‘Coyote vs. Acme’s First Clip Just Dropped, and Wile E. Coyote Finally Gets His Day in Court

Few Hollywood stories over the past two years have generated quite as much drama behind the scenes as this one. What started as a live-action-animated hybrid comedy nearly became a permanent casualty of studio bookkeeping, only to be rescued after a wave of public outrage refused to let it die quietly.

The film’s road to theaters has been unusually turbulent for a family comedy built around one of animation’s most beloved characters. After Warner Bros. Discovery shelved the completed movie back in November 2023 purely for a tax write-off, the backlash was significant enough that the studio reversed course, ultimately allowing Ketchup Entertainment to acquire distribution rights and finally bring the project to audiences.

Fandango has released the first proper clip from ‘Coyote vs. Acme‘, giving audiences their earliest direct look at footage from the long-delayed comedy ahead of its August 28 theatrical release. The clip shows Wile E. Coyote presenting his business card, reading “Wile E. Coyote, GENIUS, Have Brain, Will Travel,” setting up the film’s central premise of the perpetually unlucky cartoon character finally deciding to fight back against his tormentors through the legal system.

The film follows Wile E. Coyote as he teams up with down-on-his-luck billboard accident lawyer Kevin Avery, played by Will Forte, to sue the ACME Corporation for the countless faulty products that have repeatedly backfired on him throughout his decades of chasing the Road Runner. Standing in their way is slick corporate counsel Buddy Crane, played by John Cena, representing the profit-obsessed conglomerate behind every one of the Coyote’s chaotic misadventures. The film blends its animated Looney Tunes characters with a live-action human cast that also includes Lana Condor, Tone Bell, P.J. Byrne, Martha Kelly, and Luis Guzmán.

Beyond Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner, the film’s trailer has already teased appearances from a wider roster of classic Looney Tunes characters, including Porky Pig, Bugs Bunny, and Tweety, along with Foghorn Leghorn reimagined as an operatic Southern lawyer representing ACME in the courtroom proceedings. Directed by Dave Green from a screenplay by Samy Burch, based on a story she wrote alongside James Gunn and Jeremy Slater, the film draws its premise from Ian Frazier’s satirical New Yorker piece “Coyote v. Acme,” which imagined the character’s grievances framed as an actual legal complaint.

The project’s path to release stretches back to 2018, with live-action filming actually taking place in New Mexico back in 2022, years before the film would eventually reach audiences. Its brief shelving under Warner Bros. Discovery became one of the earliest high-profile controversies of David Zaslav’s leadership at the studio, drawing comparisons to the similarly axed ‘Batgirl’ and igniting broader conversations about streaming-era studio accounting practices affecting completed films.

Following the acquisition by Ketchup Entertainment in March 2025, the film has steadily rebuilt momentum through festival appearances and marketing rollouts, including a first look at San Diego Comic-Con last year and an industry screening at CinemaCon earlier this year. With its full trailer released just weeks ago and this new clip now giving fans their first extended look at the film’s tone and humor, ‘Coyote vs. Acme’ appears to be building toward theaters after years of uncertainty.

With its August 28 release date now locked in and the film clocking in at a lean one hour and 41 minutes, ‘Coyote vs. Acme’ looks primed to finally give audiences the ending its long saga has been building toward.

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