It’s specifically tailoring your storytelling experience to your personal tastes, kind of like a choose your own adventure novel.

Is there value in that? Sure, absolutely. But that’s not exactly a substitute for a well-crafted story that is being told in a certain way to convey an intentional effect on its audience. They accomplish different things, and in industries where creators are often already undervalued, it’s discouraging to hear a huge name like Russo comment like this without at least taking that into account in the conversation.

But hey, maybe I’m just an alarmist who’s read too much science fiction. AI is here whether we like it or not; only time will tell whether it democratizes storytelling or makes us its servants or whatever.

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h/t The A.V. Club