‘Scoob!’ Sequel Director Mocks Pam Abdy and Mike De Luca Firings: “Hurts, Doesn’t it?”

So now that Mike De Luca and Pamela Abdy are out at Warner Bros., some disgruntled ex-employees are starting to come out of the woodwork. Remember, it was under their leadership that a handful of completed films got scrapped in favor of tax write-offs.

Take, for example, Michael Kurinsky, who won’t be shedding any tears for Abdy and De Luca. He's the director of "Scoob! Holiday Haunt," which, you might remember, nobody got the chance to see. The sequel to 2020's "Scoob!" was fully completed before Warner Bros. shelved it in 2022 so the studio could claim a tax write-down and recoup part of its production costs.

On Friday, Kurinsky took to Instagram to share a THR piece about a "tense phone call" De Luca and Abdy had with WB CEO David Zaslav about their firing. His caption didn't hold back:

TENSE PHONE CALL, PAM? You mean like the one I got when you told me SCOOB Holiday Haunt was canceled? Hurts, doesn't it?

Ouch. Honestly? I don't blame him.

This isn't the first time Kurinsky has vented about the decision. Back in 2022, he told Variety that the reasoning given to him on those calls was simple: the studio was taking the tax write-off and couldn't monetize the film. That was the explanation he got for years of work vanishing into thin air. He said he felt like “just a name on an agenda.”

Of course, ‘Holiday Haunt’ wasn't the only victim. The studio also buried the live-action "Batgirl" movie and the Looney Tunes feature "Coyote vs. Acme," both in the name of tax maneuvers. "Batgirl" remains locked away, but "Coyote vs. Acme" got a second life when Ketchup Entertainment bought it for close to $50M. It opened in August and has grossed almost $100M worldwide, which tells you everything you need to know about how shortsighted those shelving decisions were.