Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers, it's Jan here!
As you know, I absolutely loved Zootopia, and each time I watch the movie, I find something
new to enjoy.
But because of the way animated movies are made, there's often tons of incredible stuff
that the animators work on which doesn't make it into the final movie.
So, in this video, I'm going to be taking a look at the dozens of amazing deleted scenes
and rejected ideas from Zootopia that hit the cutting room floor.
And a quick warning that of course there are spoilers ahead, so if you want to avoid any
spoilers, click here for my spoiler-free review or come back after you've seen the movie.
Just before I get started I've got another fantastic copy of this gorgeous hardback book
The Art of Zootropolis to give away.
All you have to do is subscribe and leave a comment about the deleted scenes on this
video.
To give you an idea of what you can look forward to in the book, there's tons of amazing concept
art, sketches, and information that give an incredible peek into the making of the movie.
First up is the movie's opening scene which sets Judy up to become a police officer in
Zootopia although in a different way than we see in the final movie.
The alternate opening is set in Woodlands Elementary School rather than at the Carrot
Days Festival and has Judy practising a song with her classmates while their teacher Mrs
Armadillo accompanies them on the piano.
Judy's friends each sing a line about what they want to be when they grow up, but when
it comes to Judy's turn, she won't sing that she wants to grow carrots.
This opening establishes how animals are stereotyped, for example, Sally the squirrel sings that
she wants to sell nuts and the Rory the racoon sings that he wants to drive a trash truck.
But Judy proves she's capable of other things when Bobby Catmull the cougar cub is about
to fall out of a tree.
Judy grabs Mrs Armadillo's laser pen and gets Bobby to chase its light down the tree to
safety.
A police offer then arrives and gives Judy a Junior ZPD badge and says she should become
a police officer.
And when Judy's classmate scoffs that she's just a bunny, the officer replies "This is
Zootopia where anyone can be anything", a moment which echoes what Judy does and says
to Finnick later in the final movie.
Other elements from this alternate opening scene also appeared in a slightly different
form in the final movie.
Bobby Catmull appears as the cougar who creates the various sound effects during Judy's performance
at Carrot Days and Mrs Armadillo is the landlady at Judy's apartment complex.
And the scene in the alternate opening which features a deer being mock-attacked by a predator
as part of the rehearsals for the school's show mirrors both the dramatic scene Judy
performs with fake blood in the opening of the final movie and also the final movie's
climactic showdown when Nick fakes turning savage to catch Bellwether.
Since Zootopia came out, there've been tons of fans shipping Judy and Nick, and an incredible
amount of fan art on just that subject.
So, shippers of Nick and Judy everywhere will likely love this next deleted scene I'm going
to talk about which features Nick meeting Judy's parents and her dad assuming that Nick
is Judy's boyfriend!
The scene would have appeared in the movie just after everyone's favourite fox and bunny
team escape Manchas who's gone savage.
In the scene, Judy and Nick arrive at her very pink apartment which prompts Nick to
question Judy's description of where they were going as a 'safe-house'.
Judy's reply that it's a 'safe house, with a space in the middle, a house that is safe'
is a fantastic riff on Nick's earlier words to Judy that he was not falsely advertising
the Redwood he sold the rodents as it was actually 'red wood with a space in the middle,
wood that is red'.
Judy's family have come to the big city to pay her a surprise visit, and when Judy's
father first sees Nick, he asks her to pass him the fox-taser, and then worries that Nick
is her boyfriend.
The family also discovers that Judy is a meter maid, not a real cop as she'd led them to
believe, so her father demands that she leave Zootopia and return home with them, but Nick
steps in to defend her.
In the final movie, this moment was replaced with Chief Bogo rather than her father trying
to make Judy leave the police force.
There are some really amazing designs for Judy's family home in Bunnyburrow that didn't
make it to the final movie.
The huge size of Judy's family and house was going to be a major feature of the film with
over 200 bunnies running around.
In fact, originally, Judy's family was so large that her father couldn't even remember
her name!
Also, the family home was going to be centred around a constantly-in-use kitchen and a dining
area that rotated slowly allowing new hungry bunnies to take the place of bunnies who'd
already finished eating.
And The Bunnyburrow district was also going to feature more of the Totoro-inspired buildings
we only saw briefly in the final film at the Bunnyburrow train station.
