Zootopia (2016)
March 3, 2016 7:22 PM - Subscribe

In a city of anthropomorphic animals, a fugitive con artist fox and a rookie bunny cop must work together to uncover a conspiracy.

This is the best animated kids movie about prejudice and police brutality ever. [Vox]

While on the surface the plot sounds like a forgettable DreamWorks Animation picture that coasts on celebrity voices for anthropomorphic animals, Zootopia is rich, deep, and textured in a way you would rarely expect from a family film. [Collider]

It's too bad the target audience for Disney's Zootopia isn't of voting age - not even close - because there are issues here, about exclusion, prejudice, xenophobia, and women's rights, that would fire up an electorate and make voters look twice at the candidates vying for the presidency. [Philly.com]

But the pleasure now comes in appreciating the sumptuous artistry. In particular, the city of Zootopia is an extraordinary creation with different neighbourhoods reflecting distinct environments, from perpetual winter to lush jungle, and from human-scale settings like Sahara Square to the miniatures of Rodentia [Toronto Sun]

Notopoulos noted that Disney’s animators have also favorited tweets from furry community Twitter users about the film—and that many furries believe Disney purposely made the film to appeal to furries. [Gizmodo]
posted by jeather (47 comments total) 6 users marked this as a favorite
 
I would like to give them props for the Alan Tudyk Duke Weselton/Weaselton joke.
posted by jeather at 7:23 PM on March 3, 2016 [3 favorites]


Had no information about this movie. When we went to see The Force Awakens, there was a trailer for it beforehand, a lengthy bit featuring an attempt to run a license plate at a DMV operated solely by sloths. After the easy joke of the opening, it went for deep character humor in a way that was tremendously appealing and impressive for such a short piece.

Basically we're going to take our four-year-old to see this on Monday and even though he probably won't get most of the plot, I am quite excited for it.
posted by Scattercat at 3:13 AM on March 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


The beau and I are going to see this movie Wednesday to celebrate four years of being rather fond of one another. I'm so excited.
posted by PearlRose at 7:35 AM on March 4, 2016


My understanding is that Kristen Bell plays one of the sloths, another outstanding in-joke.
posted by stevis23 at 10:31 AM on March 4, 2016 [15 favorites]


You are correct (background on the joke).

I saw the trailer before The Good Dinosaur with my four year old son, and he wasn't sure about the movie from the trailer. Now? I'm interested to see it myself.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:27 PM on March 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


It opened rather earlier in Denmark (and AFAIK the rest of the world, too) than in the states—I was at the pre-screening on February 10th, and it was Amazing. So far, the must see movie of 2016. Seeing a movie once in the cinema usually suffices for me, but I have seen this one three times (the final one being the last showing of the original version in my city).

Seriously, this may well be one of the best movies Disney has ever made. Beautifully realised, written, and acted.

Apart from the plot and the characters, the setting of Zootropolis (in the US, Zootopia) is so rich and lush. Because of the wide range of citizens’ sizes, there are so many things going in many scenes that rewatching (and pausing) will be a joy.

A bit of trivia: One of the newscasters in the American (as well as Danish, and possibly European) version is a moose. In Japan, he is a tanuki, in Australia/NZ a koala, and in Brazil, a jaguar
posted by bouvin at 2:13 PM on March 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


Wow, everything about this film was incredibly well handled. Let me just focus on one of the myriad of ways this film succeeds at making its point... the dialog!

The animal based jokes, they come with the territory in such a cartoon, but-- it was different. These constant features in the dialog were reframed into what they were logically in the context: casual racism.

A passing joke about rabbits and multiplying, a confidence in an elephant's memory, the film was full of it-- but each time, after the premise was set by the film, these jokes were delivered in a state of tension. The dialog was tinted by the possibility that it might trigger hostilities, and, indeed, some jokes did go too far, and were recognized as such-- but, and this is perhaps the most radical part of the entire film, it was depicted as impossibly unavoidable. But, as with "nature," "dna," and "instincts," it was something to be more than.

