Night of the Zoopocalypse

image for Night of the Zoopocalypse

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Not suitable under 9; parental guidance to 10 (violence, scary scenes, themes)

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This topic contains:

  • overall comments and recommendations
  • details of classification and consumer advice lines for Night of the Zoopocalypse
  • a review of Night of the Zoopocalypse completed by the Australian Council on Children and the Media (ACCM) on 21 October 2025.

Overall comments and recommendations

Children under 9 Not suitable due to violence, scary scenes and themes.
Children aged 9–10 Parental guidance recommended due to violence, scary scenes and themes.
Children aged 11 and over Ok for this age group.

About the movie

This section contains details about the movie, including its classification by the Australian Government Classification Board and the associated consumer advice lines. Other classification advice (OC) is provided where the Australian film classification is not available.

Name of movie: Night of the Zoopocalypse
Classification: PG
Consumer advice lines: Mild horror themes and animated violence
Length: 91 minutes

ACCM review

This review of the movie contains the following information:

A synopsis of the story

Gracie (voice of Gabbi Kosmidis), a spirited young timber wolf raised by her cautious grandmother, is bored by life in the zoo and complains that nothing ever happens. When a meteor, containing a virus, crashes into the zoo, it is eaten by a bunny who transforms into a deranged mutant zombie who bites other animals and seems intent on infecting the entire zoo. As chaos erupts, Gracie is separated from her pack and must navigate the infected grounds to reunite with them.

Gracie soon teams up with Dan (voice of David Harbour), a gruff mountain lion who recently arrived at the zoo and whose survival instincts and brute strength make him a powerful ally. The pair form an unlikely alliance with a random group of survivors, including Felix (voice of Paul Sun-Hyung Lee) a selfish monkey, Ash (voice of Scott Thompson) a cautious Ostrich, a baby pigmy hippo called Poot (voice of Christina Nova), and Xavier (voice of Pierre Simpson) a lemur obsessed with films. Together they must try to survive the zombie attack, stop the virus from spreading and find a way to save those who are already infected.

Themesinfo

Children and adolescents may react adversely at different ages to themes of crime, suicide, drug and alcohol dependence, death, serious illness, family breakdown, death or separation from a parent, animal distress or cruelty to animals, children as victims, natural disasters and racism. Occasionally reviews may also signal themes that some parents may simply wish to know about.

Prejudice; Xenophobia; Paranoia; Survivalism; Manipulation; Fear; Contagion; Distrust and Division.

Use of violenceinfo

Research shows that children are at risk of learning that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution when violence is glamourised, performed by an attractive hero, successful, has few real life consequences, is set in a comic context and / or is mostly perpetrated by male characters with female victims, or by one race against another.

Repeated exposure to violent content can reinforce the message that violence is an acceptable means of conflict resolution. Repeated exposure also increases the risks that children will become desensitised to the use of violence in real life or develop an exaggerated view about the prevalence and likelihood of violence in their own world.

There is some violence in this movie, including:

  • Dan is shot with a tranquiliser. The gun is later dropped and a dart hits a wolf.
  • A character is nearly eaten by Dan after she was tied up in ropes beside him.
  • Gracie and Dan are both shot with tranquiliser darts.
  • A bunny zombie eats baby animals and then regurgitates them, having transformed them into zombies as well. They all attack other animals.
  • A group of monkeys are attacked by zombies.
  • Zombie animals try to break into a vet’s office where Gracie, Dan and Xavier are.
  • A zombie leg is severed.
  • Gracie and Dan are chased by zombies.
  • Stuffed animals are hung from the ceiling by their necks. They momentarily terrify the animals fleeing the zombies.
  • Gracie’s Grandma tries to eat Gracie’s arm.
  • A character punches Gracie’s Grandma in the face and Gracie flees from her family after realising the whole pack has been turned into zombies.
  • A monkey is electrocuted.
  • Ash attacks Felix.
  • Zombies attack Dan. Dan grabs a zombie by its tongue and swings it into other zombies.
  • A gorilla zombie tries to bite and eat Gracie and the others.
  • Gracie kicks the gorilla zombie in the face, decapitating its head.
  • One zombie lands on another and they both blast apart on the ground.
  • A zombie attacks Dan, who bites off the zombie’s head.
  • Tree frog zombies chase and try to attack Felix, he is nearly crushed and grabbed.
  • Felix is chased and grabbed by Dan.
  • Gracie is attacked and chased by a zombie bunny.
  • Poot is nearly crushed.

