With a global gross of $1.7 billion, Zootopia 2 recently became the biggest animated movie in box office history, but fans haven’t gone as wild over the franchise’s first Walt Disney World theme park attraction. Take a trip to Disney’s Animal Kingdom with the Unofficial Guides team to find out why, as we take an honest look at what’s wrong with the new Zootopia: Better Zoogether! 4-D film.
In 2025, Disney retired the opening-day attraction It’s Tough to Be a Bug and closed the Tree of Life Theater for several months, then reopened it last November 7th as the home of Zootopia: Better Zoogether! The new film, which is presented in “CarrotVision 3-D,“ incorporates many of the same in-theater effects as the previous Bug’s Life-based attraction, repurposing them to fit the new theme. But even though it features more current characters and shares many similar elements with its predecessor, this new addition represents a lateral move—or even a step backwards—in several key respects.
1: The Queue
The queue for Zootopia: Better Zoogether! still snakes around the roots of the iconic Tree of Life, whose elaborate animal carvings remain as beautiful as they were in 1998. However, the massive artificial tree has deteriorated with age, resulting in debris periodically raining down on the pathways below.
Unfortunately, the visually disruptive netting and support beams that were installed as a temporary solution remain in place after the new attraction’s opening, ruining the Imagineers’ intended aesthetic.
Beyond the ugly barriers, little has changed in the exterior queue beyond a few posters explaining the show’s backstory, which involves the Zoogether Day holiday, celebrating unity among Zootopia’s diverse biomes. There are also some bulletin boards in the interior holding area that are crammed with clever puns and in-jokes, but they are easily missed if the lobby is full.
2: Storyline
Zootopia: Better Zoogether! is advertised as a telethon-style “live“ broadcast featuring various animal acts, such as ice-skating polar bears and synchronized-swimming otters. If it had stuck to that format it might have been successful, but it quickly detours into a confusing detective mystery, with Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Nick Wilde (Jason Bateman) attempting to unmask a saboteur.
The whodunnit’s ultimate solution is both arbitrary and obvious, and the rapid switching between locations and framing—as we jump between the studio audience and remote cameras—may give viewers a sense of whiplash.
3: Audio
The storyline might receive higher marks if it were easier to understand, but, for some reason, muffled sound mixing often makes the rapid-fire dialogue almost unintelligible. It’s admirable that the original voice actors returned to reprise their roles, but it would be nice to be able to hear them over the overblown background soundtrack.
4: Animatronics
It’s Tough to Be a Bug featured one of the most impressive Disney audio-animatronics of all time in its giant Hopper grasshopper, along with a smaller-but-charming figure of Flick. Zootopia: Better Zoogether! offers only one animatronic, a cousin of the Officer Clawhauser (Nate Torrence) created for Shanghai’s Zootopia dark ride.
The new animatronic is impressive—when it works. However, while Hopper only made a single brief appearance in the old show, Clawhauser repeatedly interacts with the on-screen characters, which becomes a major problem when the figure is having technical difficulties (as it was during our first viewing). When Clawhauser is out of commission, an alternate version of the view shows him on-screen at certain points; at others, the projected characters awkwardly talk to an empty corner where Clawhauser should be. The result is a show that makes even less sense than usual.
5: 3-D and 4-D Effects
All these flaws could be glossed over if Zootopia: Better Zoogether! bettered its predecessor in the 3-D and 4-D effects that are this attraction genre’s raison d’être; unfortunately, it fails hardest in that regard. The creepy-crawly rollers beneath the bench seats were retained, along with copious spritzes of water and air, but the falling spiders and back-stabbing stingers—which famously freaked out countless kids—have been axed, with no other physical effects added to replace them.
Worse still, for a 3-D film, the visuals are disappointingly flat, with much less impressive dimensionality than the theatrical Zootopia films. Scenes set in the studio have a reasonable sense of depth, but the action-oriented scenes offer surprisingly weak stereo separation, with zero extreme pop-out moments (like the butterfly in It’s Tough to Be a Bug) that would inspire viewers to reach out towards the screen.
The best that can be said about Zootopia: Better Zoogether! is that it represents another attraction to experience in Animal Kingdom’s limited lineup, which will be even more welcome with Dinosaur and the rest of Dinoland USA shuttering for the transformation into Tropical Americas. And the better news is that the word seems to be out about the new film; unless you’re visiting during a peak period, you should be able to walk into the next available performance with minimal waiting. Tip: Don’t waste one of your Lightning Lane pre-reservations on this attraction.
What do you think of the new Zootopia: Better Zoogether! attraction? Let us know in the comments below!
For all there is to see and do at Walt Disney World, check out The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World.
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