The Lion King: Did Scar eat his brother?

boing
#41

I fully subscribe to the idea that the TikTok theory is bullshit in an analysis-of-the-literature sense.

However, as someone who has witnessed strong evidence of lion cannibalism I feel compelled to note that lions do eat each other, and it is not necessarily due to extreme circumstances.

In the case I saw a female with a prior injury (probably making it difficult for her to keep up with other members of her group) that was likely killed by three older males who were not part of a pride. They had eaten the hindparts and viscera of the female and were resting under a tree about a quarter mile away, with their faces covered with blood and with distended bellies. Pretty strong evidence.

So, in the Lion King story, do we have evidence that the authors imagined Scar ate Mufasa? Not really. But can and do lions kill and eat other lions? Absolutely.

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#42

So Mufasa dies by wildebeest gangbang?

#43

Who says it was wildebeests? A lot of people are saying that it was Antifa dressed as wildebeests. Those wildebeests love their country.

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#44

Killed by wildebeest? That’s gnus to me.

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#45

good-gnus
good-gnus700×438 40.5 KB

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#46

But Hamlet likewise is exiled and returns – he was sent overseas with his college buddies where he is supposed to be executed, but he figured it out and had his buddies executed instead. It happens off-stage, and the fact that people forget this subplot is kind of the basis of Tom Stoppard’s “Rosecrans and Guildenstern are dead” dealing with obscure characters that think the play is about them.

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#47

Hamlet is briefly sent away, but he is not straight up exiled, or presented as dead. He is not a child, not does not get raised apart from his people. And when he returns it’s for revenge. Not to save the kingdom/people.

This stuff doesn’t cleanly map to Hamlet or Moses. And I’m not saying it’s Exodus instead of Hamlet.

They’re both in there, mixed. Because that’s how this works. The film isn’t musical Hamlet with Lions for Kids, anymore than it’s an episode of Vegitales. There’s other influences as well, including Disney’s own back catalog.

Nothing about it screams adaptation. Most of the core beats, themes and archs from Hamlet are missing. Even as more of the characters, and the fratricide angle, seem to come from it than from elsewhere.

#48

I was going to say this is what shouts adaptation to me. The things that happen to them are different, but pretty much all the named characters have a direct and obvious correspondence to Hamlet, save only Rafiki and the hyenas (replacing Horatio for introducing the ghost and Laertes for the end fight, but not similar). I don’t think there is any comparable parallel with anything else like Exodus.

Note adaptations don’t have to be all or none, and where to cut the line is a question of semantics. This one is a very loose adaptation with of course a Disney ending. But it was obviously the main influence and you can still see the mapping very easily.

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#49

Which brings us to…

Lion_king_1_half_cover

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#50

That just isn’t what adaptation means though.

Adaptations don’t neccisarily have to be strict. But they are pretty clearly defined as the transfer of a work from one medium to the next. Or the transfer of a story from one work to the other.

If anything narrative and plot use is more core to adaptation than anything else.

If I take the characters from Dracula and drop them wholesale into The Office. I am not adapting Dracula. I am adapting The Office.

It tends to seem obvious cause that’s the influence, source we often hear about. You poke them with a stick and the correspondence isn’t exact, sometimes a poor fit. Many of those things that don’t fit are from other influences or sources. Cause the people who made it gave mentioned many. Moses (not neccisarily Exodus) is just the other one they list right next to Hamlet. So it’s one I ran with.

#51

Ok. I wasn’t aware there were formal criteria. You will I’m afraid have to point me to them, because for instance wikipedia’s review on what adaptation means in art doesn’t explain the difference. I mean, it does say work or story, but characters can be a key part of a work – sometimes even in “remakes” they endure while everything else shifts – and it doesn’t say how much you are allowed to introduce plot differences on top of other similarities before it stops qualifying.

In my case it’s not because I often hear about it, it’s because the first time I did, lots of parallels jumped out…I immediately thought “oh, I see, then this would have inspired this, and this would have inspired this” and so on. Whereas saying Moses I really only see the one general similarity and no further insights come to mind at all. Obviously, your mileage must vary.

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#52

An adaptation is a transfer of a work of art from one style to another.

Some common examples are:

Film adaptation, a story from another work, adapted into a film (it may be a novel, non-fiction like journalism, autobiography, comic books, scriptures, plays or historical sources)
Literary adaptation, a story from a literary source, adapted into another work.[citation needed] A novelization is a story from another work, adapted into a novel.
Theatrical adaptation, a story from another work, adapted into a play

Part of a work is not a work. When you mash different things up into new material it’s not generally considered an adaptation.

Otherwise everything is an adaptation.

#53

:notes:
Loosely based on, but legally distinct from [enter previous work here]…
:notes:

#54

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