{"id":519588,"date":"2026-03-07T04:09:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T04:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/519588\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T04:09:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T04:09:10","slug":"the-director-of-hoppers-was-sure-hed-have-to-cut-its-most-shocking-moment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/519588\/","title":{"rendered":"The Director of ‘Hoppers’ Was Sure He\u2019d Have to Cut Its Most Shocking Moment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pixar\u2019s latest film, Hoppers, is now in theaters, and it\u2019s excellent<\/a>. Truly. It\u2019s funny, surprising, heartfelt, and everything you\u2019d want in a Pixar movie<\/a> or any movie for that matter. Nowhere is that better seen than in a specific, semi-spoilery moment early in the film.<\/p>\n

The moment was so shocking, so out of place, so ballsy, that the film\u2019s director, Daniel Chong<\/a>, was sure they\u2019d have to cut it. This was a Disney movie, after all. In fact, he even came up with a simpler, less shocking version, fully expecting he\u2019d have to replace it. But that didn\u2019t happen. (Minor spoilers for Hoppers below.)<\/p>\n

\"Io9<\/p>\n

The moment in question, which is also the moment I chose to vaguely reference in my review<\/a>, is when the Insect Queen, voiced by none other than Meryl Freaking Streep, is flying past our main character, Mabel. Mabel, who is a human in a beaver body, feels the queen fly by her and quickly, instinctively squishes her between her hands. It\u2019s violent, it\u2019s sudden, and it\u2019s hilarious. It\u2019s also a crucial moment in the film because the Queen\u2019s death sets up the role of her son, Titus, voiced by Dave Franco.<\/p>\n

Speaking to Slashfilm<\/a>, Chong explained that while he loved the scene, he was ready to let the scene go. \u201cI remember after our first screening or second screening \u2026 we were like, \u2018You know what? There\u2019s probably no chance we\u2019re ever going to get away [with] doing this. So we should just change it now so that we don\u2019t get this note and get screwed later,’\u201d Chong said. \u201cAnd so we reboarded it for the next screening, and we just had the Insect Queen die on her own, and then there was a scene where Mabel and [the mammal king] George looked like they killed her, but she didn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

It works for the story but doesn\u2019t quite have the same impact. Enter Pete Docter, the head of Pixar and director of Up, Inside Out, and Monsters Inc., as well as Andrew Stanton, director of Finding Nemo, Wall-E, and the upcoming Toy Story 5.<\/p>\n

\u201cPete Doctor and Andrew Stanton were so mad at us,\u201d Chong said. \u201cThey were like, \u2018Why did you change that?!\u2019 And we were like, \u2018Well, we thought, because it\u2019s Disney, we thought\u2026 \u2018 And they were like, \u2018No! Put that back in.\u2019 And we were like, \u2018Okay, but promise to make sure we don\u2019t have to change this.\u2019 And they were like, \u2018We will fight for this.\u2019 So those guys were on board. We were the ones that were second-guessing ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whether or not audiences will enjoy the moment as much as I, Docter, and Stanton did, we\u2019ll know after the film\u2019s opening weekend. But it\u2019s awesome to see that they realized the moment is a perfect example of what makes Hoppers so special. It\u2019s in theaters now.<\/p>\n

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel<\/a>, Star Wars<\/a>, and Star Trek<\/a> releases, what\u2019s next for the DC Universe on film and TV<\/a>, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pixar\u2019s latest film, Hoppers, is now in theaters, and it\u2019s excellent. Truly. It\u2019s funny, surprising, heartfelt, and everything…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":519589,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[49,48,205153,75,133354,205154,56185],"class_list":["post-519588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-daniel-chong","tag-entertainment","tag-hoppers","tag-meryl-street","tag-pixar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=519588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/519588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/519589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=519588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=519588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=519588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}