Two years ago, it looked like Coyote vs ACME would never see the light of day. Warner Bros Animation cancelled the live-action-meets-animation legal comedy so it could write it off for tax purposes, and it refused to let anyone else take the movie on.
The wrath of Looney Tunes fans, including one who protested while dressed as Wile E. Coyote, finally changed the company's mind, and it let Ketchup Entertainment buy the rights to the movie. We finally have a trailer, and fans are delighted to see that it doesn't hold back in making the connection to its own plight.
The germ of Coyote vs ACME was a humorous article written by Ian Frazier for The New Yorker magazine in 1990. The author wrote the piece in the style of a legal brief making the case for Wile E. Coyote in a lawsuit against the ACME Corporation from the Looney Toons cartoons for repeatedly selling him allegedly faulty products.
Article continues belowDirected by Dave Green, the movie was written by Samy Burch from a story by Burch, James Gunn and Jeremy Slater. The film's blurb sets out the premise: "After decades of being blown to bits by bombs, demolished by dynamite, mangled by magnets, battered by boulders, trampled by trains... Wile E. Coyote finally fights back".
The long-suffering canine teams up with billboard accident lawyer Kevin Avery (played by Will Forte) to take the profit-obsessed ACME conglomerate to court.
The movie was reportedly first proposed by James Gunn way back in 2015. Initially, some key Looney Toons characters were deemed off limits, but the new trailer shows appearances from Road Runner, Porky Pig, Foghorn Leghorn, Daffy Duck, Tweety and Bugs Bunny.
That said, it's a big departure from Looney Toons cartoons, with Wile E Coyote becoming the lovable hero in a battle against corporate greed. Fans are delighted to note a dig at Warner Bros itself. "The ACME Corporation is releasing this film for accounting purposes only," a voiceover reads at the end of the trailer.
Lone protestor outside of Warner Bros Studios demanding the release of the film Coyote vs. Acme. from r/LosAngeles
Coyote vs ACME had been penciled into Warner Bros's release calendar for July 2023, but the company replaced it with Barbie after deciding that it would be more profitable to claim a $30 million tax write-off than to complete the film. Ketchup Entertainment, which previously bought Warner Bros's The Day the Earth Blew Up, acquired the rights in March 2025.
Ultimately, the way the cancellation ended up neatly connecting to the plot of the film might have helped Coyote vs ACME get much more attention than it would have if Warner Bros had released it when it originally planned. Now it needs all the people who demanded Coyote's release to turn out to see it.
Coyote vs ACME will be released on 28 August. Could it be as bit a hit as Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
For more upcoming animations, see DreamWorks' Forgotten Island trailer.
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