Reviews WesternAnimation / Zootopia

I still can\'t help but feel that Pocahontas explored racial themes better.

^ ...You\'re kidding, right?

Could anyone, please, remind me when is \"cute\" mentioned in the movie, and how can it be connected to racism?

I\'ve never enslaved anyone. My family\'s never enslaved anyone. My country\'s never enslaved other races, at least not in a thousand years\' time. And most of my life, black-skinned people were pretty uncommon in this barren northern lands. And yet, constant internet b**ching about n-words and racism has taught me that black people are dumb, aggressive, tend to be accidentally provoked, and seek to be offended at all costs, and so are their friends. In hindsight, I\'m unsure if that really ought to have lessened the probability of people becoming racists.

If racism were only slavery, then racism would\'ve stopped existing in 1865 and Martin Luther King Jr would\'ve had nothing to protest about.

Wow, so I can\'t call another Troper an idiot, but Xenos Hg can throw his unabashed racism around?

Are you kidding Berserker?

You can call me an idiot any time you like it, I won\'t protest. Please.

And I\'m not racist, as in I don\'t think any race is naturally worse than any other race, or that some race is better, more equal than the others, and has more rights. But the popular discussions on racism, on the other hand, teach completely different stereotypes. It\'s just as you rarely meet people who hate women, but much more often you hate popular \"feminists\" who, somehow, think everybody hates them. My previous comment was an attempt to explain that, as a complete outsider, I can\'t understand what you say \"only adults can\". Because, maybe, in those countries where it\'s more common, the children are mo knowledgeable in this matter than the adults here.

So, the question is still \"Can anyone please remind me, which scene it\'s supposed to be?\", thank you.

I called Bastard 1 an asshole in a different review and got censored.

Well, saying \"Black peiple are dumb, aggressive and accidentally provoked\" is pretty goddamn racist. And I don\'t see why you\'re offended over discussing racism if apparently people need to to stop \"bitching about the N-word.\"

And the scene in question was when Clawhauser calls Judy cute. She tells him that it\'s considered patronizing for someone who\'s not another rabbit to call a rabbit cute.

My ears are burning! Anyway, beginning a sentence with "I'm not racist, but..." is pretty much part and parcel of every stand-up routine about racism ever made, ever. And, you know, in so-called "normal" people's real life discussions every day, all across the world. Make of that what you will. But hey, a guy with much the same manner of sneakily bigoted rhetoric is currently gunning to be president of a country of no insignificant magnitude as we speak, and there's no way a PRESIDENT could be a racist, so... I guess you win? Or something? Allowing yourself to judge any group of people in broad strokes based on the deeds and words of a minority is to become the definition of a bigot at the very least. This is a fact.

Anyway, I'm sure the original reviewer invited some level of debate given their didactic take on the subject in question, but I doubt they necessarily expected or welcomed something like this. I'd advise we let this one die down if they have no objections. What I'd like to know is, since it seems to vary from reviewer to reviewer, how much of this subtext, if any, is text, as intended by the creators? I find that often, someone who's made a conclusion about a movie's message and/or theme find it hard to view the film outside this context and thus they may, in some ways, be a bit of an unreliable narrator (...to get all Tropey up in this shiznit). I know this because it happens to me all the fucking time.

I\'m happy for civil debate. Due to the subject of the film, it\'s to be expected.

As to the question, I think there was a lot of intended subtext, but there is inevitably going to be some unfortunate implications somewhere the creators hadn\'t anticipated. For instance, people are already pointing out the implication the film potentially makes when it mentions how violent and primitive predators once were (bearing in mind they are can be seen as an analogue for racial minorities). In regards to that particular observation, I think the movie\'s references to the past conflict between predators and prey was intended as a reference towards things like the slave trade; a terrible, backwards thing from the past whose effects are still felt in modern society. It helps to not view the predators as a precise stand in for specific minority groups, when clearly prey are also used in the story to represent them as well.

Is it really necessary to deride Frozen\'s story as simplistic in this review, even in passing at the beginning? Since the review is about Zootopia, rather than Frozen (which, by the way, I really liked), it serves little purpose but to take away valuable words, and perhaps show that you\'re one of those tropers who appears to have distaste for traditional uplifting messages.

I like Frozen too, but I think it is a very different kind of beast from Zootopia and that has to be pointed out. Especially for the benefit of people who are deciding on whether to watch it, based on their experience of previous Disney movies.

marinahat,

I see what you\'re trying to do. Still, I wouldn\'t call Zootopia \"a million miles from\" Frozen, since while Zootopia has surprisingly subtle and nuanced treatment of its themes, Judy doesn\'t succeed by gradually working to overcome prejudice, but by solving a seemingly impossible case against all odds (worsened by the fact that she has barely any help from the department)- it\'s a nuanced look at the problem, but Judy\'s solution is similar to that of most other underdogs who are looking to prove themselves.

Technically Frozen wasn\'t their last outing. Big hero 6 was great too

<Moderator bandana on>

Xenos HG has been bounced for these comments.