Zootopia 2 Filmmakers Talk Pushing New Boundaries With Animation to Create the Sequel

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It’s been nearly ten years since Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde won over audiences worldwide in Disney’s Zootopia, and fans are finally getting to see them return to the big screen in the much-awaited Zootopia 2. While the original Zootopia was remarkable for its animation and visuals, Zootopia 2 co-director Byron Howard and Head of Animation Chad Sellers recently shared with ComicBook how the sequel is taking things even further, particularly with a new character being introduced.

The latest addition to the world of Zootopia is a new character named Gary De’Snake, brilliantly voiced by Ke Huy Quan. Gary expands the Zootopia universe in several ways; he’s not the only reptile appearing in the film, and introducing multiple reptiles was actually one of the biggest hurdles the team faced when they first started working on the project.

Something New

Howard explained that when Jerry first proposed this idea for Gary, it presented a significant challenge for the animators, but they actually enjoyed that. You’ll hear from some of them today, and they really thrive when faced with difficult tasks – that’s when they’re at their best. Every week, they consistently amazed us with incredible snake animations. He also believes that with each new movie, every department – whether it’s animation, environments, or any other team – embraces the difficulties of tackling something completely new, or something that previously seemed almost impossible to overcome.

It really gets everyone excited and motivated. It’s a refreshing change of pace – a chance to tackle something new. And I believe there’s no better moment than when everyone thinks something is impossible. That’s when the teams step up and deliver something truly amazing, often within a week. Gary is a perfect illustration of this, as Adam Green, who’s heading up the animation, showed us. Some of you might have seen his test – he animated Ke’s interview on The Colbert Show with Ke appearing as Gary on stage, even before we had cast Ke. It instantly brought that character’s personality to life. Of course, it took a lot of effort to achieve that, but they managed to make him the most endearing and lovable character in the film,” Howard explained.

A Fun Challenge

It’s easy to overlook the fact that despite the many different animals in Zootopia, they largely shared a common trait. Because of this, adding reptiles to the story in a sequel presented a real hurdle, but the preview footage suggests the filmmakers handled it exceptionally well.

“Absolutely, I’d say animating Gary was the most unique part, simply because, unlike the other characters in Zootopia, most of them have legs and arms. But how do you animate a snake? Snakes slither; they don’t walk. The challenge was figuring out how to get a snake to gesture without arms. It was a fun and exciting problem to solve, forcing us to be creative. We definitely studied how Disney animated snakes in past films, taking the best elements from those and building on them to create a fresh character, and we really wanted to do him justice,” Sellers explained.

Okay, so Gary is definitely the main focus of the movie, but trust me, he’s not the only reptile you’ll get to know! As Judy and Nick investigate, they’re going to run into a whole bunch of fascinating reptilian characters, and at one point, they even stumble upon a secret reptile speakeasy – how cool is that? It feels like this is going to really expand an already huge world, and with all the original Zootopia characters coming back, I have a feeling this could be another massive hit for Disney. I’m really excited!

Zootopia 2 lands in theaters on November 26th.

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2025-09-30 23:48