Even though Zootopia was a movie directed towards the younger audience, the creators didn’t hesitate one bit on showing one of the messages of the film, which is primarily the bigotry in our world, among others as well.
Renegade Cut is a channel mainly to discuss these kinds of messages in movies and series in an analytical level. And in one of their videos that covered Zootopia, Renegade Cut talked about the message above rather thoroughly and well thought out. I was genuinely interested and was hooked as the video goes. So whether you like watching a dude talking about a somewhat-political-topic-but-not-really or not, give the video a watch, which will be linked below after the break.
I keep saying this: Zootopia was a phenomenon.
It's a movie with SO MANY layers. And great message for ALL age brackets.
And its messages were so universal, EVERYONE found something that resonates with them. And that led to a VERY successful sleeper hit.
I consider myself blessed to have watched this GREAT movie, probably the BEST movie I've ever watched. And it has been an honor being part — and still a part — of the Zootopia Fandom.
The creators of the film have always said their message was on bias not bigotry so any analysis that focuses only on bigotry/racism never quite lines up with the film.
The second part of the video when he starts talking about institutionalized racism just isn't supported by the film. For example, except for Nick whose character arc is a focus of the story, no other predator is shown being discriminated against by society, in fact predators are shown holding prominent roles like a ZNN news anchor, a doctor, or the mayor of the city.
His suggestion that the ZPD is an example of institutionalized racism totally overlooks how the composition of the ZPD is pretty evenly split between predators (wolves, bears, big cats) and mega-fauna prey (hippos, rhinos, elephants).