Will Forte Refuses to Let Warner Bros. Discovery Off the Hook for Canceling ‘Acme vs. Coyote’
No one is angrier about Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav’s decision to throw a completed Coyote vs. Acme film in the trash for a measly tax break than Will Forte, and an enraged Will Forte is never a pleasant sight — he usually pisses his pants.
Cartoon fans know well the story of the finished, well-tested and widely anticipated Looney Tunes movie that met its end on a WBD budget sheet without ever seeing a streaming, theatrical or festival release. In November 2023, Zaslav, fresh off of a merger that put him in charge of the combined Warner Bros. and Discovery media empires, secured a $30 million tax write-off by cancelling Coyote vs. Acme long after post-production had already finished. Creatives who worked on Coyote vs. Acme and industry insiders who were lucky enough to see a screening of the film before it got the comically oversized ax decried WBD’s decision, and in a half-assed, face-saving gesture, the media conglomerate briefly allowed the filmmakers to search for a distributor willing to outbid the IRS for the project.
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Due to the obscene price tag, Coyote vs. Acme was predictably unable find a buyer, and the movie died in the darkness of Zaslav’s tax forms. Nevertheless, the memory of Coyote vs. Acme still lives on in Saturday Night Live legend and Coyote vs. Acme star Forte’s expletive-laden rants like the one he just unleashed on MovieWeb earlier this week:
When asked to give his thoughts on Coyote vs. Acme’s cancellation as one of only a few dozen human beings who actually got to watch it, Forte responded plainly, “My thoughts were that it’s fucking bullshit. It is such a delightful movie. It deserves so much better than it got. I can’t tell you possibly why the decision was made to not release it, but it makes my blood boil.” Forte added of the question, “Thank you for asking me about it because I like talking about the movie, because I want them to — I don’t want people to forget what they did to us.”
Seemingly remembering that Zaslav and WBD control almost every corner of the entertainment industry that isn’t already owned by Disney, Forte threw in a little acknowledgement for the a-hole suits who canned Coyote vs. Acme, continuing, “That said, I appreciate them letting us make it, but, like, don’t let us make this thing that we fall in love with and then not show it.”
“I mean, I would understand it if the thing sucked,” Forte said of Coyote vs. Acme, “but it’s really good!”
Still, Forte isn’t giving up all hope on Coyote vs. Acme finally finding the audience that deserves to see it, concluding his thoughts on the subject with, “You never know what happens in life. Maybe, somehow, we get to see it at some point. I hope people do, because I was really proud of it.”
While we would welcome news about Zaslav finally letting Coyote vs. Acme see the light of day (for real this time), it would be hard to ever trust that guy to follow through with actually adding beloved comedy content to the world instead of eradicating it. When it comes to WBD, every light at the end of a tunnel has been painted on.
