Seth Rogen Slams AI Writers: “You Shouldn’t Be a Writer” and Calls AI “Stupid Dog Sh*t”

Seth Rogenisn’t buying the AI hype train, especially when it comes to writing movies and TV shows. While promoting Tangles, the new animated feature he produced with wife Lauren Miller Rogen, the actor and filmmaker gave a brutally honest take on AI-generated content in Hollywood, and he didn’t hold anything back.

Speaking with Brut, Rogen ripped into the growing obsession with AI tools replacing creative work, saying: “I don’t understand what it’s supposed to do. Every time I see a video on Instagram that’s like, ‘Hollywood is cooked,’ what follows is the most stupid dog shit I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Rogen went even further when talking about writers leaning on AI to do the heavy lifting. For him, the entire point of being a writer is actually doing the work, wrestling with ideas, and pushing through the difficult parts of the creative process.

He explained: “And if your instinct is to use AI and not go through that process, you shouldn’t be a writer. Because you’re not writing. Go do something else.

“And if you don’t want to go through the process, you shouldn’t be a writer. The idea of a tool that makes me write less is not appealing to me, because I like writing.”

It’s the kind of comment that’s probably going to fire up plenty of debate online, especially as studios and tech companies keep looking for ways to inject AI into filmmaking.

But Rogen’s stance feels pretty clear. He sees creativity as something human, messy, frustrating, and personal. Removing that process defeats the purpose.

That philosophy also carried over into the making of Tangles. Rogen made a point to say that absolutely no AI was used in creating the movie, which was directed by Leah Nelson.

When asked whether AI played any role in the animation process, Rogen said: “Not at all. It’s hand-drawn animation. Every frame has a human touch to it, which is great.”

That human connection matters even more considering the story Tangles is telling. The animated film centers on a young woman navigating her mother’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis and the emotional impact it has on the family.

The project clearly hit close to home for the Rogens. They co-founded Hilarity for Charity, a nonprofit dedicated to Alzheimer’s awareness and care, inspired by Lauren Miller Rogen’s personal experience with her late mother’s diagnosis.

Ahead of the film’s Cannes premiere, Lauren explained why the movie resonated with her so deeply, saying it “spoke to me in such a sincere and deep way.”

The movie’s debut at Cannes also landed in a big way, earning a seven-minute ovation after its Friday screening.

At a time when Hollywood keeps chasing the next tech trend, Rogen’s comments feel like a pretty passionate defense of artists actually making art themselves.