Hoppers (2026) 🦎🐸🦌🐺🐭🐰

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Content Warning
Warning: This movie gets really, really bizarre.


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Let’s start by showing y’all the trailers shall we?

When I first saw the trailer for Hoppers, my honest reaction was basically, “Oh great… another Pixar movie.” Lately Pixar hasn’t exactly been knocking it out of the park for me. The last Pixar movie I watched was Onward. That movie was fun, but it wasn’t amazing. It definitely didn’t have that classic Pixar magic that movies like Up, Ratatouille, or Toy Story had.

So when I saw the trailer for Hoppers, my expectations were honestly pretty low. I figured it would be another safe, predictable Pixar movie about saving nature with a couple emotional moments sprinkled in.

Then the reviews started coming out.

And suddenly I kept hearing the same thing over and over again: people were saying this movie was weird. Not just weird, but absurd. I remember watching Corey Coleman from Double Toasted review it and at one point his reaction was literally just him yelling “Ahhhhhhh!” in confusion.

So I started thinking, “Okay… how absurd can this movie really be?”

Then I watched it.

And yeah… they were not exaggerating.


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Non-Spoiler Plot Overview

The story follows Mabel Tanaka, a college student who has basically made it her personal mission to protect animals and nature. When we first meet her, she’s trying to stop Mayor Jerry from building a highway through a place called the Glade, a beautiful natural area filled with wildlife that means a lot to her.

The Glade is especially important to Mabel because of her grandmother, who used to take her there when she was younger. The opening scene with Mabel and her grandmother is actually really emotional and sets up why this place matters so much to her.

The problem is that the animals have disappeared from the Glade, which is why the mayor thinks it’s the perfect place to build the highway.

While trying to figure out what happened, Mabel discovers that her professors have developed a new piece of technology called a “hopper.” This device allows a human mind to temporarily transfer into a robotic animal body so they can observe wildlife up close and understand how animals communicate.

Mabel quickly realizes she could use this technology to figure out why the animals left the Glade and hopefully bring them back.

So she does the logical thing.

She jumps into a robotic beaver body and runs into the forest.

And that’s where things start getting… strange.


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Character Rundown

Mabel is a really likable protagonist. She’s stubborn, passionate, and maybe a little reckless, but you understand exactly why she cares so much about protecting nature. Her connection to the Glade and to her grandmother gives her character a lot of emotional weight.

George the beaver is probably my favorite character in the movie. He’s the king of the mammals in the forest and is surprisingly chill for someone who’s literally the ruler of an entire animal kingdom. He ends up forming a really nice friendship with Mabel, and their conversations about nature and trust are actually some of the most heartfelt moments in the movie.

Mayor Jerry is also surprisingly entertaining. At first he seems like your typical politician who doesn’t care about the environment, but as the story progresses he becomes a lot more interesting and even a little sympathetic.

Then there are Mabel’s professors, who created the hopper technology. They’re basically the scientists trying to understand animals without interfering with nature… although things obviously don’t go exactly according to plan.


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Pacing

The pacing in this movie is actually really good.

The first half of the film feels like a pretty traditional Pixar story. It focuses on Mabel exploring the animal world, meeting the different creatures in the forest, and slowly uncovering the mystery of why the Glade was abandoned.

Then the movie keeps building momentum as things start getting stranger and stranger.

By the time the third act begins… let’s just say the movie goes places I absolutely did not expect.

And I mean that in the best way possible.


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Pros

The biggest strength of Hoppers is how unpredictable it is.

For the first half of the movie, you think you know exactly what kind of story you’re watching. It feels like a classic environmental Pixar film about protecting nature and understanding animals.

But as the story progresses, the movie becomes more and more absurd. There’s really no other way to describe it. This movie is completely nuts, and I mean that as a compliment.

Another huge positive is the emotional core of the story. Mabel’s relationship with her grandmother and her friendship with George the beaver give the film a lot of heart. There’s a moment where George explains that trust is like a dam. Sometimes it leaks, but you can always patch it back up. That line honestly might be one of my favorite metaphors I’ve heard in a movie in a long time.

The animation is also fantastic. The environments, the animals, and the forest all look beautiful. Pixar still knows how to make their worlds feel alive.

And finally, the humor works really well. There are several moments in this movie that had the entire theater laughing because of how ridiculous the situations become.


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Cons

Honestly, I don’t have many major complaints.

If anything, some viewers might find the third act a little too chaotic. Once the movie decides to fully embrace its absurd side, it really commits to it.

But for me, that was actually part of the fun.


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Final Thoughts

I went into Hoppers expecting another safe Pixar movie that I’d probably forget about in a week.

Instead, I got one of the strangest and most entertaining Pixar films I’ve seen in a long time.

The movie starts like a fairly normal environmental story about protecting nature and understanding animals. Then it slowly becomes weirder and weirder until by the end I was just sitting there wondering what on earth I was watching.

And somehow… it works.

The story still has heart, the characters are likable, the animation is beautiful, and the movie is genuinely funny.

Most importantly, it surprised me. I never expected to walk out of a Pixar movie thinking, “Well that was absolutely insane… and I loved it.”


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Rating

⭐ 10/10


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Spoiler Warning

If you haven’t seen Hoppers yet and want to experience the surprises for yourself, stop reading here. The next section talks about the movie’s biggest twists and the completely ridiculous third act.


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Spoilers

Alright.

Now we can talk about the part of the movie where everything completely loses its mind.

Because once the story reaches the council of animal rulers, the movie stops pretending to be normal and goes straight into full chaos mode.

You’ve got animal monarchies, a giant council made up of frogs, birds, snakes, fish, and insects, and eventually a caterpillar who becomes the new insect king after his mother gets accidentally squished during a meeting.

Yes.

That actually happens.

And that’s only the beginning.

At one point there’s literally a car chase where birds pick up a shark from the ocean and carry it through the air to attack a moving car on a cliffside road. I sat there watching that scene thinking, “What movie did we just enter?”

Then the movie somehow escalates even further when the caterpillar villain decides to take over a robotic version of Mayor Jerry.

So now we have a dictator butterfly controlling a robot humanoid of the mayor and planning to wipe out the humans using sonic weapons hidden inside fake trees.

That sentence alone should tell you how insane this movie becomes.

Eventually Mabel rips the fake human face off the robot during a confrontation on stage, revealing this creepy mechanical face underneath with realistic eyes and teeth. The robot gets electrocuted and explodes, the butterfly villain wakes up in his real body, and then the frog king casually eats him.

Just… gone.

And somehow the movie still isn’t finished yet, because right after that the forest catches on fire and the characters have to break a dam to flood the valley and stop the wildfire.

The ending finally slows things down again with Mabel returning to the restored Glade and sitting on the rock where she used to sit with her grandmother. George the beaver shows up, but since the hopper technology is gone they can’t talk anymore.

Instead he grabs her phone and starts pressing emoji buttons so the phone reads out things like “Beaver. Beaver. Chop wood.” followed by “Heart. Heart. Heart.”

And that’s how the movie ends.

Which honestly feels perfect after everything that happened.

Because after the absolute insanity of the third act, the movie finishes with something simple and sweet: two friends sitting quietly together in a place they both care about.

And honestly?

I wouldn’t change a thing.