Was Moana Copied? Animator Sues Disney for $10 Billion Lawsuit

Animator Buck Woodall has filed a $10 billion lawsuit against Disney, alleging the company copied his idea for the animated film Moana and its sequel, reports The Hollywood Reporter. The lawsuit, filed last week in California federal court, claims Disney took elements from Woodall’s screenplay for a project titled Bucky, which features similar themes of teenagers from an ancient Polynesian village embarking on adventures to protect their homes.

According to the complaint, Woodall gave his screenplay and a trailer for Bucky to Jenny Marchick, a former Mandeville Films executive who now heads up development for feature films at DreamWorks Animation.

Disney’s Moana was created following the receipt by Defendants of virtually all constituent parts that are necessary to create and make such film over the past 17+ years of inspiration and work towards his animated film, according to the lawsuit.

The complaint also points out other similarities between Moana and Bucky, such as a dramatic sequence in which “Moana and her crew are sucked into a perilous whirlpool-like oceanic portal, another dramatic and unique device-imagery found in Plaintiff’s materials that could not possibly have been developed by chance or without malicious intentions.”

He previously filed a similar lawsuit over the original Moana film, which was dismissed last November after he was ruled to have waited too long to bring the case, but the premiere of Moana 2 reopens the chance for legal action.

So far, Disney hasn’t commented on the new case. In the earlier case, the company has flatly denied all allegations, arguing that no one associated with Moana had seen Woodall’s materials. “Moana was not inspired by or based in any way on [Woodall] or his ‘Bucky’ project, which I learned of for the first time after this lawsuit was filed,” Moana director Ron Clements stated in a court declaration.

Moana 2: Success and Awards

Moana 2 is the direct sequel of the 2016 hit movie, released last year. Moana 2 follows the storyline of Moana (Auli’i Cravalho) and assembles her crew for the new adventure she embarks with Maui, portrayed by Dwayne Johnson. Moana 2 was a highly successful film as it grossed $964 million, making it the fourth most-grossed movie of 2024.

Not only is Moana 2 successful at the box office, but it is also being considered as a front-runner in the Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song categories for the 2024-2025 awards season.