GreyHopps

GreyHopps is the het ship between Judy Hopps and Gideon Grey from the Zootopia fandom.

Canon
During her kithood, Judy Hopps had participated in a play put on during Bunnyburrow's annual Carrot Day Festival. During the performance, Judy and several of her classmates revealed to the crowd their dreams for the future, with Judy's being becoming a police officer. A young fox in the audience named Gideon Grey heckles Judy upon her saying that, calling it the "most stupidest thing" he's ever heard. In response, Judy adlibed and talked about the seeming impossibility of her dream to the audience and the people who would disparage her for it, even breaking character and addressing Gideon directly. Being called out forced Gideon to quiet down as the play continued uninterrupted.

After the performance, during a country fair that was being held for the festival, Judy found Gideon and his friend Travis taking some fair tickets from some of her friends. Approaching Gideon, Judy calmly asked the fox to give back the tickets, which only results in Gideon mocking her and pushing her to the ground. Judy retaliates by kicking Gideon in the face. Angered, Gideon claws Judy's cheek and making her bleed while also deriding her, claiming she would never be anything more than "a stupid, carrot farming dumb bunny". Feeling confident with what they had done, Gideon and Travis walk away from Judy, unaware that she had taken back the tickets during the scuffle. Gideon's words and actions just then motivate Judy to prove him wrong, reaffirming her dream of being a police officer.

Fifteen years after gaining that motivation, Judy returned to Bunnyburrow defeated and depressed, having resigned from the Zootopia Police Department following her disastrous press conference about the Missing Mammals Case and the ensuing chaos it was currently causing. She returned to her family and for two months helped them in their carrot farming business, seemingly validating Gideon's words to her back at the festival all those years ago. Ironically enough, a now older and reformed Gideon finds Judy working a stall one day while he was driving down the street. Approaching Judy, Gideon makes the surprise move of apologizing for his actions back in their kithood. He explains that the reason he was so combative towards Judy was because he was suffering from self-doubt. After summing it up by calling his past self a jerk, Judy accepts the apology and notes that she knows what being a jerk is like.

After making amends, the two hear Judy's parents warning some of her younger siblings away from some nearby flowers. Seeing the flowers, Gideon recognizes them and casually refers to them by their nickname of "Night Howlers". Upon hearing that, Judy remembers that she heard the term "Night Howler" during the Missing Mammals Case and finally realizes what was really going on in the city. After asking around to brush up on what the flowers did to mammals, Judy frantically tells Gideon and her parents what she had missed during her investigation before taking off in her father's truck. As they see Judy drive off, Gideon questions her parents on if they understood what she was saying.

Fanon
GreyHopps is a decently rare ship for the Zootopia fandom, having garnered a handful of supporters but not to the degree of other ships, particularly WildeHopps. Those that do support the ship do so thanks to several factors. One of the big factors is the shared history that Judy had with Gideon that simply isn't there with Nick, even if that history was one where they were at odds with each other. The latter fact feeds into another big contributor into the ship's popularity, which is Gideon's reformed attitude and his apology for his childhood behavior to Judy when they reunite. Supporters tend to latch on to that sincerity of his changed personality, as well as Gideon now having amicable relationships with Judy's parents. The ship is also helped by Gideon being a fox like Nick, thus allowing the same kind of predator/prey dynamics that WildeHopps had to occur.

The ship seems to have begun shortly after the movie's release by way of a piece of fan-art from Deviantart artist Gerardson. Gerardson would make several more pieces featuring this ship over the next few years, even seemingly coining the term "GreyHopps" to refer to the ship. This, in turn, would garnered attention from other artists to begin doing their own pieces as well as fanfics writers to start writing about it.

On AO3, GreyHopps isn't very written about, with tagged stories currently only numbering in the 30's range. Surprisingly, it's Judy's second most written ship, being only behind WildeHopps. It's also currently neck and neck with Gideon's relationship with Judy's friend Sharla as his most written ship.

Fandom
FAN FICTION

DEVIANTART

TUMBLR

Variations

 * GreyWildeHopps — the ship between Judy Hopps, Gideon Grey, and Nick Wilde