[Quick News] YES, You Can Bring Your Pets to the Cinemas Now!

Credit: Ti Gong

Caption: Wujiaochang Wanda Cinema and the Hoyts Cinema have offered multiple pet-friendly screenings on weekends.

Pet-Friendly Cinema's Opening for Zootopia

Walt Disney Animation's Zootopia 2 is absolutely cleaning up in China right now. According to the bean-counters over at Beacon, the sequel has already hauled in a casual 2.2 billion yuan (that's about US$311 million) on the mainland as of Thursday afternoon – big numbers for a bunch of talking animals.

Leaning into the theme, cinemas around China have started rolling out pet-friendly screenings, which is exactly what it sounds like: you, a movie ticket, and whatever adorable fur-monster runs your household.

Where to go in Shanghai:

Wanda Cinemas says two of their Shanghai locations – Wujiaochang Wanda and Hoyts – have been doing weekend pet-welcome showings, all of which sold out faster than a bag of imported cat treats. People showed up with cats, dogs, and the kind of pet strollers, lining up to take photos with the Zootopia standees before piling in for a group shot and a post-film raffle.

Other chains like Perfect World Cinema have also gotten in on the action, clearly marking their "bring-your-beast" showtimes on the ticketing apps. So yes – Shanghai's movie scene has officially gone full animal kingdom.

Credit: Ti Gong

Caption: These screenings proved highly popular...

After photos of Chinese audiences watching Zootopia 2 with their dogs actually sitting beside them in the cinema started making the rounds on overseas social media, the international pet-parent community collectively lost its mind – mostly in admiration, with a healthy dose of "why don't we have this?" thrown in.

One foreign netizen, going by "xyoob," was particularly impressed that all the dogs in the photos looked so calm and civilized, joking that if this happened in the US, it'd be wall-to-wall pit bulls and someone's emotional-support Rottweiler starting a cage match in the aisle.

Commentators are already calling it a budding cultural moment: the movie theater no longer being a strictly human-only zone but drifting into this hybrid emotional playground for people and their pets. The boundary between "cinema" and "pet café but with surround sound" is getting blurrier by the weekend.

This isn't the first time...

Wanda Cinemas actually piloted this stuff back in 2023 – pet-owner screenings with required paperwork, followed by a full disinfect-and-scrub routine after each show. A little bureaucracy, a little bleach, and voilà: dog-friendly cinema.

Fast forward to now, and Chinese theaters are actively rebranding themselves from simple movie-viewing boxes into full-on social habitats – pet hangouts, parent–child play zones, theme-party venues, the works. It's less going to the movies and more joining a community center that occasionally plays films.