Zootopia 3 could take Judy and Nick somewhere they’ve never been before
Zootopia 3 just got its meatiest look yet from Walt Disney Animation Studios Chief Creative Officer Jared Bush — and he’s also teasing more sequels.
Bit of news for anyone still keen on animated films that don’t always treat the adults in the room like idiots. Zootopia 3 is very much alive at Disney—and this week, the studio’s Chief Creative Officer Jared Bush lifted the lid (just a crack, mind you) on where things might be heading for Judy Hopps, Nick Wilde, and possibly a whole new flock of critters.
Zootopia heads for a field trip?
Bush, who literally helped invent the place, let slip at the SCAD Savannah Film Festival that our favourite bunny and fox will still be the leads. (No surprise there, since you don’t bin your only Oscar-winning odd-couple duo.) The interesting bit is he floated the idea that in this next outing, the pair might actually leave the famously segregated animal metropolis for the first time. If you felt like the world-building stopped at city limits, apparently so did he—because that’s something they’ve been pondering for years.
Bush told Collider: 'I think this may be the first time that we travel outside the bounds of Zootopia City itself.'
He also reminisced that he and fellow director Byron Howard have been batting about ideas to expand the animal cast since way before the original film even made it to script stage. Reptiles, birds, all the usual suspects for an animated bestiary—those possibilities have been on the board since the late noughties. None of this is a locked-in plot synopsis, to be clear, but don’t be shocked if you see a saga about toucans or geckos alongside the next batch of ZPD shenanigans.
Patience is a virtue, apparently
Bush then got into Disney’s classic habit of refusing to say anything concrete about release dates. He mentioned the animation division works from a “sort-of” ten-year plan, with the next five years actually nailed down and the rest more like a wish list. Workflows, box office, and the general state of the planet all play into how fast or slow these films come together. Bush reckons Zootopia 3 could drop anywhere in the next several years—it just depends how everything else in Disney’s slate pans out, and frankly, how the world itself is functioning at the time.
He explained that Zootopia 3 'could be in a few different years depending on how that movie is doing, how the movies around it are doing, how our world is doing.'
One thing’s clear: these animated features don’t appear overnight. Bush says a typical film in their pipeline takes four to six years to pull together, from pre-viz to plushies on toy shop shelves.
Zootopia 3 hasn’t officially been given a release window by Disney or anyone above Bush’s pay grade.