Warner Bros. killed a Looney Tunes movie starring John Cena. Now it’s back from the dead

Just like in a Looney Tunes cartoon, a bruised and battered Wile E. Coyote may soon limp back to fight another day.

A year and a half after David Zaslav-run Warner Bros. Discovery shelved the movie “Coyote vs. Acme,” the studio is in talks to sell the film to North Hollywood-based film finance and distribution company Ketchup Entertainment.

The firm could pay nearly $50 million for the rights if the two sides can hammer out a deal, according to a knowledgeable person who was not authorized to comment.

Warner Bros. Discovery scrapped the movie during the fall of 2023 amid Zaslav’s purge of entertainment content amid his company’s race to cut costs and tidy its balance sheet following Discovery’s $42-billion takeover of Warner Bros. and the HBO and Turner channels. The acquisition left Warner Bros. Discovery heavily in debt.

But Warner Bros.’ decision to cut “Coyote vs. Acme,” a project greenlighted by a prior management team, was immediately met with howls in Hollywood because of Wile E. Coyote’s iconic stature and because the film starring Will Forte and John Cena, featuring a blend of animation and live-action, had been finished and screened for test audiences. The film had a reported budget of $70 million.

Several producers who saw the film voiced support in a social media campaign soon after the news of its apparent demise.

To quell the jeers, Warner Bros. reversed its decision to shove the movie off a cliff. Instead, it agreed to allow the director, Dave Green, to shop the title around to other distributors in the hopes of finding a buyer.

Ketchup Entertainment’s Gareth West was not immediately available for comment on Wednesday.

Hollywood industry site Deadline first reported the advanced talks to sell the rights.

“Coyote vs. Acme” is based on classic Looney Tunes characters and a New Yorker humor article, “Coyote v. Acme” by Ian Frazier.

Written by Samy Burch, the film follows the travails of the desert denizen who is tired of being slammed with Acme products as he tries to outsmart the Roadrunner. Coyote finally decides to hire a lawyer to take the Acme Corp. to court for product liability, such as faulty rocket skates and defective aerial bombs. Forte plays his lawyer.

If a deal is clinched, it would pave the way for the film to be released in theaters as early as next year.

Last year, Ketchup acquired rights to another abandoned Warner Bros. project with Porky Pig called “The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie.” It was released widely last week and generated $3.2 million in ticket sales, according to Comscore.

The initial outrage over the film’s shelving reached the halls of Congress. Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) had asked the Biden administration to investigate Warner Bros. Discovery’s decision to deep-six completed films for favorable tax implications. In addition to “Coyote vs. Acme,” Warner Bros. killed off “Batgirl” and “Scoob! Holiday Haunt.”

Back in 2023, Green pledged his continued support for the project and its crew.

“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,” Green said in a 2023 statement.

“I was surrounded by a brilliant team, who poured their souls into this project for years,” Green said back then, sounding a hopeful note. “I am beyond proud of the final product … but in the spirit of Wile E. Coyote, resilience and persistence win the day.”