After decades of suffering injuries at the hands of Acme products, Wile E. Coyote hires personal injury lawyer Kevin Avery (Will Forte) to sue.
Perhaps the oddest story surrounding Coyote vs. Acme is the fact that Warner Bros. initially scrapped the entire film as a tax write-off after completion. Filmed in 2022 and scrapped in 2023, it took an internet campaign to get the decision reversed and allow the filmmakers to seek distribution elsewhere. Upon watching the film, I find myself absolutely baffled that it was deemed surplus to requirements because it is a rather witty and clever reinvention of the source material that contains some great morals for a family audience.
Coyote vs. Acme is set in a world similar to Who Framed Roger Rabbit, where cartoons and humans live side by side. It is the sort of world where Kevin Avery, a disillusioned lawyer, makes a quick buck here and there via “cartoon injury claims”. Acme is known for settling small fry claims, no questions asked. But Coyote will not be satisfied and tricks Kevin into going after them for everything they have.
What follows is a feature absolutely brimming with visual gags, witty asides and madcap schemes. Will Forte, a master of subtle yet ludicrous humour, pairs perfectly with Wile E. Coyote, an animal of few words and a limited number of signs.
The film also doffs its cap to the original cartoon’s history through the many blueprints that Coyote makes his plans on. These provide an opportunity to insert footage from the original cartoons that many of us will have grown up with, or that younger generations will at least have seen on YouTube.
There is also some cleverness in the family-friendly moral messages. The obvious idea that friendship is important is a simple choice. But the idea that Coyote is able to teach Kevin the value of hard work and not giving up is an especially nice touch. Which, of course, by way of serendipity, is exactly the mindset the filmmakers themselves needed in order to get the film out of the Warner Bros. scrap heap.
If I was being critical, I would argue that they could have shaved ten to fifteen minutes from the runtime and aimed for a tight ninety-minute movie.
All in all though, Coyote vs. Acme is a success story in more ways than one.