And, paying only attention to the jokes made, the most damningly racist character in the film turned out to be the heroine herself. Which, for a hero's journey character arc, an incredible centerpiece.

Go see it!
posted by TwelveTwo at 11:24 PM on March 4, 2016 [15 favorites]


Saw it last night. Very well done. John Lasseter was executive producer and it lived up to his best works.

A great kid movie with a female main character-- Jason Bateman's fox is definitely the sidekick-- who isn't anything like a princess. Although she is a cuddly bunny rabbit.

The animal jokes all went deeper than "haha, it's funny because animals are acting like people" and were the kind of jokes that people would make in an animal-based universe. And yes, the topics related to racism (aside from being the moral center of the film) were really well-handled and often quite funny.

It's a very message-heavy film (along with racism, you get some things about bullying and the typical kid-movie "you can be anything") but I didn't mind that at all, the jokes and action sequences come at you very fast (except one) so you don't feel preached at.

The sense of scale was very well done. Animal cartoons usually make rabbits, wolves, and elephants about the same size so they can all be on camera. This one relished the size difference and put tiny mice and huge polar bears and everything in between in the same scenes, and drew a bunch of humor from that.

And hearing my 14-year-old describe the parallels to racism he noticed on the way home, before we even brought up the topic, made my day.
posted by mmoncur at 12:47 AM on March 5, 2016 [8 favorites]


I am curious about this one, but... I don't know, I thought Frozen was a pleasant mediocrity and Big Hero Six was a good Iron Giant-ish movie trapped inside some weird superhero thing that didn't work. The ads for this one are sure hyping that this is from the same folks who brought you those, and that kind of scares me off. The reviews are great so far, but I feel like I've been burned twice already.

Did anybody think Frozen was overrated and Big Hero Six was kind of a big lumpy mess, but they liked this? Will I walk out of this one feeling like a big grump again, wondering what everybody else loved so much?

I'm not surprised, Sokka shot first. Disney is clearly trying to corrupt us with their furryist agenda!
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:55 AM on March 5, 2016


I enjoyed Big Hero 6 but didn't think it was the most amazing story ever, it was fine but not much more. I liked Frozen a lot, but for specific personal reasons -- I thought it was good, but not among the best of their genre. I also liked Wreck-It Ralph, and I think this was most similar to that, but with a larger age range.
posted by jeather at 5:14 AM on March 5, 2016


So many kids 6 and under fleeing the theatre in terror during the film. My own two were huddled in the entryway for the back haLG of the film....
posted by Nanukthedog at 9:53 AM on March 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Did anybody think Frozen was overrated and Big Hero Six was kind of a big lumpy mess, but they liked this? Will I walk out of this one feeling like a big grump again, wondering what everybody else loved so much?

I haven't seen Frozen, loved Big Hero 6 (comics nerd), and felt like Zootopia was most enjoyable when it wasn't trying so hard to hit you over the head with a tree called SOCIAL COMMENTARY. The message was good, but felt really heavy-handed to me.

Everything else about the movie was great. Visuals and design were great. The solutions to animals being various sizes were great. The sly fox vs. the idealistic bunny banter was great.

I really enjoyed the different boroughs of the city with their own climates. It was an ingenious way to bring together animals that live in different biomes. The different sizes of vehicles was also well thought-out. The chase through Rodentia was really enjoyable. The final scene was a good laugh.
posted by Fleebnork at 11:23 AM on March 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Utterly fantastic. Enjoyable, deep characters, a very well-thought-out world (designing accessibility features for a city where some residents are fifty times the size of others must have been no easy feat), wonderful comedic timing (some of the jokes had me in stitches), an incredibly relevant message that, while a bit heavy-handed, was handled with respect and great forethought... It may not be the best animated movie ever, but in my personal ranking it's at least in the top five.
posted by brecc at 12:20 AM on March 6, 2016


Man. For all the humour and cuteness in the movie, it felt (and continues to feel) really heavy afterwards. Like, when I think about it, the first thing I remember isn't the Rodentia chase or the sloth DMV scene or all the other fun parts, it's the "sigh, casual racism" feeling that permeates the whole film. But that's not the movie's fault, it's the world's fault -- the movie isn't participating in casual racism, it's depicting and confronting casual racism head-on. I'm really glad they didn't shy away from that.