Material that may scare or disturb children

Under fiveinfo

Children under five are most likely to be frightened by scary visual images, such as monsters, physical transformations.

In addition to the above-mentioned violent scenes, there are some scenes in this movie that could scare or disturb children under the age of five, including the following:

  • There are frequent and numerous scenes with creepy, drooling, zombie monsters chasing, attacking and infecting others. Occasionally, the transformations are shown, such as when Dan is bitten, quickly becoming a zombie and intent on attacking Gracie as she pleads with him to remember her. He stabs at her with his claws, and chases her all over the shelf until he drowns in a sink covered in bubbles, before being resuscitated. Many of these scenes could be very upsetting for younger viewers.
  • There are creepy, glowing eyes on a beast-like monster who chases Gracie through a forest.
  • An alien pod blasts open while the other animals sleep, revealing an evil bunny zombie with sinister, glowing eyes.
  • In one scene, an animal’s eyes pop out into a drain.
  • Gracie decapitates a gorilla and its body parts begin to fall off. The gorilla zombie puts itself back together haphazardly as the body parts continue to fall off.
  • A monster zombie with a giant gorilla head on a super long neck, with enormous spider legs, roars and tries to grab Gracie.

Aged five to eightinfo

Children aged five to eight will also be frightened by scary visual images and will also be disturbed by depictions of the death of a parent, a child abandoned or separated from parents, children or animals being hurt or threatened and / or natural disasters.

In addition to the above-mentioned violent scenes and scary visual images, there are some scenes in this movie that could scare or disturb children aged five to eight, including the following:

  • A sinister hand suddenly reaches out from an alien-like cocoon and grabs at Gracie. It doesn’t give up and continues to follow her, trying to grab her tail and attack as it chases her around the barn, dragging the cocoon behind it.
  • A can is thrown at a zombie, knocking him unconscious. A creature bursts out of the unconscious zombie and moves to attack others.
  • Xavier is turned into a zombie by tree frogs as they growl, spit and rage.
  • The zombie bunny transforms into a gigantic monster that incorporates all the zombies into it. It has lots of glowing eyes throughout the dark body and it is intent on grabbing Gracie. Its spidery arms continue to grab for Gracie as she struggles to save the other animals.

Aged eight to thirteeninfo

Children aged eight to thirteen are most likely to be frightened by realistic threats and dangers, violence or threat of violence and / or stories in which children are hurt or threatened.

  • Nothing further noted.

Product placement

  • None noted.

Sexual references

  • None noted.

Nudity and sexual activity

There is some nudity and sexual activity in this movie, including:

  • The bare butt of a gorilla is shown.

Use of substances

  • None noted.

Coarse language

There is some coarse language in this movie, including:

  • God Dern
  • Numbskulls
  • Little missy
  • Stupid
  • Coward.

In a nutshell

Night of the Zoopocalypse is an animated horror-comedy/survival quest. It is promoted as a family film due to the lack of profanity, however, the animated horror sequences are likely to be a little much for younger audiences. The film is best suited to children over the age of eleven.

The main messages from this movie are that there is strength in diversity; that working together can help overcome even the largest of obstacles; and that the lights of resilience and optimism can illumine even the darkest and most desperate of times.

Values in this movie that parents may wish to reinforce with their children include:

  • Teamwork
  • Cooperation
  • Open-mindedness
  • Empathy
  • Courage
  • Resilience.

This movie could also give parents the opportunity to discuss with their children the importance of facing fears and building courage, as well as the importance of questioning prejudice and assumptions.