Perhaps, but he's also highlighting how fundamentally broken the copyright system is. I don't think that's his goal (he's mostly being petty; there's a reason there's a pop song about his vanity), but it is an interesting side-effect of his odd project.
I think it's simpler than that. IE; not a vanity thing for his ego or pettyness for the sake of being petty,
Entity owns an IP, Entity doesn't want another entity to own it for risk to the IP. (the other entity being a globally publicly owned historic aggregator of IPs for sake of short term profits)
DIsney is doing the same in reverse with the Muppets/Henson Properties. Don't do anything with it beyond semi-annual short projects to retain the IP.
> So is Warren being an asshole here? I mean, we haven't seen a Dick Tracy movie since the 90s. I am out of the loop so trying to understand.
Well the rights were held by Disney from 1988 until 2005, and then they were tied up in court (between Beatty and Tribune) until 2011, when Beatty won the rights. The movie you're referring to was released in 1990.
So Beatty has held the rights for only 14 of those 35 years. Although the first special he made was released in 2010, during that legal battle.