I loved the rich and varied environments (which work both as visually interesting settings and as a metaphor for places like Chinatown, Little Italy, etc.) but my favourite part was the character designs. Especially the body language! The way Judy's nose wiggles, the way the posture of the ears signals characters' feelings, the realistic size differences between everyone... Such a fantastic use of the medium.

Sokka shot first, what was the Frozen joke? I must have missed it.
posted by a car full of lions at 4:47 PM on March 6, 2016


Hah! I remember that. I missed the joke entirely!
posted by a car full of lions at 6:51 PM on March 6, 2016


Yes, the action, particularly involving characters going "feral", is a little too intense and scary for some little kids, a few had to be carried out bawling.

It's PG, not G, so 6 and up, or wait until it comes out on disc or PPV to watch at home on Saturday Morning, where they can hide behind the couch rather than at a dark, loud theater.

Visually stunning, amazingly well animated. Just, utterly natural and believable movement for animal-people of vastly different bodyshapes, perfectly rendered textures and body physics, wild perspective shots emphasizing the size differences of the characters. The extended music video at the end is worth it just to watch a gigantic crowd where no member is identical to any other, dancing their butts off. Just a gorgeous film.

This is old-fashioned World Building that sweats the fine details and takes a lot of chances, almost all of them paying off. It's one of those fictional worlds that are so sweeping and expansive, it feels as if you could no-kidding live in it, and keep running into something new and marvelous everyday.

Chief Bogo has a great accent (South African?) and impressive screen presence thanks to Elba, but is otherwise kind of more a cardboard cutout than a character, a walking trope. What's amazing is that he's the only one. Every other character, including the "throwaway" background characters, shows surprising depth and take unexpected directions. Every character feels as if they are real people who actually matter - which is important in a movie trying to teach the lessons that this one is. The cast is hitting well above their weight in giving life to these characters with their voice work, and considering that includes Idris Elba and Jenny Slate and J.K. Simmons and Alan Tudyk and Jason Bateman, that is saying A LOT.

The plot is classic Noir, updated for our moment in time - "Forget it Jake, It's Zootopia" - and those responsible for the plot (there are apparently seven of them, and they work wellll together, let me tell you!) are working at all times with a keen appreciation for Chekhov's Gun. Smart grownups are given things to figure out on their own, kids are given furry Sherlock/Batman level of scary-good detectives. Such an intelligent movie, wow. And this is even before we get to the theme.

I'm not going to cover that here, as I can't do it justice. See the movie. It's an important film, fun as all hell, yes, but essential viewing for the world we humans live in.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:08 PM on March 6, 2016 [7 favorites]


Seconding most of what Slap*Happy said, the world-building was truly impressive.

What I really liked--and what made it way better than the trailer had me expecting--is that this wasn't a movie about Zootopia at all, it was a movie *set in* Zootopia. They spent a little time here and there describing the world, but we mostly discover it as the characters move through it.

It's rare that a kid's cartoon has me wishing for a sequel, but this one does. Not that there's more story to tell--it actually resolved everything. But there's a whole world there and they could literally tell any story with any characters there. I'd love to spend more time in that world.

One way to tell that the world is so well-constructed is that when a couple of things happen that would be perfectly normal in our world--animals walking around naked, and animals acting wild--you see them as bizarre/creepy/scary just like the characters do.

