Animal Kingdom’s Tree of Life has a new show, but is it better than its predecessor?
The year was 2010.
My five-year-old daughter and future Disney cast member was on her first trip to Animal Kingdom.
Back then, in the days before Pandora, the park was a very different place. Where Pandora now stands was a meet and greet area where we visited Pocahontas and met Thumper and Miss Bunny. Terk – from Tarzan – and Baloo hung out between Africa and Asia, and we learned about poachers on the Safari ride. There was even a little animatronic elephant.
Technology hadn’t really invaded the park experience and we just kind of stumbled around, soaking up what we could and grabbing as many fast passes as Disney would allow us.
I don’t remember making the conscious decision to go see It’s Tough to be a Bug!, but I imagine the lure of air conditioning and a comfortable seat factored heavily into the decision.
I’m not sure Sofia had even seen the movie from which the show had pulled its characters at the time.
A Bug’s Life was Pixar’s second movie and a good one, but its footprint wasn’t as prominent as other Disney and Pixar projects that followed – certainly not on the level of Toy Story or the Cars franchise in terms of market penetration.
I found the show charming and a little educational. It was well done.
Poor Sofia found it traumatizing. I don’t recall her being afraid of bugs prior to that day, but when the chair activated and it felt like dozens of little bugs were crawling underneath us, she freaked. In fact, even today she’s terrified of bugs. I’m not saying that show was the cause, but I’m not saying it wasn’t.
So, while I enjoyed the show, I never developed any special attachment or fondness. When Disney announced the show would be shuttered and replaced with something themed to Zootopia, I figured it was a probably a good move and waited patiently for the new show to come in.
Zootopia: Better Zoogether! opened in the fall to mixed reviews. I figured that was to be expected – Disney can’t change the color on the trash cans anymore without drawing criticism. Now that we’ve had some time to let the dust settle, we can sit down and make an honest assessment if Better Zoogether is worth all the hubbub and, more importantly, your time.
IN THIS ARTICLE
Why did they make a change?
It’s Tough to Be a Bug! opened in 1998 – several months in advance of the “A Bug’s Life” movie, Pixar’s second film and an absolute success. Designed to be fun and educational, the show taught audience members about the world of bugs. It featured an excellent animatronic in Hopper, the evil grasshopper, and an OK animatronic for Flik, the ant hero – not antihero – of A Bug’s Life.
But Sofia wasn’t the only one to be terrified. It was a bit of a Disney cliché that the show was either well liked or absolutely hated.
Wait times were short, and audiences were small. In a park where the Festival of the Lion King still draws big crowds, the lack of attention for the show in the Tree of Life was concerning. A Bug’s Life never really grew legs like some of the other Disney/Pixar movies, and frankly, a lot of Disney guests either hadn’t seen it or struggled to remember it.
Fun fact: To manage park crowds and wait times, Disney wants rides and attractions to pull their weight and help to distribute guests across the park evenly.
The show was outliving its shelf life in many ways. In the years since A Bug’s Life came out, Disney and Pixar released several more successful movies with higher cultural impact, and many of those have not yet had a presence in the Orlando facilities. There are several massive Disney properties, including Zootopia, which have little-to-no park presence in Orlando.
They are working on getting Encanto into Animal Kingdom, but where is Coco? Cars is coming to Magic Kingdom amid quite a bit of controversy, but where are The Incredibles? Moana has a small presence in EPCOT that drew a lot of criticism… until it actually opened and people both dug it and felt it fit with EPCOT’s educational mission. Tiana’s arrival was also controversial, but all they could do for Rapunzel was build the best themed bathrooms in the Eastern United States?
And let’s not forget a few older beloved classics: The Emperor’s New Groove and Hercules, neither of which have anything more than a few character appearances.
Focusing on A Bug’s Life with other properties with a higher Q rating wasn’t helping. ???
It made sense that with a new Zootopia movie coming out – one that has received excellent reviews – getting that world into AK became a priority.
Zootopia was a massive success with a big sequel that recently debuted, which has received very strong reviews. The opportunity to get a more popular entity into the park, one that would draw – at least in theory – bigger crowds and sell more merch seemed like a no-brainer.
Pros and Cons
As we said above, Zootopia: Better Zoogether! has received decidedly mixed reviews. Among the pros is the fact that it gets the Zootopia characters into Disney World.
While the wait times and audiences for the show haven’t been much better than the Bug audiences, the Nick Wilde and Judy Hopps character meet and greets have been a significant success, with wait times of 40 minutes to an hour. While the Zootopia world, with its many biomes and elaborate cast of characters, might have been better served by a ride, or its own land, it is nice to have even a bit of that world in the parks.
I can promise you most young Disney fans will be much more excited to meet Nick and Judy than they are Flik and Princess Atta.