During the chase through Little Rodentia, you might have spotted a billboard for the
fast food restaurant Chez Cheese.
In an early draft of the movie, Finnick would take the drive-thru orders making use of his
giant ears while Nick worked cleaning the cheese filters.
In that version of the movie, Clawhauser was also a delivery cheetah for the restaurant,
making deliveries to the district's rodents.
Chez Cheese was going to tell the story of how Nick and Finnick met.
The movie's co-director Jared Bush has said this was his favourite deleted location and
that he'd love to see a short film featuring the fast food joint.
Another fast food joint which didn't appear was Bug-Burga which is where Zootopia's predators
would go to eat.
Because predators don't eat other animals in Zootopia, to get their protein they eat
insects, so Bug-Burga served up "grasshopper shakes, cricket chips and cicada burgers."
There is a tiny reference to Bug-Burga in the final film in the scene where Nick is
leading Judy through an alleyway shortcut and there are some Bug-Burga fast food boxes
littered on the ground.
Originally, there was going to be more of Nick's backstory explored in the film, including
a scene where we get to see Nick as a cub with his father.
It's a touching moment where Nick's father goes with his son to pitch a business idea
for a loan so he can start his own family tailoring shop called Suit-topia.
The scene wasn't used as it was part of the initial idea for the film where the story
was told from Nick's perspective as the central character, rather than through Judy's eyes.
We know Nick has always had an entrepreneurial mind with his pawpsicle business, but in an
early version of Zootopia, just like his father, Nick went to the Zootopian banks to pitch
a business idea, but Nick's idea was for an entertainment venue called Wild Times.
In a scene which was actually voiced by Jason Bateman, Nick explained his idea to all of
the city's bankers, who just happened to all be prey.
It's a funny scene where Nick visits banks like Lemming Brothers, Borrow Burrow, JP Mare-Gan
and Slothoman Brothers, and gets rejected every time.
Eventually, Nick ends up visiting the polar bear gangster boss Koslov who loans him the
money.
The designs for Wild Times were well-advanced before the idea was abandoned.
Wild Times was an indoor arcade where predators could let their instincts loose a little.
The amusement park featured a huge range of games and rides.
For example, there was a roller coaster called the Roar-A-Coaster where predators could roar
and be themselves.
By the way, there's a glimpse of what might have been the building for Wild Times in the
scene where Judy goes to find Nick by the small stone bridge.
Koslov, who Nick takes a loan from to finance his Wild Times arcade, did appear in the final
movie as the polar bear who carries Mr Big in his hands when Nick and Judy have been
caught by Kevin and Raymond.
In earlier versions though, he ran the mafia in Tundra Town and he owned a restaurant called
Koslov's Palace which served as a front for his shady operations.
The design of the interior of Koslov's Palace used warm colours to contrast with the icy
blue and white of the cold exterior.
The scene we see in the final movie of Nick and Finnick hustling Judy into paying for
their Jumbo Pop is a much revised version from an earlier version of the movie.
That early alternate scene in Jumbeaux's Café shows Nick claiming that his son has a condition
called "pachydermiopathy", which according to Nick means that his son thinks he's an
elephant.
Nick and Finnick put on a hilarious performance with Nick begging the ice cream parlour owner
not to break his son's heart when he refuses to serve him what he wants, and then to cap
it all Nick claims he left his wallet at the orphanage.
Nick senses Judy's fallen for his scheme, so lays the sob story on even further, which
ends in Judy pulling out her cash to pay.
It's still very funny as it displays Nick and Finnick's con-man skills although Judy
probably comes off a bit more naïve and silly in this version.
In the final movie, after Judy discovers she was hustled by Nick, she goes back to her
apartment feeling really fed up, and gets a call from her parents who discover she's
just a meter maid.
There's an earlier and longer version of this scene where we see Judy travel back to the
apartment on the subway, getting squashed by two larger animals.
In this version, after discarding her microwaved carrots for one, she goes to call her mum,
but stops herself.
However, the phone accidentally dials and she ends up talking to her parents and her
grandfather who's very prejudiced against foxes.
In this version, her parents don't realise she's just a meter maid which makes Judy feel
guilty for hiding the truth from them.
It's a much sadder version of the scene than the one in the movie and ends with Judy curling
up on her bed among her cuddly toys.
