#nickjudy

my fav commission ever

This particular scene in Zootopia (the first film) is absolutely packed with foreshadowing. You can spot a lot of things in it-it’s a pretty famous one too, right?

Just like in the sequel,

it feels like a lot of the lines characters say to others in this franchise are actually reflections of things they themselves have experienced.

Take what Pawbert says in the second film, for example:

“We’ve always been better than you, and we always will be. Nothing you do matters.”

That line sounds very much like something Pawbert himself has probably heard his entire life—from his siblings, or from his family.

Words that got burned into his brain, and that he now repeats almost unconsciously.

The same goes for Nick in the first film.

When he talks about the harsh reality of Zootopia, or says things like “your dreams are gonna get crushed”—

That’s really his own story he’s talking about.

Stuff like:

No one cares about her or her dreams. Only to find… whoopsie, we don’t all get along. Everyone comes to Zootopia thinking you can be everything you want. Well, you can't. You can only be what you are. Sly fox, dumb bunny.

Those lines are basically him reciting his own lived experience.

Judy, not knowing Nick’s background, tells him he’s never even tried to live differently.

But when Nick responds with “You can only be what you are,” there’s clearly a reason for that bitterness—

those lines have teeth. They come from somewhere real. His past.

That aside… I kind of think Nick already liked Judy from the start.

That’s probably why she gets under his skin so much.

He keeps teasing her, throwing little verbal jabs—but honestly?

If you listen closely, he’s constantly calling her cute.

Sweetheart. Meter maid. Little nicknames like carrot, one after another.

If he weren’t interested at all, his lines wouldn’t keep getting longer like that.

He adds all these softeners and fillers—“Take care,” “My bad,”—there’s a casual gentleness to how he speaks.

“With that cute, fuzzy wuzzy little tail…” “You’re a cute meter maid, though. Maybe a supervisor one day. Hang in there.”

I mean—he just keeps calling her cute. 😆 And he cares enough to remember where she came from and uses that against Judy (lol)

Seeing Judy seems to remind him of who he used to be—bright, hopeful, sincere.

That’s probably why his reactions are stronger than usual; it’s a kind of rebound effect.

If he truly disliked her, he wouldn’t bother talking this much.

He wouldn’t find a need to engage at all.

You can see the same thing later in the sequel—when he reacts to Judy dressing up nicely and says,

“You know, this is not your worst idea.”

He clearly thinks she’s genuinely pretty.

Honestly, I think Judy was his type from the very first meeting,

and that’s exactly why he was so prickly—. He gets interested, so she gets hard to just plain ignore and push away like nothing.

When he gets impressed, he covers it with jokes and becomes a tease. But this indicates he has his eyes on her.

If I had to guess, Nick was the one who fell first. And that checks out.

And to be fair, Judy did open up to him first.

She genuinely wanted to help him—that scene in the early clip shows it clearly.

Even though Nick was scamming her at the time,

I don’t think it’s possible that he felt nothing at all toward her kindness.

But because he used that kindness to deceive her, things got complicated.

So when they meet again later, his reaction isn’t simple.

If you break it down, his responses feel like:

about 60% cynicism (which is really self-directed bitterness),

10% genuine fondness,

30% challenging her / offering advice in his own way.

Because Judy had shown him goodwill once, he now slips out of the situation more gently.

If he truly had zero affection for her, I think his behavior would’ve been very different.

The reason Nick gradually starts stepping in for Judy, and taking her words seriously,

is probably because he felt her sincerity early on.

More and more, he starts thinking:

I don’t want her to get worn down the way I did.

That protective instinct grows.

He even says something like,

“Never let them see that they get to you.”

He hates watching Judy get chipped away, because he sees himself in her.

It’s like he recognizes a small light in her—

one he lost a long time ago.

So when Judy suggests they become partners,

he’s genuinely shocked… and genuinely excited.

That’s why he fills out the form right away—and why he becomes genuinely hurt and disappointed to find that Judy still does take predators as a threat.

Honestly, from the moment Judy handed him that application and said she wanted to work with him,

Nick may already have started thinking of her as his pack.

I’d need to rewatch the first film to see if there are earlier incidents that might adjust this interpretation, but...

It doesn’t feel like the police job itself mattered most to Nick.

It feels like he chose that path because it meant being with Judy. This was confirmed in that long exchange he has with Judy in the second movie, doesn't it?

We don’t really see him having a strong sense of belonging with the rest of the police force—but with her, definitely. She's his buddy and mate.

Given that foxes are known to live in bonded pairs and male foxes, especially, are dedicated partners that protect their mate and offspring,

It almost feels like, on an instinctive level, Nick chose Judy as his partner and decided,

This is the one I stay with.

The fact that he starts calling her cute and giving her nicknames from the very beginning says a lot.

He wouldn’t do that to just anyone.

If she’d just been some random parking officer,

he would’ve written the whole encounter off as a failed con and avoided her altogether.

But instead, he does engage and responds back to her, even if it may not be the friendliest way.

At first, he probably thought, Bad timing, bad connection—this’ll end here.

And then somehow, it didn’t.

They kept running into each other.

They kept getting entangled.

And the bond just… didn’t break.

(I got the KR clip because it includes Judy's gestures, I'd like to point that out - and this version of the dub's really nice too btw!)

I’ve mentioned before that I think Judy has exceptionally high empathy,

and watching these clips again really confirms it.

People like that genuinely exist—and from my experience,

they seem even more common in Western media portrayals.

Judy reminds me of characters like Joy (Inside Out) or Anna (Frozen).

Bright, energetic, encouraging—but also quick to feel hurt or deflated.

That’s because they absorb others’ emotions very easily.

They feel with people.

Still, their will is strong, and they always push through in the end.

Warm-hearted, driven to care for others—even if that eagerness sometimes gets ahead of them.

At their core, they’re genuinely good people.

In that scene, Judy takes the idea of Nick having a painful backstory as his joke early in-

However, later, when Nick finally opens up about his past, watch Judy closely (around the 3:03 mark in that clip). Her expressions are all immersed and considerate.

Up until then, she might’ve brushed his sadness off as jokes—

but once she hears the truth, she immediately leans in, places a hand on him,

and repeatedly affirms him that he's a good guy.

And it’s completely sincere.

Because that sincerity is so strong,

Nick starts blinking and pulling away around 3:18, trying to shift the mood.

It’s not that he dislikes it.

It’s that he’s never received this kind of unconditional trust or support before.

He doesn’t know how to handle it. He’s awkward. A little overwhelmed.

But I think he was already being saved by her—bit by bit.

That’s why he falls in love with Judy.

And everything Judy does in the sequel, Zootopia 2, grows naturally out of that same heart.

Her actions come from kindness—

sometimes to the point of recklessness.

She immerses herself in others, devotes herself, wants to help at any cost.

Because Nick has already been comforted, validated, and rescued by that part of her,

I think he truly loves that very trait.

Which is why, when it comes to Judy’s safety,

he worries intensely—but never tells her she’s wrong for being who she is.

If he did, he’d be denying the very thing he loves most about her.

So yeah. That’s what I spotted this time!

Judy is an incredibly lovable type of character. I did keep saying that Judy is so lucky for having a devoted partner like Nick, but she deserves him more than anyone, she's the only one who's reached out to his heart, and that's how Nick came to be so willing to give everything for her. You don't see someone like her so often, her heart is extremely sweet, a heart of gold and you don't want to lose that once you see it in your life.

And honestly?

I just had to draw humanized Nick because GIVE MY BOY SOME MELANIN, thank you