You’ve read the title. It feels like Pixar has found a momentum that works for them and is truly back in their prime with Hoppers. With that being said, it doesn’t feel like they ever lost it completely, with Elio releasing in 2025 and Inside Out 2 in 2024, they’ve been providing some quality animation. In 2026, Pixar has asked the question: What if beavers/animals/robot beavers had feelings? The answer we get is a beautiful message that speaks to the audience about the environment and how we can do an overall better job of protecting the homes of these animals.
Hoppers follows Mabel Tanaka (Piper Cruda), a 19-year-old animal lover who does everything in her power to stop the mayor, Jerry (Jon Hamm), from destroying her local forest glade, even if that means using the Hoppers program to transferring her consciousness into a robotic beaver to help communicate with the animals and save their community.
There’s no denying it, Pixar hasn’t had an opening as powerful, thought-provoking and emotional since Up. I mean, it has its own Wikipedia page and countless analyses based on it. Hoppers opens with a young Mabel as she spends time with her grandmother, and the bond they build over the Glade doesn’t just strengthen the relationship between Mabel and her grandmother but also Mabel, the Glade and the overarching message of Hoppers.
This opening that leads into the movie is touching and heartbreaking but also so effective, as it connects you further with Mabel and her motive. It genuinely might be one of the reasons that Hoppers thrives so well, and that’s because its writer, Jesse Andrew, does an outstanding job at making Mabel such a loveable character, and she’s the best main character we’ve gotten since Coco. Alongside this opening, there are references later in the film that’ll make you understand why Hoppers is a clear spiritual sequel to Up.
Hoppers plants Jerry as the antagonist and Mabelʼs main rival as he attempts to tear down the local glade, which Mabel takes personally as an animal lover but also because it resides as a core memory with her grandmother. We get some hilarious banter between the two, and you can’t help but laugh that a grown man is seeing a young teen as a genuine problem in his plans to build a bridge. As we get further into the story, the dynamic between Mabel and Jerry shifts as a new character poses a major threat for everyone, and it’s not only refreshing to see a fake-out but also to see how their dynamic evolves over the course of the film.
This Pixar movie is all about preserving nature and the environment, but most importantly, it’s about unity. There’s no better way to share that message than having humans and animals team up. There’s a devastating but beautiful scene in the third act that involves a fire which helps to encapsulate this beautiful messaging and send it across effectively.
Hoppers wouldn’t be the movie it is without the heartwarming animals that are at its center. Mabel might be an extremely strong lead, but without her supporting cast, we don’t have a film. We get to meet King George (Bobby Moynihan), who rules the glade and quickly becomes acquainted with Mabel and makes her his “hand”. Moynihan and Cruda are a heartwarming pair as their respective characters that you just want to see more of. Their interactions with the rest of the glade become iconic, and in a car chase scene that involves them and a shark, it’s a great talking point for one of the best Pixar sequences in recent years alongside the third act, “Fire”.
Hoppers might have a similar concept to Avatar with its mind-switching concept, but they’re absolutely nothing alike. Pixar continues to be an animation studio that produces these grand, expressive, creative, and visually stunning animated movies that have powerful, moving, and heartfelt messages. It’s a chaotically hilarious time at the cinema with the family, and Pixar continues the trend of bringing some creepiness into their movies after Elio’s horror stunt last year.
It highlights Pixar’s advancement in the animation industry, as each movie continues to show improvements, and with Hoppers looking this magnificent, I can’t wait for Toy Story 5 later this year and Gatto in 2027.
