Review by Tim Robins
The title – Coyote vs Acme – pretty much sells itself, particularly to generations brought up watching the theatrical shorts on TV. Created by animator Chuck Jones as an answer to Tom and Jerry, the films are mini-masterpieces of pure cartoon violence in which the eponymous Wile E Coyote pursues and fails to capture a road runner only to be defeated again and again by his own, elaborate traps usually incorporating the faulty products of the Acme Company.
In Coyote vs Acme, the coyote takes Acme to court over their many product failures. In this, he is represented by the personal injury firm of Avery, Jones & Maltese. Ho, ho. The names are in joke references to Tex Avery (creator of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and others), Charles “Chuck” Jones (of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and Pepé Le Pew fame) and Michael Maltese, a screen writer and storyboard artist whose collaborations with Jones led to the critically acclaimed, 1957, Merrie Melodies cartoon “What’s Opera Doc?” starring Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd in a conflict that reaches Wagnerian proportions, with Bugs dragged up as Brunhilda and Fudd singing “Kill the Rabbit” to the tune of the Ride of the Valkyries.
Coyote v Acme combines animated and real life actors, much along the lines of 1988’s Who Framed Roger Rabbit? and subsequent Space Jam movies (1996 and 2021). It is worth noting that human and animated characters had been combined in films as far back as Winsor McCay’s 1914 short modestly titled “Winsor McCay, the Famous Cartoonist, and Gertie”. In the 1920s and 30s, Walt Disney directed the so-called “Alice Comedies”, which incorporated a real little girl with a cartoon cat. After seeing Mary Poppins (1964) in the cinema, I grew up with an irrational desire to dance among cartoon penguins.
The new film sees Coyote’s legal team led by SNL’s Will Forte, as Kevin Avery, and Lana Condor, as Avery’s niece, Paige, follow a series of clues, messages and other leads to build their case against Acme. However, Coyote may have other reasons for wanting his day in court. The Road Runner has been subpoenaed as an eyewitness to Acme products’ many failures and will now have to take the stand. Yum, yum!
The defence is led by former WWE wrestler, Jon Cena, as Acme corporate lawyer, Buddy Crane, blustering bigmouth Fog Horn Leghorn and the Tasmanian Devil, Acme’s PR Officer, who may seem inarticulate but can reliably give the company’s actions a positive spin.
Guest appearances also include: Daffy Duck, Bugs Bunny and Tweety Pie. I smiled at the inclusion of Peter Lorre who similarly appeared in cartoon form back in the days when cartoon shorts contained nods to then contemporary, Hollywood stars. But I nearly I nearly punched the air when notorious sex pest Pepe Le Pew made a surprise guest appearance on screen.
At the very least, Le Pew’s appearance validated my desire to have a skunk of my own. Thanks to the algorithm behind ‘Facebook Reels’, I have been doom scrolling skunks for the last month. They look good fun, even if their owners tend to give them alarming names like Stinklord, Smellmistress and Sir Spraysalot.
Forbes recently enthused that Coyote vs Acme gained a “96% Rotten Tomatoes critic review score ahead of its wide release, with 104 reviews counted”, making the film “Not just the best-scored animated (well, in part) movie of the year, but one of the top three wide-releases of the year, so far”.
Fair enough, but away from star ratings and percentages (however they are calculated) critics have been more circumspect, I know I am. The film is fun, but it’s no Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Coyote vs Acme lacks that film’s compellingly entertaining performances, such as, Bob Hoskin’s Eddie Valiant, a human everyman trapped in a world of ‘toons’, and Christopher Lloyd’s deranged Judge Doom. It seemed as if Cena’s Crane would be similarly revealed as something other than human. At one point he is described as “a machine”, but nothing comes of it.
There is at least one thing Coyote vs Acme does better than Who Framed Roger Rabbit? It gets the cartoon character’s personalities entirely right. Wile E Coyote is pitch perfect, scheming to the very last.
The coyote conforms to Jones’s source of inspiration – a chapter in Mark Twain’s semi-autobiographical book, Roughing It (1872), to wit:
“The coyote is a long, slim, sick and sorry-looking skeleton, with a gray wolf skin stretched over it, … a furtive and evil eye, and a long, sharp face, with slightly lifted lip and exposed teeth… He is always hungry. He is always poor, out of luck, and friendless… He is so spiritless and cowardly that even while his exposed teeth are pretending a threat, the rest of his face is apologizing for it”. He is “scrawny, and ribby, and coarse-haired, and pitiful”.
When it came to designing Coyote, Jones’s immediate inspiration was the appearance of his fellow animator, Ken Harris. Later, Jones was to add “rules” for the Coyote vs Road Runner shorts. “No outside force can harm the Coyote — only his own ineptitude or the failure of the Acme products” and. “The Coyote could stop anytime — if he were not a fanatic” that is “one who redoubles his effort when he has forgotten his aim.”
Coyote v Acme turns the coyote’s fanaticism into a moral fable. Lawyer Avery has long since aimed for the low hanging fruit of miniscule personal injury payments from Acme. Instead, the Coyote inspires him to try, try, try again – and escalate damages to the max.
The script also challenges the acceptability of cartoon violence. Toons may be indestructible but that doesn’t mean they don’t feel pain. That’s a bold move for a genre whose entire popularity rests on us suspending our empathy. If cartoon violence was perceived as real, what’s left at the beginning of Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, for example, are just scenes of animal cruelty, child endangerment and weaponised kitchen utensils.
There’s lots of fun to be had here, although, particularly since Coyote and Road Runner are both effectively mute, a lot of screen time is taken up with the human cast. There has also been a lot of good will behind the film.
The story of under-coyote vs corporate greed echoes its own production history. Warner wanted to write the film off as a tax loss, but a vocal campaign spared it the fate that befell the Batgirl movie.
I honestly don’t know what youngsters will make of the film, but for me it confirmed that the anarchic world of Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes still has a firm place in my heart.
Wait, is that a group of penguins I spy? Hey guys, fancy a dance?
Tim Robins
Head downthetubes for…
• Likely Looney, Mostly Merrie: Coyote inspiration Ken Harris
• Forbes.com: Coyote Vs. Acme’ Sets A Rotten Tomatoes Review Score Record
• Roughing It by Mark Twain | Project Gutenberg
- About the Author
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John is the founder of downthetubes, launched in 1998. He is a comics and magazine editor, writer, and Press Officer for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He also runs Crucible Comic Press.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine and Overkill for Marvel UK, Babylon 5 Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, and its successor, Star Trek Explorer, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics; and has edited several comic collections and graphic novels, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”, and Hancock: The Lad Himself, by Stephen Walsh and Keith Page.
He’s the writer of comics such as Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs”, with Dave Hailwood.
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