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Warner Bros. released a 90-second promotional episode of the AI podcast "DogPack" this week to promote its upcoming sci-fi action film "The End of Oak Street." The clip, shared across the studio's social channels, stars Starbuck, the AI-animated dog who appears alongside Anne Hathaway and Ewan McGregor in the film - and it drew a sharply split response from fans.

Goldie, an AI golden retriever, and Frenchie, an AI French bulldog, host the podcast. Frenchie opens the interview by asking Starbuck, "Which one of your human co-stars was the best trained?" Starbuck replies, "Ewan McGregor was excellent with treats. Anne Hathaway matched him there, but she could scratch behind both ears at once. Game over!"

Fans split on the AI promotion

The video drew plenty of excited comments on Instagram, but the decision to use AI in promotional material also drew pushback. One commenter wrote, "Billion dollar company using AI. slop." Another comment with more than 400 likes asked, "So is this an AI movie or????"

The film

Writer-director David Robert Mitchell's "The End of Oak Street" follows a suburban family forced to survive a dinosaur horde after their neighborhood is transported through space-time. Hathaway and McGregor lead the cast, which also includes Maisy Stella, Christian Convery, Jordan Alexa Davis and P.J. Byrne.

J.J. Abrams produced the film under his Bad Robot banner. At a recent press event, Abrams explained why the project won him over: "The brilliance of what you wrote is that each of the characters has a secret, essentially. Each of the characters has something they're wrestling with, but they're a family that you so connect with and so root for and believe in. It's not a sadistic movie. It's got a big heart at its core."

Why this matters for marketing, PR and communications professionals

For marketing and communications teams, the "Oak Street" promotion is a compact example of the tradeoff in AI-forward campaigns. It drew attention across a major studio's social channels, but it also produced visible skepticism, including an Instagram comment with more than 400 likes questioning whether the film itself is AI-made. The novelty of a gimmick can make audiences question the product behind it, and that is a question worth answering before launch.