Paramount And ‘Toy Story 4’ Director Working On Animated Feature About Eating Shit

Usually when Hollywood studios make an animated feature that’s shit, it’s not on purpose. But Paramount Animation is flipping the playbook: they’re developing an animated film entirely about eating shit.

The film, based on Mark Pett’s children’s book I Eat Poop: A Dung Beetle Story, is about an anthropomorphized dung beetle who likes to eat shit.

Per the official book description via Macmillan Publishers:

Dougie has a secret: he’s not a ground beetle. He’s a dung beetle, and he loves eating poop. Dougie knows he should be proud. Dung beetles help process waste and do other extraordinary things! But Dougie also knows that if anyone at school saw his lunch, he’d be an outcast.

One day, the lunchroom bugs out over a classmate eating poop, and Dougie must make a choice. Can he stand up for his friend — and for his true self?

The project is being adapted by Toy Story 4 and Transformers One director Josh Cooley, who is also in talks to direct the film. Cooley, who also co-wrote the screenplay for Inside Out worked at Pixar for 17 years and won an Oscar for his feature directorial debut, Toy Story 4.

Ryan Reynolds’ Maximum Effort is producing the project, alongside EGOT-winning lyricists and composers Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (La La Land, Snow White remake).

Brad Butler is the executive in charge at Paramount Animation.

Deadline was the first to report news about this film.