Also appreciated: No singing. The only character who sings (played by Shakira) is just a popular singer they make reference to, and you don't hear a whole song until the end credits.
posted by mmoncur at 11:57 PM on March 6, 2016 [9 favorites]


I loved a LOT of things about this movie, not the least of which was the way it handled female characters. Judy, the mobster's daughter, the assistant mayor, Judy's mother, were all interesting, complex, diverse women who, possibly because the film had even BIGGER "Messages" to focus on, were never (unlike in something like "Frozen" or "Tangled" or "Brave") really played for their "token strong-but-still-princess-y" woman-ness. They were just super rich characters, like everyone else we encounter.
I especially appreciated the unexpected and lovely friendship that develops between Judy and the mobster's daughter: Judy is an ambitious dreamer, a "tryer", a bunny in a predator's job, but she doesn't need to be a tom-boy (tom-bunny?) to fit in or be believable, nor do the creator's anxiously compensate for her ambition and skill by making her super stereotypically "girly" (which was something that bothered me a LOT about "Big Hero 6"). She's presented as feminine without needing to "prove" or perform her femininity, and capable without needing to account for her femininity. If that wasn't awesome enough (and it's really fucking awesome), the film also makes space for a female character who genuinely enjoys performing a version of femininity (Mr. Big's daughter), and (astonishingly) doesn't ridicule her for it. She and Judy actually become friends, and neither is made to shame or judge the other for their way of being a woman. Judy can compliment Fru Fru (ok, the name is not the greatest) on her hair or her dress and not lose any of her "credibility" as the hero of the story; Fru Fru can enjoy these aspects of feminine display and not become the butt of a joke or a laughing stock or an emblem of female superficiality. Most amazingly of all, these two female characters become FRIENDS, just as they are, without one needing to "teach" the other what it means to "be a real woman" (as is so common in female friendships is much of the media directed at children). It was such a small thing, in the grand scheme of the whole film, but just so fucking great to see. I just can't even.

Also, the male television news announcer in Zootopia is a Moose named Peter Moosebridge, appropriately voiced by the beloved (at least to me) Canadian anchor Peter Mansbridge. Just perfect.
posted by Dorinda at 9:41 AM on March 7, 2016 [18 favorites]


The Night Howler lab moved from a subtle homage to Breaking Bad (scientist in yellow hazmat suit working in broken-down vehicle), to an obvious reference (blue liquid passing through lab equipment), to a blatant elbow in the ribs (Jesse and Woolter) at a pace that lined up perfectly with your own realization of what they were doing.
posted by cardboard at 11:19 AM on March 7, 2016 [13 favorites]


I agree with most of what's been said. It's a really really great movie, and I didn't even think the message was heavy handed. It was timely and I think everyone would be better humans for watching these animals.

Specific notes:
- a bunny in a predator's job -- you mean large animals job, most of the force are actually large herbivores, like elephants, hippos, and rhinos, and chief Bogo is a bison.
- The Breaking Bad homage definitely had just the right pacing, I commented on it to my friend right when the blue liquid was pouring.
- The "cute" compliment from Clawhouser to Judy, and her saying only other bunnies can call each other "cute". I think I died from laughter and my heart was full from the social commentary.
- I will never not find the sloths in DMV scene funny. And I appreciate more than you can imagine that Kristen Bell is the voice of the female sloth, Priscilla.
- I love that they never even hinted the romance between Judy and Nick. I was dreading it and dreading it and then it just didn't happen and it felt great. Like when Rey in The Force Awakens called Finn her friend at the end and went off to find Luke.
- I like that I couldn't guess the twist until we saw that Doug wasn't the only ram/sheep involved in the scheme. When the rest of them were attacking I'd guess Bellwether, but I still had my doubts 'cause she was so innocent and trying so hard.
- Apparently in Bellwether's closet/office there's a sticky note with Doug's name and number, but I didn't catch it.
- My one gripe with the plot is that somehow the Hopps had never heard of the name Nighthowlers for the plants despite being from that area and her uncle went "savage" after stepping on one. It's kind of a leap that she didn't mention any of that to her parents right after finding the victims.
- I also experienced a couple of kids getting scared and crying and had to be carried out by their parents. I guess PG is really PG!
- And also why the "nude" animals are so... not nude. Imagine if this was rated R! It'd really be a movie for furries!
posted by numaner at 12:11 PM on March 7, 2016 [3 favorites]


