#and something about universal dynamics telling roz she's defective and needs to be reprogrammed according to their specifications

[novelmonger]

The first time I watched The Wild Robot, a cynical part of me was skeptical when all the animals set aside their instincts and started working together. What are the predators going to eat if not the prey animals? This isn't Zootopia, where they can go to the grocery store and buy vegan burgers or whatever. The movie had already established very bluntly that some animals eat other animals, so they can't just brush something like that under the rug, right?

I was willing to suspend my disbelief, though. It's a kids' movie about talking animals; even with the dark humor peppered throughout the movie, they weren't going to have these lovable characters literally eat each other, and that's okay. There are plenty of other movies that do the same. And it's not really the point of the movie anyway, so fussing about it is just going to ruin a good time.

But as I thought about it later, I suddenly remembered that passage from Isaiah 11:6-9:

The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain, for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

In other words...the state of the island at the end of the movie is the way things are supposed to be. The way they will be in the end. Predator and prey living together, their young lying down in safety together (like they do in Roz's hut), no longer hurting or killing each other.

The island at the beginning of the movie is the way it is, full of death and fear, because of the Fall. The animals' very nature has been corrupted so they are incapable of seeing the possibility of life without killing and hunting. Until someone from the outside comes and shows them a better way. Someone who dies because of love, comes back to life because of love, and eventually leaves with the promise of returning one day. And now that island is forever changed, a model of the heavens and earth that is to come.