Duke Weaselton

"It's Weaselton! Duke Weaselton!"

- Duke

Duke Weaselton is a minor antagonist in the 2016 Disney animated feature film Zootopia.

Backround
The proclaimed "Duke of Bootleg", Duke's main source of income is the sale of pirated DVDs. He is a career criminal, though, and will just as quickly pick pockets or work for clientèle, as his allegiance is to money before anything else.

He appears to be an affiliate of Zootopia's underworld, having known Mr. Big and Nick Wilde prior to the events of the film. He receives little respect, however, and uses his sharp-tongue as a defense mechanism. Nevertheless, he utilizes his size and swiftness to become an elusive criminal.

Tufts of fur can be seen missing from the pelt over his stomach, indicating scars. This suggests he's been stabbed or otherwise wounded in fights with other members of Zootopia's underworld.

Official Bio

 * Duke Weaselton is a small-time weasel crook with a big-time weasel mouth who tries to give Judy the slip during a police chase.

Role in the film
On Judy's second day of parking duty, a shop owner frantically tells Judy that someone just robbed his store. This gives Judy the opportunity to show her talent at being an actual police officer. Judy chases after the suspect, revealing himself later to be Duke Weaselton. Needing to escape, Duke heads into Little Rodentia, successfully getting away with his duffel bag. Nevertheless, Judy continues the chase. After a brief getaway, Judy manages to hurl Duke backwards, making him lose his momentum. As Judy approaches him, Duke tells Judy "Have a donut, copper!," before kicking a donut sign towards her. Judy successfully dodges it, but it is now hurling towards a shrew who is crossing the road. Judy successfully saves the shrew from getting crushed, and uses the donut sign to capture Duke, and turning him in at the ZPD. Unfortunately, Chief Bogo isn't pleased with Judy, since he believed the items Duke stole were just moldy onions, helped little by the fact she caused a panic in Little Rodentia over the "onions". His irritation over the incident was so great that he blew up at her when Judy tried to correct him in the true nature of the stolen items as flower bulbs that her family uses on their farm.

Later in the film, Judy realizes that night howlers are a flower, and the flower contains a toxin, that, when hit or consumed by animals, it causes them to go savage. Realizing that person the Duke stole them for was likely using them deliberately on predators, Judy and Nick confront Duke, who is selling bootlegged films to pedestrians. Judy and Nick demand answers for why he stole night howlers from the store. When he refuses to cooperate, the duo take Duke to Tundratown's most feared crime boss, Mr. Big, to interrogate him. On the verge of getting iced, Duke admits he was trying to give the night howlers to a ram named Doug for some money, the one thing Duke is unable to resist.

Duke is last seen attending Gazelle's performance at the end of the film dancing, then noticing some animal's money sticking out of their back pocket, steals it out of their pocket and then quietly dances away.

Trivia

 * Duke's name is a pun on the Duke of Weselton from Frozen, another character voiced by Tudyk, and the mispronunciation "Weasel-Town" the Duke was often called by.
 * Ironically, Duke hates being called "Weselton" instead of his actual name.
 * The pirated DVDs that Duke sells are all Zootopia versions of various Disney animated movies: Wrangled (Tangled), Wreck-It Rhino (Wreck-It Ralph), Pig Hero 6 (Big Hero 6), Meowana (Moana), Giraffic (Gigantic) and Floatzen 2 (Frozen 2).
 * Despite being called a weasel, Duke is actually too large to be one, and is instead more similiar in size and appearance to a ferret or stoat. This makes him one of the few animals in the film who isn't up to scale.
 * Another trait that sets him apart from real-life weasels is the fact that Duke has a long tail with a black tip. Real weasels do not have this, but stoats do.
 * Also, while a real weasel's snout is short, Duke's snout is longer and narrower, giving him a slightly more canine appearance. This feature, however, is also sometimes seen in various species of martens.