- a bunny in a predator's job -- you mean large animals job, most of the force are actually large herbivores, like elephants, hippos, and rhinos, and Chief Bogo is a bison


Whoops! You're right, of course. It was Judy's size/meekness/cuteness that was her barrier to entry, not solely her "prey" designation.
posted by Dorinda at 12:41 PM on March 7, 2016


Also, can someone explain to clueless me why Kristin Bell's inclusion makes the DMV bit even better? I thought that part was pitch perfect and hilarious, but I don't get the Kristin Bell cone cation...
posted by Dorinda at 12:42 PM on March 7, 2016


Dorinda: Kristen Bell's Sloth Meltdown.
posted by foxfirefey at 1:04 PM on March 7, 2016 [7 favorites]


Numaner, this is one of my favorite Muppet sketches.

The credits thank the North Hollywood branch of the LAPD...Tujunga and Vineland are 2 of NH's streets.
posted by brujita at 10:52 PM on March 7, 2016


Saw it and loved it. People have already pointed out the reasons - the worldbuilding is stellar, the message is core to the conceit but not hammered home in quite the typical way, the jokes were mostly hilarious, and the characters and particularly the female characters were handled with particular depth that was highly welcome in a film aimed at a younger audience.

I would agree that this is definitely more of a middle grades movie; the four-year-olds got a little bored and a little scared at the talky and spooky bits respectively. They enjoyed the chases, but they're both pretty fearless chaser-types themselves, and I could easily see it being too much for someone.

We're buying this one, though, just to have for ourselves if nothing else. I would watch an entire series of these movies with gusto. Bonus points if the sequels don't focus on Judy and Nick at all and are just completely new stories in the same world, with maybe old characters showing up again to perform their appropriate roles a la Discworld.
posted by Scattercat at 10:41 AM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]


Such a beautiful movie! My eleven year old and I loved it!

I thought there was an interesting tension inherent in telling a fable about Racism. It's fine line to walk, using a structure that relies on the baggage of various species archetypes, and then demonstrating the archetypes themselves to be poisonous.

(Except when they didn't: gazelles are graceful, sloths are slow, and weasels are weasels. Which is fine, not every character has to play against type (which becomes just as boring as any other formula). But, still, weasels are like the most typecast of any animated animal, ever.)

I thought the predator/prey analogy to racism was a little more complicated. Predators are defined by their diets, so I'm not sure what it's saying that they have to give up this fundamental part of themselves to live in a utopia. Is eating meat Zootopia's version of privilege? Seems like a stretch.

(And, also, what exactly do they eat? I assume all creatures in this universe have a personality, so meat is out. I guess they're all vegans? Except they have ice cream parlors. Are there struggling cows who are forced to sell their milk on the side to the local Ice Cream Corp. to make ends meet? Or is it a respectable nine to five job? Or is the ice cream in Elephanton made with elephant milk, while that sold in Rat Town is made with rat milk? Gross. And confusing! Fortunately, I live in a cowtown.)

The nudist colony was really interesting, too, and maybe it was the writers' pulling the rug out from under criticisms like those above. It was a funny sort-of-meta-riff, but it was also a statement of: "a.) This is our universe, and b.) in our universe animals arbitrarily wear clothes, and c.) those who don't are nude. It's just how it is (any questions: refer to a)."

