Wouldn’t it be great if Coyote vs. Acme does well enough at the box office to prove David Zaslav and his weird anti-toon agenda wrong?

Dear Gossips,

Almost two years ago, we learned that David Zaslav and Warner Bros. Discovery intended to shelve Coyote vs. Acme, a live action/animation hybrid film about Wile E. Coyote suing the Acme Corporation, for a tax write off. Unlike the previous times this happened, people got spooked and started calling for the film to be saved, which it ultimately was. Today, Coyote vs. Acme hits theaters, the film and its anti-corporate message only enhanced by its wild progress to the big screen.

Coyote vs. Acme is very good and you should go see it. I mean that literally, everyone should go see it. Saving the film from WBD was only phase 1, phase 2 is that people actually need to support this film in theaters. Spider-Man: Brand New Day will undoubtedly clock its fifth straight weekend at number one, but Coyote gained steam in its box office tracking over the last couple weeks as positive word of mouth spread, moving up to a $15 million opening weekend projection.

That’s a decent opening for a sub-$100 million film. And the math on Coyote’s performance is a little unusual given that its distributor, Ketchup Entertainment, had no hand in its production. They’re out the rumored $50 million they spent to buy it from WBD, plus marketing. For them, this is more like releasing a film you pick up at a festival. Still, the icing on the cake is for the film to actually do well.

Mainly to stick it to WBD and their terrible business practice of tanking films for write offs—which they haven’t tried since Coyote blew up in their faces like an Acme rocket—but also for the fans who put in real effort to bring attention to the film and pry it out of Zaslav’s grasp. Fans like Marco Vaccaro, who protested as Wile E. Coyote outside the Warners lot in Los Angeles:

But also, mainly to stick to David Zaslav and his weird anti-toon agenda. Nobody expects Coyote to beat Spider-Man at the box office, but wouldn’t it be great if it performs over expectations? If it does well enough to prove that Zaz was wrong to try and sh-t can it? He saw no value in Coyote vs. Acme; the best outcome is to prove him wrong. That, or he watched it and saw himself on the wrong side of the film’s anti-corporate message. Or it could be both. Yeah, it’s probably both.

Live long and gossip,

Sarah