Zootopia 2 cut an incredible Silence Of The Lambs scene out of its official theatrical cut

The freshly released animated sequel Zootopia 2 has paid tribute to some iconic films, including Silence of the Lambs. It was a scene upto four minutes, but the makers took the ultimate call to remove that scene from the official theatrical cut.

In an interview with Variety, one of the directors of the film, Jared Hush, addresses the reason behind the edit. It was because he and the co-director Byron Howard felt that the scene pushed the boundaries too much, and they also felt it could not connect with its younger viewers. He says:

"That’s where we go, and now we have lost our younger audience members."

Keep reading to find out more about what Hush said about the scene in Zootopia 2.

Disclaimer: This article contains major spoilers for Zootopia 2. Reader discretion is advised.

Here's what Zootopia 2 co-director says about removing the Silence of the Lambs scene

In a conversation with the outlet, Jared Hush talked about the deleted scene that directly referred to a legendary scene of Silence of the Lambs. It was the meeting scene of Clarice and Hannibal Lecter. The characters in Zootopia 2 spoke the exact lines as they recreated the scene when Nick is serving jail time at one point in the film.

But the directors felt that the scene would not work with its younger audience, as Hush says:

That scene used to be four minutes long. We did word by word the first scene when Hannibal Lecter meets Clarice, all the way down to the guard saying, "All the way down the left, stay to the right."

That’s where we go, and now we have lost our younger audience members.

So now, even though the whole scene was cut, the presence of Silence of the Lambs still remains in the form of a soft reference. It is in the scene where the criminal strategist Dawn Bellwether breaks out of prison. Rings a bell? It is like Dawn pulled a Hannibal Lecter when he runs free from jail in the 1991 film.

Along with this Anthony Hopkins film, Zootopia 2 also has references to films such as Stanley Kubrick's The Shining and Pixar animated classic Ratatouille.

The buddy cop sequel was released on November 26, 2025. Upon its release, it received a decent score of 7.8/10 on IMDb, and an impressive rating of 91% on Rotten Tomatoes. The film explores yet another crime investigative adventure of Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde as a snake named Gary De'Snake makes his entry into the land of Zootopia.

The voice cast of the film includes both the old and new cast members of the film, including Ginnifer Goodwin, Jason Bateman, Idris Elba, Shakira, Nate Torrence, Alan Tudyk, Bonnie Hunt, Jenny Slate and Don Lake, as well as new additions to the cast, namely Fortune Feimster, Ke Huy Quan, Patrick Warburton, David Strathairn, Andy Samberg, Quinta Brunson, Danny Trejo and Patrick Warburton.