Anyway, that's all! I loved this movie, and can't wait to see it again!
posted by crumbly at 11:03 AM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]


I decided to assume they have vat-grown meat in this world.
posted by jeather at 11:09 AM on March 8, 2016 [4 favorites]


Yeah I forgot to note that I also questioned what the predators are eating. I assume from Nick's love of the blueberries that they've honed their bodies to get more nutrients from veggies and fruits (although Nick seems to dislike carrots).

I also assume all the ice cream is made with soy milk or some other plant-based milk. Speaking of, the start of the ice cream shop scene you see the elephant scooping ice cream with his bare trunk; I immediately noted to my friend how gross that is. Next thing you know Judy is threatening to write them up for that. I love this movie.
posted by numaner at 12:00 PM on March 8, 2016 [4 favorites]


I was going to say that yeah, Nick eats blueberries with apparent relish, and Clawhauser is constantly eating donuts and processed junk food, so the whole obligatory carnivore thing seems not to be a thing in Zootopia-verse.

Which is fine. Eating a modern American diet would probably kill a chimpanzee, and they're darned close to us. Zootopia's conceit seems to be that all mammals gained sentience kind of in lockstep, evolutionarily speaking, so it appears that whatever food technology revolution they had in place of "cooked meat" worked for everyone. *shrugs*

Or maybe we're just never shown the screeching pens filled with wordless, animalistic apes that never reached their potential in this universe.

(Or perhaps even more plausibly, the animals all very specifically refer to "mammals" as the class of sentient beings, so perhaps fish, birds, and reptiles are the remaining animals there to provide meat for the meat-eaters.)
posted by Scattercat at 1:47 PM on March 8, 2016 [3 favorites]


(It's quite tangential to the movie, but foxes are among the most omni of omnivores and do generally appreciate fruit, including berries, blue and otherwise. Probably the most famous fox story of all time is about trying to get some grapes...)
posted by Wolfdog at 3:45 PM on March 10, 2016 [4 favorites]


Yeah, but polar bears? Obligate carnivores. Also most big cats, to my admittedly limited knowledge. Presumably they're eating *something*, and the giraffes have an acacia smoothie stand at one point, which suggests that ancestral preferences at least inform their tastes.
posted by Scattercat at 9:32 PM on March 10, 2016 [1 favorite]


I didn't see any sentient fish in the movie (and no birds? I'm pretty sure.) So I assume they all eat fish and maybe chicken.

Even further along the tangent... the only time I've seen a fox up close was when I was parked in the small lot next to Gibbon Falls at Yellowstone. Someone had spilled a pile of blueberries in the corner of the lot and a fox was eagerly munching on them.
posted by mmoncur at 1:07 AM on March 12, 2016 [1 favorite]


When we first travel through the frozen area they show a fish shop, so I think they're still eaten.

I thought this movie was really great.
posted by graventy at 1:07 PM on March 13, 2016 [1 favorite]


I wish that zpd.gov was a real website.
posted by soelo at 8:58 AM on March 14, 2016 [3 favorites]


The movie gets high marks for going in the direction it did, but also loses some for the its awkwardness at times. For instance, Judy makes a comment about other only bunnies can call other bunnies 'cute'. But she's regularly referred to as cute by others throughout the movie, with no comment from her. Then there's the Italian mobster trope ( and Judy knowingly working with a criminal) and Fox's comment about "all you bunnies" are so emotional. So the film wants to have its cake and eat it also, which I'm mostly ok with, because wow what a cake, but there's a few problems.

Despite all that, I would love to see a sequel of Judy and Nick's adventures as cops.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:13 PM on March 15, 2016 [1 favorite]


IIRC, it was mostly Nick that called her cute, and I think it was clear he was doing to push her buttons. It was one of those situations where telling him to stop wouldn't work. Kind of like how men will keep catcalling women IRL even if they're told to stop. Repeatedly.
posted by numaner at 8:15 PM on March 16, 2016


For instance, Judy makes a comment about other only bunnies can call other bunnies 'cute'. But she's regularly referred to as cute by others throughout the movie, with no comment from her.

