♪ Love always comes as a surprise. ♪
Spoilers are unmarked on this page. You have been warned.
- The entire ending. Especially the gang's realization that they much preferred being in the circus than living in the zoo.Stefano: So, you want to run away with the circus?
Alex: Live a life of adventure?
Gloria: Full of romance?
Melman: And danger!
Marty: Really livin'!
Stefano: Whaddya say?!
Marty: (after a Beat, starts up the "Afro Circus" song)- Especially the reactions of the circus animals to Trapeze Americano becoming a real act.
Stefano: (with tears in his eyes) Balloons to the children of the world! Trapeze Americano!
Vitaly: (in awe) It is real.
Stefano: It's-a real! - The group hug with Vitaly, Gia, and Stefano when they convince the tiger to do his act one more time.
- And the scene just before where Stefano and Gia say they won't do the act without him in it, which convinces him to do "one hoop".
- Alex's Rousing Speech to Vitaly:Alex: Vitaly, what are you doing?Vitaly: You missed.Alex: You're leaving? You're just gonna walk out on everybody?Vitaly: They have good show without me.Alex: Look, I have a good left foot, but without my right foot, I can't walk!Vitaly: You get fake foot, then you walk.Alex: I don't want fake foot, okay? What happened to "Circus stick together", huh? "Show must go on"?Vitaly: Clichés...Alex: Come on, man. Stop being this guy! Be that other guy!Vitaly: What other guy?!Alex: The guy who is all circus! The guy who jumped through hoops! The guy everybody looked up to! Come on! Where's that Vitaly?Vitaly: (sadly) That Vitaly... is no more.Alex Listen, man. You may have given up on yourself, but your friends haven't given up on you. Are you just going to turn your back on them and sit and eat borscht for the rest of your life? Or are you going to get out there and jump through that tiny little hoop?Vitaly: (sighs) It is impossible.Alex: It was always impossible, Vitaly. That's why the people loved it.(Alex starts to leave, when...)Vitaly: That is why I loved it! Because I did the impossible!...I was once a brave tiger... and if I go down in flames, (laughter) so be it!
- Vitaly's look of stunned joy after he successfully leaps through a flaming ring and gets over his PTSD is pretty touching and incredibly satisfying.
- The whole "Trapeze Americano" scene where Alex clumsily creates a spectacular trapeze act with Gia largely by accident to a beautiful song, "Love Always Comes As A Surprise", as they fall in love.
- Pretty much whenever the two are on a trapeze, they both have this smile
◊ that screams "I'm doing what I love, I'm doing it with who I love, and nothing could feel more perfect than this moment."
- Pretty much whenever the two are on a trapeze, they both have this smile
- The tightrope scene with Melman and Gloria. It's just pure love right there. At the same time, we see Stefano flying through.
- Marty's previous scene with his joy flying in the air. It certainly helps that Dreamworks Animation always has a way to make you feel like you're flying alongside him.
- Finally, there is that moment when the Zoosters made it back to the gates of the Central Park Zoo, only to discover that they've changed too much to return to captivity. Marty apologizes for putting the gang in this situation in the first place, but Alex tells him that there is nothing to forgive since being sent to Madagascar was actually the best thing that ever happened to them.
- It's the way Marty's apologizing that really pushes it home.Marty: Guys... I'm sorry I ever left the zoo in the first place.Alex: What do you mean?Marty: I mean, if I'd just stayed put... we wouldn't have anything to be sad about right now.Alex: Leaving the zoo... was the best thing that ever happened to us.Marty: Really?Alex: Yeah, out there in the world, we were really living. It was exciting!Gloria: It was romantic!Melman: It was dangerous!Marty: I've never felt so alive!Alex: When we were with the circus, we were already home! I only wished we realized that sooner...Melman: I'm really gonna miss those guys...Alex: (lightening up) What do you say...we go back?Gloria: Really?!Marty: I'm with ya!Melman: Yeah, but what do we tell them?Alex: Well, we... we make it right by telling them how wrong we were!Marty: It's worth the shot!
- There is also how Alex says "the best thing that's ever happened to us". Back in the first movie, he tells Marty that being shipwrecked on Madagascar was "not the best thing that's ever happened to us". But after all the adventures they've had before reaching the zoo, it becomes a nice Meaningful Echo.
- It's the way Marty's apologizing that really pushes it home.
- The fact that the main circus trio are quick to forgiving the Zoosters for lying to them and want them to come back. When they learn from Julien that DuBois have captured the Zoosters they waste no time going to try and save their friends and convincing the rest of the circus to pitch in.
- Skipper is immediately concerned when he finds out "the hippies" got ambushed by DuBois.
- Special mention goes to Vitaly's outraged response to one of the dogs claiming that the Zoosters aren't even circus animals.
"That's BOLSHEVIK!"- During the gambling scene, while Alex fears that the penguins are not coming back from Monte Carlo and will abandon them in Africa, Skipper later says to Kowalski he plans to pick up the "hippies" (aka Alex, Marty, Melman and Gloria) before flying home to NYC. This shows Skipper he does care for his fellow zoo animals.
