Hoppers (film)
Hoppers is an upcoming American animated science fiction action comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. Directed by Daniel Chong from a screenplay by Jesse Andrews, the film stars the voices of Piper Curda, Bobby Moynihan and Jon Hamm. It follows an animal lover named Mabel whose mind is transferred into a lifelike robotic beaver in order to communicate with animals and save their habitat from destruction.
Chong began working on a new original film at Pixar in December 2020. The film was first officially announced as Hoppers in August 2024, along with Curda, Moynihan, and Hamm revealed as part of the cast.
Hoppers is scheduled to be premiere at the New York International Children's Film Festival on February 28, 2026, and will be released in theaters in the United States on March 6.
Premise
After a group of scientists invent a way to "hop" human minds into lifelike robotic animal bodies, an animal-loving teenager named Mabel uses their technology to embody a robotic beaver and thwart a construction company's plot to destroy the local animal habitat.Voice cast
- Piper Curda as Mabel Tanaka, a 19-year-old animal lover whose mind is transferred into a robotic beaver
- Bobby Moynihan as King George, a beaver monarch
- Jon Hamm as Mayor Jerry Generazzo, a greedy mayor
- Kathy Najimy as Dr. Sam, Mabel's biology professor who created the hopping technology
- Dave Franco as Titus, the Insect Queen's demanding, spoiled spawn
- Eduardo Franco as Loaf, a slow yet staunch beaver
- Aparna Nancherla as Nisha, Dr. Sam's astute colleague
- Tom Law as Tom Lizard, a lizard who prefers to avoid drama
- Sam Richardson as Conner, a grad student working under Dr. Sam
- Melissa Villaseñor as Ellen, a big, menacing, mostly grumpy bear always on the lookout for her next meal
- Isiah Whitlock Jr. as Bird King, a goose
- Steve Purcell as Amphibian King, a frog
- Ego Nwodim as Fish Queen, a fish
- Nichole Sakura as Reptile Queens, three snake sisters
- Meryl Streep as Insect Queen, a butterfly who is the most respected and feared member of the all-seeing and all-powerful Animal Council
- Karen Huie as Grandma Tanaka, Mabel's grandmother
- Vanessa Bayer as Diane, a shark assassin. Heidi Klum voices the character in the German version of the film
- Demetri Martin as a flock of birds
Production
Development
In December 2020, Daniel Chong revealed on Twitter that he had returned to Pixar following the completion of his Cartoon Network television series We Bare Bears and the release of We Bare Bears: The Movie and that he was working on an original feature film. At the D23 fan event in August 2024, Pixar's chief creative officer Pete Docter announced that the film would be titled Hoppers. Shortly after, Jesse Andrews revealed on his Twitter account that he had been working on the film for three years. As part of the film's announcement at the D23 event, Piper Curda, Bobby Moynihan, and Jon Hamm were revealed to be part of the voice cast.In an interview with D23, Chong said that one of his inspirations for the film were the nature documentaries in which robot animals are placed in the animal world; "It felt like it was ripe for comedy, this idea of how humans try so hard to fit into the animal world and the weird things that happen through that." He additionally stated, "obviously there are Avatar influences, But there's also this Mission Impossible spy-thriller quality to the movie too, because Mabel's kind of infiltrating the animal world."
Chong initially pitched the film with penguin protagonists. However Docter disapproved, arguing that penguins had been protagonists in several other animated films, so Chong changed the protagonists to beavers after doing research on how they affect the environment; "These animals can be these ecosystem engineers and help everyone else survive; I think that just made me go, 'Oh man, beavers are crazy cool.