How Zootopia Almost Became the Best Disney Movie

Well, here it is, the Zootopia video that I teased I would make over 2 years ago.

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Social Media -

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Timestamps -

0:00 - A Mostly Good Movie With a Lot of Untapped Potential
1:14 - Judy and Nick are Great Protagonists
3:57 - The Themes, and What Works About Them
9:13 - Arguably the Best Scene in the Movie
13:04 - Here Come the Flaws! Starting With the Themes
17:55 - The Plot is Constructed From Too Many Coincidences
20:10 - This One Scene Annoys Me (It's Not Even Bad, Just Frustrating)
20:54 - Beep Beep I'm a Mean Sheep
21:57 - How the Original Version of the Movie Hit Harder
25:20 - The OG Version of Nick Was Even More Relatable
27:20 - The Saddest Disney Deleted Scene
29:44 - Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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Keywords -

Zootopia, Animals, Disney, Animation, Mixed Bag, Judy Hops, Bunny, Nick Wilde, Fox, Themes, Dark, Behind the Scenes, Police Investigation, Comedy, Coincidence, Sheep.
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#analysis #disney #animation #zootopia #animals #theme #bunny #fox #waltdisneyanimation
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[Rockotarthepurplehatguy]

Can I get a pat on the back for uploading a new video within a time span of less than two weeks for the first time in over a year and a half?

[asdflkjh-rg]

I love the scene where Judy looks back at Nick and his collar is on yellow. She knows they're feeling the same way about what just happened but only one of them can experience their emotions without repercussion. It reads to me that she truly realizes in that moment that it's not a safety precaution, predators are being punished for just being alive.

[DapperLastname]

You forgot to mention the part where the collars shock the predators whenever they feel any strong emotion, like, *all* emotions. The kid at the polar bear taming party is at first excited, then he gets too happy and gets shocked.

[MysticHydra]

Oh my god, the "taming party" scene wouldve broken me. I wouldve been ugly crying in that movie theater.

[edit_town]

28:35 there is a slight pause before he says "accepts you" and that really speaks to me. he knows his kid is so happy about this. he knows how wrong it is to lie to him. he knows how much it will break him when he realizes it was all just a facade to keep everyone else happy. idk that one pause there just makes me want to cry

[kiraschutte]

I think the idea of the taming collars would've added so much more to Mayor Lionheart's character as well (following the released plot of the movie). It would further solidify why he covered up all of the missing animals cases and why he had people working hard to keep it quiet but also cure them. Finally, a predator who "can be anything!" got into a position of power - he was "one of the good ones" - always a green collar. Him covering all of that up would be even more due to him not wanting to lose his position but also not wanting to place predators into a more negative light since it's ALREADY bad enough that they have shock collars. If it turns out there's something that makes predators go absolutely feral despite the presence of a shock collar, then what? How bad would things get? He would probably lose his position and predators would be WILDLY displaced and restrained in society. Mayor Lionheart would want to hide things, find out what's causing it, find a way to cure things to prevent further chaos.

Not super well thought out but I just think a combo of ideas could've worked so well across so many elements.

[omegafire]

Ironically the original script could work as a prequel, a sort dark kept secret for the perfect zootopia from the current film.

[pyronuke]

Personally, as a writer myself, I think the reason the collars were removed was because they couldn't find a way to give the story a happy ending without making it feel like a major contrivance.

[Anonymous_Lilac]

The scene where the polar cub receives the collar and celebrates before getting immediately shocked broke my heart. And when he went back to hug his dad, AH. That would’ve been one of my favourite Disney movies ever.

[spikeabug]

I'd still argue the best scene is the one in the train where the tiger sits down and the mother scoots her kid away from him- it's so subtle but perfect

[mdog]

what makes gideon's apology all the better, is that through the wording he uses you can tell he's been to therapy. This wasn't just him ending up an okay person in the end, this shows that at some point he looked himself in the mirror, said "I want to be better than you" and put in the freaking work. He conciously acknowledge just how wrong he had been for his actions and worked on bettering himself.

[ixiahj]

I remember the original ice cream shop scene with the elephants. The guy did not want to sell the jumbo pop to Nick because it was too big for his "son." He was not gonna finish it and most of it would end up on the floor as wasted food. I thought that was a logical take on the scene but the final cut made it look like they were just mean to non elephants.

Same with Bogo assigning Judy with traffic duty. She's new on the force. That's not discrimination but they made it look like discrimination.

[kkinthewheelchair]

This is the " if it was indie it'll be a classic" movie pick for me

[SiliconSlyWolf]

Based on some of the size difference things in this movie, you'd think they would NEED things like rabbit cops to police mouse town or such, rather than say, an elephant who is basically a kaiju to them.

[umjammerlammy]

There's an old webcomic called Zistopia that remade the entirety of Zootopia through the lens of the original pitch, setting it in the 1970s. It gave a deeper examination of systemic racism and class systems than I think even the original script did. It got very intense, one character had had a miscarriage due to having an electric collar on during childbirth.

[kawansiesquad]

Guys go watch beastars if u want a dark version of zootopia.

Zootopia is like if humans were pretending to be animals. Beastars is like if animals were pretending to be human.

Beastars actually explores the fact that predators need to eat meat and how their society essentially makes eating meat illegal, they have substitutes for meat but it’s an unspoken secret hidden from all herbivores that there is a hidden market selling herbivore meat to carnivores.

The story also explores interspecies relationship and how they are viewed by the public.

Predators and larger species of animals have to take medications or learn how to suppress their instincts to live in society in peace with herbivores. Bears have to take specific meds so that they don’t get too strong or too big so they don’t harm anyone but it has painful side effects. And there is so much more!

It’s such a fascinating story.

[kialeysmith]

wow, that polar bear scene was chilling and heartbreaking. disappointed that it got cut, bc that seemed so well written

[vetarlittorf]

I love the movie. My only problem with it is that the anti-predator sentiment was solved by pinning it on the villain even though the ice cream shop scene implied it was systemic.
I also wasn't a fan of portraying Judy collaborating with the mafia to interrogate the weasel as a positive thing, since that is dangerously close to making her a rotten cop.

Other than that, it was a decent buddy cop movie with likable characters and great humor.

[fluffywhompus]

Somthing that still confuses me is how Judy never knew about the night howlers despite living on that farm her entire childhood. Even if she never went near them herself I feel like she would already know about how dangerous they can be

[orionyxe]

I'm 19, and still remember watching these rough draft animatics of Zootopia on my iPad when I was 11 (I had the blu-ray that came with the code for behind the scenes footage). I genuinely felt kind of robbed, at that young age, because as young as I was I still understood & resonated with the emotional & bleak messages that were conveyed with the original world-building of the society and its "taming collars." I thought it added a level of depth to the film that wasn't there in the original, even though I wouldn't have necessarily been able to put that into words at that age. I still agree now, and it's nice to see those thoughts reflected in this video essay. While I still really like the original, it's a shame that it was rewritten to be more "kid friendly, " especially since as a kid I emotionally connected more deeply with the deleted scenes, and I'm sure most other kids would have as well.