By the way, Judy's grandfather "Pop-Pop" is the rabbit we see at the train station in
the final movie, the one who bears a very close resemblance to Carl from Up.
There's a deleted scene in which Judy starts her investigation into the missing otter,
Emmet Otterton, by using the office and computer of an elephant cop who's away on vacation.
It's a fun scene where Judy has to use her agility to use a computer that's way bigger
than she is.
The scene was edited out of the final movie to keep the film's pace up and to show Judy
getting her lead on Otterton by working more closely with Clawhauser.
Designs for a rough biker-style bar for sheep were developed although the location didn't
make it into the final film.
The bar was called The Cloven Hoof and it was set in a sleazy part of town.
It's likely that we would have seen Doug and other bad sheep like Jesse and Woolter hanging
out here.
The filmmakers also had plans for a Nocturnal District, which was going to be an area of
caves underneath the city where nocturnal animals like bats would live.
In the end, Zootopia's story didn't require the location so the idea wasn't fully developed,
however, it might be linked to the Bat Eyewitness figure who appears together with Clawhauser
in Zootopia character packs, and who is described as visiting Clawhauser at the police station
quite frequently as he often witnesses crimes.
The Meadowlands is another district that we never got to see properly.
It's basically a broad grassland area where the sheep and grazing animals live.
We did get a tiny peek at the edge of the Meadowlands though, as the Cliffside Asylum
was just on the border.
In an early draft of the movie, there was a sheep conspiracy where sheep would disguise
themselves as wolves to deliberately incriminate predators, making them look dangerous.
If you'd like to find out about one of the sheep characters, called Wooly, who used to
do this, then check out my video on Zootopia's Deleted Characters.
Another location that didn't make it into the final film was Outback Island, which was
home to Australian animals such as kangaroos, koalas, platypuses and dingos, who all together
were known as "Outbackers".
This location was cut as it didn't fit the main story, although it does appear in the
book "Zootopia: The Stinky Cheese Caper (and Other Cases from the ZPD Files)."
There was an additional scene at the Natural History Museum which was cut from the film
due to time constraints.
The cut scene featured Bellwether making a speech to Judy about the origins of Zootopia.
Those origins relate back to a painting which if you're extremely eagle-eyed you can glimpse
in the museum as well as at the subway station.
The painting shows lions and zebras shaking paws and agreeing to predators and prey living
in peace.
While giving the speech in this scene, Bellwether looks out at and talks about the fountain
in the square which represents the watering hole around which the animals bonded when
they declared peace.
Although we do get to see the Palm Hotel and Casino on the train ride Judy takes into the
city when she arrives, there were also extensive designs and scenes storyboarded inside the
hotel that did not get used.
The design of the hotel was inspired by super-luxurious hotels in Dubai, and Gazelle had a penthouse
apartment at the Palm hotel.
A scene with Judy and Nick falling down the side of the hotel while escaping from a ram
was storyboarded but dropped in favour of the scene in the Rainforest District where
Judy and Nick fall through the vines while escaping from the savage Manchas.
An earlier version of the movie's action-packed finale was set in a large stadium called Zootennial
Stadium.
There was going to be a spectacular Olympic Games-style opening show called Animalia which
showcased the history of Zootopia.
It was going to feature Gazelle, who's a prey animal, performing with her predator back-up
dancers.
And there were going to be flying squirrels and pigs, and animals shot out of confetti
cannons.
And that huge show would have acted as the backdrop for the movie's climactic showdown.
The film did, of course, end with Gazelle performing with her tiger dancers at a pop
concert, but that was after Judy and Nick had already caught the baddies.
The final version we see in the movie was a cool way to show off the movie's credits.
So guys, do you think any of those deleted scenes or ideas should have been in the final
movie?
And what would you like to see in a Zootopia sequel?
I can't wait to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
And don't forget to subscribe and comment for your chance to win this beautiful Art
of Zootropolis hardback book.
If you enjoyed this video, check out my other Zootopia videos including 7 awesome characters
who were deleted from the movie, 25 things you didn't know about the making of Zootopia,
and also coming shortly I'll have a brand new easter egg video.
You'll be able to find all them right here in my full Zootopia video playlist.
Thanks for watching and see ya next time!
Yippee-ki-yay movie lovers!