Alternative Assignment

Jessica Sobieski

Instructor Cooper

INTDSC 1001

6 November 2017

Alternative Assignment

After watching the movie Zootopia in depth I have noticed many things within the movie such as stereotypes. The first stereotype in the movie is based off of Judy Hops, who is the really small bunny. Judy Hops wants to become the first ever bunny police officer but no one believes in her because she is a bunny. Her parents even don’t believe in her, they just want her to stay and work on the carrot farm. Judy Hops eventually passes all of the tests to become a police officer and is seeing as weak and little compared to the other police officers that she works with. None of them take her seriously and barely acknowledge her presence. Often, she gets called cute and whenever this happens she says that only another bunny can call another bunny cute. In society if someone other than an African American calls another African American the N word it is very offensive. This line is proving how controversial the topic of this is in today’s society. Along with this her boss does not let her work on the huge case that they have, instead she is the meter-maid. Judy Hops is very angry about this so she gives out tickets on practically every car. She keeps trying to prove herself but is getting shut down because she is a little bunny cop. People do this all the time in life, they underestimate the power of small people.

The next person the movie stereotypes is Nick Wilde who is a fox. At the start of the film Nick Wilde fulfills the qualities that one would think of when they think of a fox. These qualities include being sly, sneaky, and conniving. He is this way because he was bullied as a kid for being a predator so he did what everyone just expected him to be. Towards the end of the film he breaks away from this stereotype when him and Judy Hops become friends. Him and Judy solve the crime of why the predators are turning evil. He becomes loyal and trustworthy to Judy and even saves her in a hole. This proves how wrong stereotypes can be.

Another fox that fulfils the stereotype of a fox is the one in the beginning of the movie. He is very mean to Judy Hops and all of her friends by taking their tickets. Judy Hops trys to stand up to the fox but ends up getting a big scratch on her face and he even tells her that she will never become a police officer because she is a bunny. From this experience, it empowered her even more than she already was to become a police officer. She never gave into the stereotype, that bunnies cannot be cops, and because of events like this it made becoming a police officer so much more rewarding.

Thirdly the person that has a stereotype on them is Dawn Bellwether. She is the tiny sheep who is the assistant to the mayor. The mayor is a lion and she often bosses him around and does things behind his back. Dawn Bellwether is the main problem causer in the whole film. You would never expect this because of the stereotype of little sheep being cute and innocent. She is trying to make the prey become in charge of the predators because she believes that predators are too vicious to be in charge. Judy and Nick Wilde find many animals locked away in cages who are foaming from the mouth because they have been transformed by the city government. She is stereotyping the predators because they are known to be like this but in the movie, they already live and work together in harmony.

Small stereotypes in the movie include the following animals: sloths, elephants, and the mice. Since sloths are slow they have all the workers of the DMV being sloths. There is a common stereotype that all DMVs are slow at doing everything and Zootopia fulfilled this stereotype. With the elephant, he is an Indian elephant and they go to this chill place where he is instructing yoga to other animals. This is stereotyping Indians by making him a yoga instructor because often times people think of Indians as very Zen people which relates to yoga. Lastly, in the movie the mice are Italian and they are mobsters. When mobs are thought of often Italian people are related to this topic because of the stereotype. Although all these stereotypes are relevant in the movie, Zootopia is trying to show people how to overcome these stereotypes through the main characters, Judy Hops and Nick Wilde.