Have you heard about a horror animated movie produced keeping children like us in mind? Night of the Zoocalypse is one such super fun animated movie. It is a horror-comedy, yet toned down to what a five-year-old can handle. There are no nightmares, but laughs.

Written by James Kee and produced by Steven Hoban, the story was inspired by an idea from Clive Barker’s unpublished short story ZOOmbies. The 91-minute animated movie has been directed by Rodrigo Perez-Castro and Ricardo Curtis, who also helped plan the story scenes.

Set in a zoo, this story is about cute and cuddly animals turning into zombies! The movie mixes the fun of cartoons with the thrill of a zombie story in a way that even our parents will enjoy watching with us!

The movie begins in an urban zoo, where feeding animals and managing tourists are underway. The first animal we see is a brave young wolf named Gracie, who her grandma constantly warns that sooner or later something bad or worse is going to happen. It always does.

All the peace and calm are lost when a meteor strikes and unleashes a virus that turns most of the animals into creepy, glowing-eyed zombie creatures. What would you expect from a survival movie where no one dies and which mostly stays in the zoo? With limited exposure and setting, the animals did what they could to save everything they knew.

The movie’s main characters are Gracie and Dan, an unlikely combo of a young wolf and a recently transferred mountain lion. There is a red ruffed lemur, Xavier, a movie buff, a selfish monkey, Felix, who believes he has the biggest brain and should be the boss, with a sarcastic ostrich named Ash joining in. Together, they have to stop the zombies from infecting the rest of the zoo and eventually the world, and search for a cure in the shortest time.

The message for us is to show how important it is to work as a team and keep trying, even when things get tough. It teaches that people with different personalities can still work together to reach a shared goal. It also reminds us to stay loyal to the people we care about and to be kind and thankful for those around us, no matter how different they may be.

Published in Dawn, Young World, May 10th, 2025