In just a few years we’ll see this story/theme perfectly presented in Horton Hatches the Egg. Disney’s take on that moral scenario isn’t bad, though it does leave some unsatisfying loose ends. Unlike Horton—and by the way that’s almost certainly not a fair comparison—Pluto didn’t really commit to the chicks, or really do much of anything for them, or much of anything to earn their devotion. I guess it anticipates a similar situation pertaining to Bambi and his absentee father, who gets rather too honoured and adulated, given the paltry contributions he actually made. (That always bugs people. They’re animals, they say! Oh, yeah?)
The square-off with the rooster features an unattractive, uncritical, maybe even unconscious macho component. A subsequent reunion with the chicks, though it’s probably unearned, works rather well.