My Cultural Diet

2016’s Zootopia was one of those rare movies that was far better than it had any right to be, delivering a message about diversity and tolerance that was entertaining and thoughtful rather than heavy-handed and preachy. It took almost a decade for Disney to return to the animal city, where all kinds of mammals live in harmony thanks to a complex system of environments. Zootopia 2 also tries to deliver a thoughtful message, but gets a bit muddled along the way because it can’t quite decide which thoughtful message to deliver. One moment, it seems to be indicting those members of the 1% who feel entitled and emboldened to take from those they fear and hate. (One sequence in particular seemed clearly inspired by the 1921 Tulsa race massacre, an episode in American history that still too few people know about.) The next, it’s about Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Nick Wilde (Jason Bateman) dealing (or not dealing) with their obvious differences and personality clashes. Either one of those stories would’ve made for a good movie, but by trying to do both, Zootopia 2 sells both of them short. The constant stream of animal puns and movie references (e.g., Babe, The Shining) don’t help either. If it sounds like I’m being too harsh on Zootopia 2, don’t worry: I still had plenty of fun watching it, but the first movie was so delightful that it set a pretty high bar for its sequel.

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