Disney and Universal are suing AI photo generation company Midjourney, marking the first major legal showdown between Hollywood studios and an artificial intelligence company.

"Piracy is piracy," says Disney's chief legal officer, as the studios aim to show that tools allowing personalized AI slop creations of characters like Darth Vader or Shrek run afoul of their IP.

Disney and Universal filed a joint copyright infringement suit Wednesday against Midjourney, one of the most widely used generative AI image platforms. The complaint, filed in California, alleges that Midjourney knowingly trained its AI models on copyrighted film stills and character images without permission.