Illustration | Foxes on the Boardwalk (Uncle Nick) (Patreon)

Concept art from a story beat for Uncle Nick.

This was an early idea I had featuring a conversation Finnick has with Nick either 1) early on in the story after the chase through South Zootopia (that he may or may not assist in), 2) book-ended on episode 2, or in an episode that happens later on that he "tags along" in and thus has a bigger role in. The general idea is that Fin gives some well-meaning advice to Nick, cognisant that though the taller fox's life is altering wildly a fox is still a fox in the eyes of the city. This gives Nick some pause and while he waves it off with a quip, the comment feeds into his insecurities about his new path, including his growing friendship with Judy and the idea that she may still distrust him.

While I have my own ideas of roping Finnick in a dumb plan concocted on the fly, I did want to give him more screen-time as something other than a visual gag since Finnick is a character that Nick can relate to in a way he can't with Judy. Fin is level-headed and pragmatic, and while Nick is his own straight man character he becomes less so when combined with Judy and other characters like Clawhauser and CB, making Finnick the group's true straight man character. While both characters are probably cut from the same cloth more or less, Nick, I feel, is character that had many hopes and dreams that were beaten down by society. Only now is he starting to allow himself to be himself and to be more than what the world says he is and thus is allowing more opportunities - and mammals - into his life. While Vanessa, Nick's mother, is extremely hopeful for Nick, Finnick, while not completely against this, does give him words of caution because he knows how easy it can be to get hurt.

For a few months now I've had Finnick wearing a flight jacket with fur lining the collar mainly because of his new gig work in Tundratown. But recently I've liked giving the jacket a background. I've decided it's actually a family heirloom - a flight jacket given to him by an unnamed relative who flew in the Air Force (prob father or grandfather) at some point. That literally means nothing to the overall story, but one can argue that any character wearing a bomber jacket is probably badass. Through a few character exercises, I've determined that Finnick, when confronted with direct danger, he is more inclined to stand his ground and fight back with brute force despite his small stature - so his jacket is earned imo :3 In this late 2022 sketch, Cotton somehow swipes the old jacket in the episode he's most active in and I expect her to do so with the new one as well.

That's all for now ^^