Zootopia 2' trailer: Movie plot, release date, new cast revealed

“Ten years is a long time in general, but in the technology world, it’s like almost a lifetime, because so much has changed,” shared Zootopia 2 producer Yvett Merino in our recent crew interview for Blavity’s Shadow and Act when asked how the advancement of technology has affected the new film.

Adding that, “We’re so excited that we were able to implement Presto into our pipeline with this film. It’s never easy implementing new software into a pipeline, especially with a sequel, where we have characters that were built in the old pipeline and animated with Maya. We work closely with our artists. They all kind of came together with our software engineers to make sure that the evolution of the pipeline kind of worked well for everyone, and we were able to kind of work in both worlds.”

Her colleague and co-head of story on the film, David VanTuyle, echoed the sentiment.

“We’re always looking to the real world, like people and stuff,” he said. “As artists, we’re always studying people and animals and that kind of thing and trying to figure out a way ot get that into the film. Going back to this one, and partnerships, and Nick and Juday’s relationship, was our main goal. And, again, asking, ‘Where are these characters now?’ Even with some of the returning characters like Flash or Mr. Big, just trying to figure out what’s the new thing we could put these characters in?”

From the beginning, Zootopia 2’s director, writer, and chief creative officer, Jared Bush, along with director Byron Howard, envisioned incorporating reptiles into the story.

In the sequel, this vision comes to life through the character of a snake named Gary, who disrupts the routine lives of rookie cops Judy and Nick.

“To have a snake be that emotive, he’s such a vulnerable character,” Howard told us. “I think it’s not an easy feat to say, ‘Now the snake’s going to do something that’s going to make you cry.’ That’s dozens of people working on this. Talented artists. It’s also technicians going and figuring out the software to make that work.”

Bush added, “Every animal has these incredible superpowers; you’re going to see that in this movie. There are some really special things that they can do in our research. It was actually fascinating, because humans, as mammals, like mammals more.”

Stating, “They actually contribute more to mammal research than reptile research, and so doing the research for this was a little more difficult than the first film, because there wasn’t as much to draw from. Some of the things we found out are that some snakes, and you may not assume this would be true, are great parents. You would never think that some snakes find each other and slither side to side, which, to me, I didn’t believe. There are these really interesting things along the way that you find, preconceived notions about what these guys are that are completely wrong.”