Zootopia 2 didn’t take much time to become one of the highest-grossing Hollywood movies of 2025. However, the animated animal adventure movie is unwillingly inspiring a dangerous trend in China. The comical portrayal of Gary De’Snake, a blue snake from the movie, has Chinese kids demanding blue snakes as pets. The real-life snake that resembles Gary the most is a highly venomous one whose bite can also be fatal for an adult human.
Kids are demanding this venomous snake as pet after watching Zootopia 2
Gary De’Snake plays a character in the movie who worries excessively about even the smallest things. However, the animated pit viper has a sweet nature, which impressed a lot of kids worldwide. Gary arrives in Zootopia with a mission to resurrect the damaged reputation of his reptile family and reintegrate them into the animal kingdom.
The animated pit viper’s sweet and anxious yet determined character has become one of the most fascinating aspects of the movie for kids. However, Chinese kids are taking their love for Gary to dangerous lengths. A recent report from Dexerto reveals that kids in China are demanding blue pit vipers as pets after being impressed by the animated pit viper’s on-screen character.
After Zootopia 2 earned a staggering $503 million (estimated) in the country, Chinese state media outlets revealed that prices of Indonesian pit vipers (primarily blue) across various e-commerce platforms started to rise. While this incident indicates the rising trend of buying pit vipers in China, Qi Weihao’s case stands as proof of this trend.
Weihao, based in China’s Jiangxi province, recently talked to CNN and revealed that he purchased a blue pit viper just two days after watching Zootopia 2. He also mentioned how Gary’s character in the movie changed the public perception of snakes in the country.
However, Weihao is an experienced reptile handler, which may not be the case with somebody else choosing to follow the trend. Given a pit viper’s lethality, such cases can easily result in human fatalities.
