ROGER RABBIT Creator Developing Live-Action Jessica Rabbit Movie After Winning Back Rights from Disney

Gary K. Wolf, the mind behind Roger Rabbit, has officially regained control of his iconic characters from Disney, and he’s wasting no time bringing them back to life.

“I now have back the rights to all my characters, all my books. I can, basically, do my own Roger Rabbit projects,” Wolf told ImNotBad.

After decades of Disney and Amblin sharing ownership, Wolf’s legal win under a copyright termination clause means the creator can finally shape the future of his wacky, noir-inspired world on his own terms.

The original Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) remains a groundbreaking mix of live-action and animation, starring Bob Hoskins as private detective Eddie Valiant. The film was packed with unforgettable crossover moments that included Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny sharing the screen, and it helped cement Roger and Jessica Rabbit as pop culture icons.

Now, Wolf is taking that legacy forward with several new projects in the works, including a live-action Jessica Rabbit movie.

“The one that is most prominent… is a live-action Jessica Rabbit movie based on the book Jessica Rabbit: Xerious Business. That was the first project that we took a look at and the first we started developing. It’s probably the one that’s furthest along right now.”

Wolf also plans to adapt his later Roger Rabbit novels, expanding the universe he first introduced in his book Who Censored Roger Rabbit?, the source material for the 1988 classic.

But he’s not just revisiting the past for nostalgia’s sake. Wolf made it clear that any future Roger Rabbit project must honor what came before while pushing things to the next level.

“It has to be as good, or better than, what we did before. That’s what the fans want, and I have promised the fans that’s what I’m going to give them,” Wolf said.

It’s been a long time since Roger Rabbit last hit the screen, though the character did make a cameo in 2022’s Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers. Meanwhile, Roger Rabbit’s Car Toon Spin remains a fan-favorite attraction at Disneyland.

With Wolf now free to fully explore his zany, noir-tinged world, the prospect of a live-action Jessica Rabbit movie has fans eager to see how he’ll reimagine one of animation’s most unforgettable leading ladies.

Looks like Toon Town’s most famous couple might be getting ready for one hell of a comeback.

Here’s the fill description for the book Jessica Rabbit: Xerious Business:

“Ever wonder where Toons come from? Curious about how Toontown came to be? Stay Tooned, folks. You’re about to find out.

The gorgeous Toon superstar the whole world now knows as Jessica Rabbit started out in life as Jessica Krupnick, an ordinary young woman living in an all-too-human Toon-less world.

Jessica trudges listlessly through day after day of drudgery, boredom, and disappointment. She knows in her heart that she’s better than this. She’s capable of doing so much more. She fantasizes being one of the secret agents in the books she reads every night to take her mind off her miseries. She imagines herself living a life of excitement, danger and action.

"Then one day she spots a mysterious want ad looking for “a woman seeking adventure.” Through a combination of skill, cunning, and crafty derring-do, Jessica beats out all the other applicants. She wins her dream job. After two years of intense training, she becomes a glamorous and deadly agent of XERIOUS, a super-secret organization dedicated to pursuing and apprehending Criminal Masterminds.

Staid, the head of XERIOUS, pairs Jessica with Robbe, XERIOUS’s best operative. For their first assignment as a team, Jessica and Robbe get an extremely perilous mission. Apprehend The Klown, the menacing and murderous head of a nefarious organization called YUK.

Looks like Jessica hit the jackpot. She’s finally going to get the excitement, challenges, and respect she’s long craved and deserved. Except….not so fast. Even in the secret agent business, Jessica still faces the typical problems of a woman doing a man’s job.

Despite repeatedly demonstrating that she’s a better, smarter, more competent agent than Robbe, Jessica still gets routinely disregarded because she’s a woman. Until The Klown’s ultimate plan comes to fruition, threatening the end of the world as we know it. A horrible, unthinkable finale which Jessica and only Jessica can prevent.

Wait a minute, you say. You thought this was a book about the origins of Toontown and where Toons came from. Hold on. Toontown’s coming. As is that goofy Toon rabbit that Jessica came to love - because he made her laugh.

Jessica Rabbit: XERIOUS Business portrays Jessica Rabbit as much more than a sultry seductress songbird. The book fleshes out her character and depicts her as a true-life, multi-faceted, intelligent, capable woman who can easily hold her own in a world dominated by men.

Jessica Rabbit - a real life role model for women everywhere. For Who Framed Roger Rabbit movie fans — maybe you expect this novel to be set in the 1940’s. Instead, Jessica’s story takes place today, in the current here and now.

Toons live in a never-never land where yesterday, today, and tomorrow commingle and blend into a flowing time stream that sometimes turns a bend and runs sideways or even backwards. When you’re dealing with Toons, you never know what to expect. That’s what Toontown’s all about. That’s what makes Toons and Toontown funny.

Celebrated author Gary K. Wolf’s cult classic and highly praised first Toontown novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit? was the basis for the blockbuster Walt Disney/Steven Spielberg Academy Award winning film Who Framed Roger Rabbit. In that one, and in his two sequel novels, Wolf parodied the traditional hard-boiled private eye novel.

In Jessica Rabbit: XERIOUS Business, author Wolf gives his unique comic twist to a different genre, the secret agent spy novel. Wolf creates a wonderfully skewed – and totally believable – world compounded of equal parts James Bond and Alice In Wonderland. This riotously surreal spoof is packed with action and laughs. From first page to last, Jessica Rabbit: XERIOUS Business is uproariously funny and a sheer delight.”