Coyote Vs. Acme Breaks All-Time Box Office Record Three Years After Warner Bros. Cancellation

Coyote vs. Acme has broken a major box office record after a long journey to get into theaters.

The Looney Tunes movie is a meta comedy that blends live-action and animation as it follows Wile E. Coyote suing the Acme Corporation for its line of faulty products that injured him repeatedly as he attempted to catch the Road Runner. The movie, which was completed in 2023, was controversially cancelled by Warner Bros. that November as a tax write-off. Although Batgirl and Scoob! Holiday Haunt, other titles that were also shelved at that time, remain unseen, Ketchup Entertainment acquired the rights to the cancelled Coyote vs. Acme in 2025 and released it in theaters on August 28, 2026.

Per Deadline, as of Saturday morning, Coyote vs. Acme is projected to debut at No. 3 behind the holdover hits The Odyssey (No. 2) and Spider-Man: Brand New Day (No. 1) with a 3-day domestic gross of $14 million. This is by far the biggest release in history for Ketchup Entertainment, which hit a previous high with their previous Looney Tunes acquisition The Day the Earth Blew Up, a 2024 movie that debuted with $3.1 million in North America.

While Ketchup Entertainment is a small media company, they have produced or distributed a number of notable movies since they were founded in 2011, including Michael Mann's Ferrari (which was distributed by NEON and debuted with $3.9 million), the Liam Neeson action movie Memory (which was distributed by Open Road Films and debuted with $3.1 million), and the 2023 Robert Rodriguez-helmed, Ben Affleck-led thriller Hypnotic (which they distributed themselves and which debuted with $2.4 million).

Below, see a breakdown of the box office performance of the biggest movies that Ketchup Entertainment has distributed:

The fact that 2026's Coyote vs. Acme has more than quadrupled their all-time debut record shows puts Ketchup Entertainment into a brand-new box office tier for the first time. However, it remains to be seen if they are able to break even on their acquisition. While the reported budget of the movie is roughly $70 million, they reportedly acquired the movie for just $50 million and spent an additional $10 million on marketing.

Because theaters keep half of ticket sales, that would very likely place their estimated break-even point around $120 million, which is still a substantial risk given the small-scale releases they have thus far put into theaters. In fact, if Coyote vs. Acme has the same trajectory as The Day the Earth Blew Up, it should only be able to earn roughly $70 million in theaters by the end of its run.

However, the 2026 movie has advantages over its 2024 Looney Tunes predecessor. For one thing, Coyote vs. Acme reviews have been spectacular. While The Day the Earth Blew Up has a Certified Fresh Rotten Tomatoes score of 86% from critics and a solid audience score of 88%, the new movie blows it out of the water with a near-perfect 95% from critics and a superior 94% score from verified audience members.

Additionally, Coyote vs. Acme's star-studded live-action cast is a secondary draw on top of the iconic Looney Tunes characters being featured onscreen. Another factor that could help the movie gain momentum is the story behind its cancellation and resurrection, which brought it more attention in 2023 and beyond than a traditional advertising rollout might have.

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Release Date August 28, 2026

Runtime 101 Minutes

Director Dave Green