All 5 Looney Tunes Movies, Ranked From Worst To Best (Including Coyote Vs. Acme)

It's been hard to be a "Looney Tunes" fan this decade. For years, it felt like "Coyote vs Acme" would be scrapped from existence altogether by Warner Bros, a decision accompanied by the gradual removal of the entire original "Looney" shorts back catalogue from HBO Max. Yes, there were more than 80 brand-new shorts produced under the "Looney Tunes Cartoons" banner, but with so many classic adventures disappearing without warning, their arrival felt bittersweet. 

With "Coyote vs Acme" finally arriving in theaters and getting great reviews, we're looking back at the feature-length, theatrically released "Looney Tunes" movies and ranking them from worst-to-best. To our surprise, only five features were produced in total, three of which were released in the last five years. It's hard to believe that Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and more icons have felt like such fixtures of the big screen, but that's thanks to the enduring appeal of the timeless shorts. Until "Space Jam" in 1996, the characters' only theatrical outings were via compilation movies of their greatest hits, and cameos in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," which we're not counting for the purposes of this list.

All five movies are unique attempts to remind modern audiences of why the Looney Tunes are so beloved. Not all succeed in their goals, but they do make us wish we saw these characters onscreen more often.

A strong contender for worst film of the 2020s, the long-awaited legacy sequel to "Space Jam" fatally misunderstood what made the original so popular. "Space Jam: A New Legacy" once again saw the Looney Tunes lampoon pop culture and modern Hollywood, with LeBron James playing a fictionalized version of himself on the eve of signing a movie deal with Warner Bros. 

In his meeting with studio execs, however, he discovered that they instead want him to sign his likeness rights so an AI could insert him into any viewer's favorite franchise –- the only genuine laugh is James saying how awful the idea sounds, considering the movie itself feels like the AI slop it's poking fun at. It gets even worse when he's kidnapped by Al G. Rhythm (Don Cheadle) and forced into a life-or-death basketball game as retaliation for criticizing his ideas, with only Looney Tunes allowed as his teammates.

Released a year after HBO Max launched, this charmless replica of the 1996 original felt more like a glorified advert for everything viewers could see on the streamer than the satire of Hollywood it was likely intended as. James is awfully wooden in the lead role, his Razzie win rightfully deserved, and the writers don't offer any remotely amusing material for the animated characters. It's a shameless cash grab that wants you to think it's self-aware but is every bit as hollow as the corporate studio mindset it's parodying.

Originally conceived as a Jackie Chan-starring "Space Jam" sequel called "Spy Jam," "Looney Tunes: Back in Action" was significantly reworked by director Joe Dante due to his personal hatred for that 1996 movie. Rather than continuing the characters' modernization, he wanted to harken back to the madcap, gag-a-minute shorts of the late famed Chuck Jones. There are plenty of inspired moments throughout this globe-trotting adventure, which sees Bugs and Daffy (both voiced by Joe Alaskey) team up with aspiring stuntman D.J. (Brendan Fraser) and Warner Bros. executive Kate (Jenna Elfman) to find D.J.'s secret agent father (Timothy Dalton) who is being pursued by Acme over his hunt for a mysterious diamond.

A box-office bomb that killed the theatrical "Looney Tunes" franchise for almost two decades, there have been recent attempts to re-evaluate "Back in Action" as a misunderstood comic masterpiece. The opening stretch certainly delivers upon the Hollywood satire and cartoon chaos, with Daffy all but destroying the studio lot after being fired and unfolding around several ingenious visual gags.

Sadly, it becomes far less consistent once the spy plot kicks in, with two uninteresting human leads, and far too few animated characters outside of Bugs or Daffy. Steve Martin is the only actor who understands the assignment, playing the villainous Acme CEO as a live-action cartoon. A generic spy comedy that just happens to feature cartoon sidekicks, "Back in Action" was a disappointment then, and still is now.

No, it's not just childhood nostalgia clouding our judgment here: "Space Jam" has a far better understanding of how to utilize its animated characters and offers a more coherent celebrity satire than the two movies that followed. Lebron James might be depicted as an overbearing father in "A New Legacy," but the movie never pits him as the butt of the joke, to the point it feels like a PR exercise to keep him in the same GOAT conversation as Jordan. 

One of the best basketball movies ever made, "Space Jam" never positions Jordan as the boring straight man, even when sharing scenes with his cartoon teammates. The script is unafraid to take jabs at his public reputation and short-lived baseball career, laughing at the star as often as it laughs with him.

Even though "Back in Action" was designed to move the Tunes back to a more traditional adventure, it left too many characters on the sidelines. "Space Jam," as detested as it was by purists, had a better handle on how to incorporate each character in the franchise's deep bench. The chaotic basketball game was structured entirely around visual and slapstick gags, with the screenplay substituting players like a master manager, knowing where best to utilize each larger-than-life personality. 

Place this next to "A New Legacy," where the stale jokes make it easier to notice the game's incomprehensible rules, and it looks like "Citizen Kane."

The highest praise we give the only completely animated "Looney Tunes" feature is that it effectively recaptured the spirit of Bob Clampett to the extent you could believe this was released during his heyday. The first of two consecutive "Tunes" movies to be dumped by Warner Bros and saved from the abyss by Ketchup Entertainment, "The Day the Earth Blew Up" is an inspired tribute to 1950s sci-fi B-movies, with Daffy Duck and Porky Pig (both voiced by Eric Bauza) playing lifelong housemates who need a job to fix a hole in their roof caused by a UFO, or risk eviction.

Director Pete Browngardt's film operates at a madcap pace from its opening moments, with quick-fire montages of the pair growing up in a farm and getting fired from several jobs seconds after starting them. It  impressively sustains that high-wire comic tone for the full 91 minutes, never exhausting the audience, and instead blossoming into the silliest conspiracy thriller conceivable.

If "Space Jam: A New Legacy" suggested that the "Looney Tunes" were long past their expiration date, "The Day the Earth Blew Up" is a fantastic reminder that these comic creations will continue to endure –- the gags here are equal parts fresh and timeless, just like the inspired slapstick of the original shorts. It's a shame Warner Bros. have turned their back on these animated icons, because this movie is proof that they have plenty of life left.

In 1990, The New Yorker published Ian Frazier's short story "Coyote V. Acme," imagining Wile. E. Coyote's attorney's opening statement in a court case against the Acme corporation, dryly recollecting the various injuries he sustained using their products. It's a very funny piece, largely due to how it recontextualizes the bird-hungry predator as a believable downtrodden figure.

That idea seems to have been the gateway into Oscar-nominated writer Samy Burch's and director Dave Green's film adaptation. Set in a world where humans and cartoons co-exist on less-than-equal terms, "Coyote vs Acme" transforms an elaborate gag into a more thorough legal satire taking aim at corporate negligence and animal testing.

It does for the courtroom drama what "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" did for the noir, with every member of the live-action ensemble playing the labyrinthine conspiracy plot entirely straight. You might accuse us of recency bias for naming this the best "Looney Tunes" movie out of the gate, but it utilizes its stacked roster of animated characters far better than any movie before it. 

It makes a risky choice to have Bugs and Daffy as extended cameos, but that showcases a better understanding of how to incorporate these characters into a coherent live-action adventure. Mercifully, it never threatens to copy the "New Legacy" trick of squeezing in every last character without any strong material; this is made by a team passionate about the "Looney Tunes," who understand the comedic contexts which make each shine.