Sure, but she was talking to a coworker she was going to have to see every day, and who was trying to be friendly, and in her first naive entry into her new career, when she still believed a can-do spirit could overcome any obstacle including bunny-prejudice.

The more the grim reality of her job begins to set in, the less she tries to educate people, especially people she's talking to during the investigation. I thought it was pretty potent--whenever a man says something about "chivalry" to me, I do a quick cost-benefit analysis to decide whether or not telling him to cut it out will be worth the static/blowback. Someone I'll never see again? Not worth it. Someone I'll be interacting with on a regular basis? Whole different thing. Seeing Judy go through the same process was really interesting to me.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 6:34 AM on March 21, 2016 [5 favorites]


We just watched this today and I liked it a lot more than I expected.

One thing:

...chief Bogo is a bison.

I'm pretty sure he's a cape buffalo, which I've heard share the distinction with hippos for killing the most humans in Africa each year.

EDIT: Also, Chief Bogo always looking over his glasses had to be a total Stringer Bell call out, right?
posted by small_ruminant at 7:52 PM on March 21, 2016 [5 favorites]




I would have loved it even if it had only had the sloth scene. We laughed and laughed. And yeah, it nailed racism and sexism too. Great movie. I can't wait to see it again, because it was packed full of good stuff.
posted by bearwife at 4:45 PM on March 31, 2016


I just saw something on tumblr that showed Judy wearing earbuds that were actually in her ears and how cartoons often get it wrong by placing them on the sides of rabbit heads.
posted by soelo at 7:33 AM on April 1, 2016 [3 favorites]


The best joke to come out of this for me was the nudist colony. In itself, pretty hilarious! "We're animals! We're not meant to wear clothes!"

But then they topped that by having the elephant and others make hilariously exaggerated 'look at my crotch' poses. Typically this is the sort of thing filmmakers cover with a strategically placed lamp or vase or someone's head but here, nope, full-on view between an elephant's legs.

Except! Because it's Disney, and these are anthropomorphised animals in the tradition of pantsless wonders like Donald Duck and Porky Pig, there's nothing there! No genitalia! They're cartoons! Briliantly multi-layered, A+.
posted by ocular shenanigans at 12:59 PM on April 2, 2016 [4 favorites]


Imagining Zootopia
posted by crumbly at 11:39 AM on April 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


This movie IMHO was perfect.... Except for the fat jokes.

Really could have done without the fat jokes.
posted by Faintdreams at 1:41 PM on April 14, 2016


One of the most masterful parts of the movie is what exactly Judy says in her press conference.

She admits that all the animals who've gone wild are predators. True, and arguably a fact that is her duty to make public

She says that in the past predators hunted prey. True.

She speculates that the incidents might be caused by some sort of hunting instincts in their DNA. Bzzzzt!

That's exactly the point where people so often go wrong, confusing correlation with causation.
posted by straight at 10:34 AM on June 15, 2016 [1 favorite]


Judy is a pretty darned corrupt cop, though. She blackmails Nick (and apparently turns a blind eye to his tax evasion in return for his help). The way she leans on the elephants in the ice-cream shop is pretty shady. She uses a flimsy pretext to neglect getting a warrant for her search of the limousine. She looks through surveillance data she's not authorized to access. I would hope the police have rules about breaking off a chase that would recklessly endanger lives like the one she pursues into the little rodent town. And I'd hope that ticket quotas are illegal in Zootopia, too.

I guess she's technically resigned from the force when she gets a mobster to interrogate the weasel with death threats, but that's also pretty bad.
posted by straight at 10:48 AM on June 15, 2016 [3 favorites]


Zootopia: The Darkest Timeline
posted by Rhaomi at 4:58 PM on July 16, 2016


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