The film Warner Bros wrote off for taxes opens in theaters August 28

On 9 November 2023 Warner Bros announced it would not release a finished film called Coyote vs. Acme. The plan was to take a tax write off on it instead. On 28 August 2026 the film opens in theaters anyway, almost three years later, released by somebody else.

The premise is that Wile E. Coyote, after a lifetime of exploding Acme products, sues the company that sold them to him. He hires a billboard accident lawyer played by Will Forte. Acme's slick corporate counsel is played by John Cena.

It cost a reported $70 million to make. Warner Bros stood to book a write down on it, reported by most outlets at $30 million. Then the filmmakers went public and the studio changed its mind about selling.

For three years, I was lucky enough to make a movie about Wile E. Coyote, the most persistent, passionate, and resilient character of all time.

What made this one different

Studios shelve films. Warner Bros had already done it twice, to Batgirl and to Scoob! Holiday Haunt in 2022. TheWrap reported that several executives went out of their way to say Batgirl was not releasable, and that nobody said any such thing about this one.

Coyote vs. Acme was different in one specific way. It had screened for test audiences and done extremely well. Brian Duffield, a filmmaker who had seen it, posted that it tested in the high 90s repeatedly. Trade reporting at the time said it scored 14 points above the family average.

The studio's own statement did not claim the film was bad. It said that with the relaunch of Warner Bros Pictures Animation in June 2023, the studio had shifted its global strategy to focus on theatrical releases. With that new direction, it said, it had made the difficult decision not to move forward.

The reversal took four days. TheWrap reported on 13 November 2023 that the studio would allow the film to be shopped to other distributors after an outcry from filmmakers and artists. Warner Bros had no comment.

Nobody could agree on a price

Selling it turned out to be harder than announcing it would be sold. TheWrap reported, citing people familiar with the situation, that Netflix, Amazon and Paramount all screened the film and made offers. Paramount proposed a theatrical component to let the studio save face.

The studio wanted more. According to the same reporting it was seeking somewhere in the range of $75 million to $80 million, against a write down worth $35 million to $40 million to it. It also would not let interested buyers counter its asking price.

Ketchup Entertainment closed the deal on 31 March 2025 for worldwide rights, at a price an insider put at around $50 million. It was the most expensive acquisition the distributor had made. Its previous Looney Tunes title had opened to about $3 million.

The cast spent three years talking about it

Will Forte did not stay quiet. He told Gizmodo on 10 August 2026 that the project ran the whole spectrum of emotions: extreme excitement while they were making it, then a stretch that was frustrating and sad and made him angry, then excitement again when Ketchup Entertainment picked it up.

Looking back, Forte said he chooses to believe that everything happens for a reason, and that because of the crazy journey the film has been on it may have drawn more eyes than a release on the original schedule would have.

This is the first time in my career that this has happened before [and] I'm hoping it's the last. But it was definitely one of those moments in one's career that it's devastating not only for yourself, but, way more importantly, for hundreds of artists who have worked on it for years.

Cena's view is the most corporate and the most forgiving. He said his background in live entertainment, where segments get cut and opponents change without warning, let him weather it better than most. He added that the people who suffer are the ones whose work goes unseen.

The director says the version reaching theaters is the one they finished. Dave Green told Gizmodo the film is 100 percent untouched since Ketchup bought the distribution rights.

Green describes the film itself in less combative terms. He told Gizmodo that most Looney Tunes movies have been ensemble pictures, and that this one is a character study of Wile E. Coyote, which makes it the Iron Man to their Avengers.

The marketing is not subtle

Whoever cut the trailer decided the backstory was an asset. It opens on a spoof of the Warner Bros logo with an asterisk, and the small print reads a wholly owned subsidiary of the Acme corporation.

The trailer calls it the movie Acme doesn't want you to see. It closes on a voiceover from Foghorn Leghorn saying the Acme Corporation is releasing this film for accounting purposes only. At Comic-Con in 2025 an actor playing an Acme lawyer served Hall H with cease and desist papers.

The joke works because Acme, in this film, is a profit obsessed conglomerate that keeps selling defective products and never faces consequences. The studio that shelved the film has been handed the role of the villain in its own marketing.

Does any of that sell tickets

The first reactions were strong. Several critics compared it to Who Framed Roger Rabbit, which is the highest available compliment for a live action and animation hybrid. Drew Taylor of TheWrap, who broke much of the original story, posted that it was worth the wait.

The commercial question is separate. Ketchup Entertainment is a small distributor putting a PG rated Looney Tunes film into theaters in late August. Film reporters have followed this story closely. General audiences may not have followed it at all.

The film runs 101 minutes and is rated PG for cartoon violence and some language. Samy Burch wrote the screenplay, from a story she developed with James Gunn and Jeremy Slater. It is based on a 1990 New Yorker humour piece by Ian Frazier.

What it proved

Writing off a finished film is an argument nobody outside the building can usually check. The movie does not come out, so the claim that it was not worth releasing goes untested. Coyote vs. Acme is the case where everyone eventually gets to look.

On 28 August 2026 the audience gets the last word on a decision made in a boardroom in 2023. The film cost about $70 million and was written down for a reported $30 million. It then sold for around $50 million to a company that thought it could make money showing it to people.