Also among the pros? The show is arguably less traumatizing. They have retained the 4D effects – you get hit with blasts of air, mist, and that sort of thing. But the “scary” aspect of the Bug show has been replaced. That being said, while your kids probably won’t be terrified by the crickets running under their bums, that feature has been recycled into something that will still have them jumping out of their seats.
Finally, the Officer Clawhauser animatronic is very good. Is it as good as the Hopper one? Opinions vary. But Clawhauser is quite a bit less intense than Hopper – the killer grasshopper.
The cons? The show itself is… not great. At least not great to all audiences. Essentially, it is a nine minute Zootopia cartoon with a little mystery to solve and a lot of stuff happening on a screen. The plot is that Zootopia is celebrating a holiday – Zoogether Day – and you’re watching live coverage from around Zootopia. There’s a mystery that Judy and Nick solve, and there’s a very Scooby Doo-esque villain reveal.
Other than the Clawhauser animatronic, there’s not a lot that’s particularly new or impressive in terms of technological advancement or 4D achievement. The show recycled a lot from its predecessor.
It doesn’t feel like this was the highest focus or effort project. I hope it’s because they’re pouring everything they can into Tropical Americas. It could also be because they’ve shifted this area and may replace the show in the Tree of Life on a more regular basis, so they could be trying to get maximum impact with minimal effort.
I see this as neither a pro nor a con, but the show clearly targets children—especially very young ones. If your child is into Zootopia, they’re going to love it. But if your kids have grown, they’re likely going to prefer other shows.
The Zootopia movies are some of Disney’s best as of late. The humor works on multiple levels; the main character performances are great. But, reportedly, it took them a while to figure it out. It wasn’t until Disney flipped the script and made Judy Hopps the main protagonist that they found the first movie. The show would have worked better if they had Nick and Judy animatronics to go with the Clawhauser animatronic. There is one more animatronic appearance, but like Donald Duck at the end of PhilharMagic. It’s not a full animatronic, just some dangling legs.
I would have liked to have another character or two show up “in person” in the finale, not just on screen.
Finally, the show is saccharine sweet and not really funny enough to capture the attention of older audience members. If you’re a parent, you’ll have a good time as long as your kids are having a good time. But as an adult who enjoys the Zootopia world, I had hoped that Disney could find a tone that appealed to kids and didn’t repel adults. In a show like this, it’s just nice when Disney can better entertain at multiple age levels.
I guess that, ultimately, the show just doesn’t really capture what makes the movies great, whereas It’s Tough to Be a Bug did.
Does the show fit with the Animal Kingdom core mission?
It depends very much on who you ask. Disney’s core mission was to entertain, educate, and promote conservation.
While both It’s Tough to Be a Bug and Zootopia feature anthropomorphic animals, the Bug show did teach you about bugs and the world they inhabit. The Zootopia show is light on the education aspect.
Some people take this very seriously and feel bothered when Disney appears to veer from its original path.
Now, you might ask how Expedition Everest and DINOSAUR fit those criteria. While I concede the rides aren’t particularly educational, what with the cryptid and the time traveling, both queues have educational features, and I suppose that’s enough for the purists.
I think it’s a little splitting hairs. By that logic, if the Zootopia queue had nice presentations on the various biomes, it would be more in line with the mission statement.
For me? I don’t really care that much. I enjoy learning while being entertained, but it isn’t a deal breaker for me. If the attraction is fun, well done, and entertaining, that’s my criteria. I can watch a documentary at home.
Should we see the show?
Yes, absolutely. You should know going in that the show is clearly designed with kids in mind. As an adult, your favorite part of the show might be the Easter eggs in the queue.
Still, it’s a nine minute show with a short wait. There are worse ways to spend time while in Disney World. You also get to rest for a minute out of the elements.
Honestly, I don’t think it’s the worst show in Animal Kingdom, and certainly not the worst in Disney World. In my opinion, it’s better than the travel movies in EPCOT, and the Beauty and the Beast show in Hollywood Studios, as well as the Nemo show in AK, which I don’t really enjoy at all.
Ginnifer Goodwin and Jason Bateman shine as Judy and Nick. Goodwin – who has been out promoting the movie and attraction – has proven to be a top notch Disney star with a “one of us” kind of vibe and is someone the company should continue to work with in the coming years.
Overall, it’s not as good as some of Disney’s other recent efforts. It’s just too sweet, like a sugary drink with a heaping spoonful of saccharine dumped in. But that doesn’t mean it’s not worth experiencing at least once and seeing for yourself.
The chief enjoyment for parents in the new show will be watching their kids enjoy it.
Is the park better with Zootopia: Better Zoogether!?
It’s close, but I think so. I don’t think either show is significantly better than the other, but I think you get better value in terms of crowd interest with Zootopia in the park.
I wouldn’t be mad if in the next 20 months or so they close the show for a bit to make a few tweaks and improvements. However, I do think the park is better with Zootopia in it.
