Minecraft Movie features various scenes that make reference to in-game mechanics and jokes but one in particular has caught fans’ attention.
Some people have even been kicked out of cinemas for their reactions to the so-called “chicken jockey”.
The film came out on April 4 in the UK and already bad behaviour from some people in the US has led to some cinemas requiring younger audience members to be accompanied by an adult.
For example, the Township Theatre in New Jersey put out a statement on Sunday April 6, saying that minors would have to be “accompanied by a parent or responsible adult” following “an unfortunate situation”.
But what scene is it that has provoked such behaviour – and just what is a chicken jockey?
What is a chicken jockey in Minecraft?
The scene in question shows Jack Black’s character, Steve, seeing a baby zombie fall on to the back of a chicken. While meant to cause laughs, some viewer have let out loud disruptive screams or thrown popcorn.
Within the Minecraft game, a chicken jockey is a baby zombie riding a chicken, an extremely rare phenomenon in the game that some players might never see for themselves.
The premiere of A Minecraft Movie at Cineworld Leicester Square in central London on Sunday March 30, 2025
Ben Whitley/PA Wire
Players must wait for zombies to appear, which can only happen at night, and then cross their fingers that the zombie is a baby (relatively rare) and then cross their toes that a chicken is close enough that they might spawn on top of it.
The Minecraft Wikipedia page gives the probability of a chicken jockey’s appearance.
“Each baby zombie, baby husk, baby zombie villager, baby zombified piglin, or baby drowned that spawns has a 5% chance to check for an existing chicken within a 10×6×10 box centered on the baby’s spawn location and spawn riding one of those chickens if there are any,” the page explains.
“If it fails that 5% chance, there is an additional 5% chance of the baby zombie spawning mounted on a new chicken. In a chicken-free environment, each spawned zombie has a 0.25% chance of becoming a chicken jockey; if chickens are present, the chance increases to 0.4875%.”
The low likelihood of this happening highlights how rare the in-game event is – but it happens 100% of the time when watching that scene in the movie, of course.
Minecraft Movie has been a box office smash, generating £15 million at UK and Irish cinemas and $163 million (£128 million) on its first three days at the North American box office.
This has made it the highest-grossing video game movie adaptation ever, beating even the Super Mario movie.
