Would this movie be held in higher regard if...

[Elton John]

It was the lion king 1?

Let's say, the first one never happened and in summer of 1994 they released this movie but on a bigger budget (better animation, etc)

Would this movie have achieved the same critical and commercial success?

Last year when I told my friend that the lion king was my favorite Disney movie he told me 'dude, that's everybodies favorite disny movie'. A bit hyperbolic but there was a lot of truth to it.

Usually on other sites when I see topics about favorite animated movies, the most picked disney movie by far was the lion king. It's also one of the tiny number of animated films that's positively mentioned in topics about movies in general.

Also, out of all the reaction gifs from disney films the lion king is probably the largest used.

... Tlk 2 sp is a different story, it isn't mentioned often at all. That's not to say the movie is unknown, at the time it had the biggest budget of any disney direct to video sequel. It also is the highest selling disney dtv sequel.

Would this movie have been nearly as successful as the first lion king? Or would it have fallen into obscurity like brother bear, atlantis, or early dreamworks 2d animated films like the prince of egypt and sinbad?

[TheLionPrince]

That is a good question, but if Simba's Pride was a stand-alone film released in summer 1994, then it would be compared to The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin, and it wouldn't fare too well in comparison to those films. Better animation wouldn't have saved this movie since the storytelling of this movie was too familiar with Romeo & Juliet and the love stories Disney animation had previously done, and the story is almost predictable. Here's an example: Kiara would easily be compared to Ariel, a love-struck teenaged princess whose kingly father forbids her from having a romance with a male from a certain society her father distrusts. Because the audience would be familiar with this type of story, the audience will easily guess that Kiara and Kovu will get together, and Simba would have a change of heart. There will be nothing for the audience to feel compelled to since audiences will correctly guess what will happen next. So, the story and the characters would need to be fleshed out more and feel less predictable in order to make a greater emotional journey and impact for general audiences.

If Elton John and Tim Rice wrote the songs, who knows if the songs would be memorable, since they can be creatively uneven as the songs composed for The Road to El Dorado (an animated film whose story wasn't as strong and developed as The Lion King) didn't catch on in pop culture and top the music charts as high as The Lion King did. The soundtrack album debuted at #105 on the Billboard 200 albums chart, though the single, "Someday out of the Blue" reached #5 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart. But, if the music was memorable, then, it would probably do more or less the same commercial success as TLK soundtrack performed.

Not to mention, Pocahontas would really be hurt by this film (if it came out the year before) since it has nearly the same storyline. So, in all honestly, if this film was The Lion King, it would probably carry the same reputation as Pocahontas carries today: beautiful animation and memorable music, but a preachy, all-too familiar storyline that broke the stellar streak of the Disney Renaissance.

[Elton John]

Yeah, the story is predictable. I like kiara way more than ariel or pocahontas though. and kovu has much more charisma than prince eric and john smith.

To be honest I didn't even know that Elton John did music for the road to el dorado. I know the basic premise of the movie but I have never actually seen it.

And as good as elton john music can get, he does have a fair amount of clunkers. His last album "the diving board" which was released in 2013 is booooring and even a great album like "goodbye yellow brick road" has one or two mediocre songs {however, I have seen people criticize jamaica jerk-off but it's a fun song at least in my opinion}.

I'm not very knowledgable about Tim Rice outside of Aladdin or The Lion King.......I sometimes wonder what the song lyrics of the lion king would be like if Bernie Taupin, EJ's main songwriter wrote the lyrics instead of tim.

[SimbasGuard]

Another thing to consider is that if Simba's Pride was the first Lion King movie, no one would have the emotional connection to the characters that exist. Many Lion King fans feel that Simba was a jerk in Simba's Pride. without us knowing what happened in Simba's life he could have become a very hated character. Also we would have no idea who Mufasa and Scar are. thus removing a lot of emotion from the story.

To be honest I love Simba's Pride. However I don't know if I could say that had Lion King not found a special place in my heart first.

[Biomac]

No matter how much more budget the movie makers would've have, I think that Simba's Pride lacks the depth of the first movie. But still SP remains a good sequel.

[Iberian]

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[AnActualLion]

I honestly think this movie is incredibly underrated and gets a lot of flack that isn't really deserved. Simba's Pride, though it definitely had its flaws just like any movie, was a lot grittier than the first. The characters aren't just black and white, evil and good, like in the first movie. Rather there is this moral grayness that is touched on a lot that seems to go super unnoticed in my opinion. The Shakespeare piece it was based on is annoying to say the least in its tendency to be incredibly overdone and cliche, but SP also does a very good job at making sure the characters have real motive and real emotions. Scar's motive was pretty simple: Greed, and Simba was motivated by ~destiny~, while the motives of the characters in the second movie are much more realistic and grounded.
Simba wanted to protect his daughter and kingdom, which lead him to become extremely paranoid and closed minded. Zira (although I do believe that she is a truly evil character in the end) honestly believed that Scar was murdered and that she, and her pride, had been robbed, leading her to formulating this intricate plot to kill Simba and possibly his whole pride. Kovu and Vitani, along with the other Outlanders, believed Zira and followed her until the end when they realized that Simba was not the monster they thought he was, and that this war was fruitless. And Nuka, a character a talk about a LOT on account that I think there is a lot to say about him, just wants his mother to love him.

I really adore this movie and I don't know why it doesn't get more attention and love other than the whole "Sequels always suck" mentality I see literally everywhere nowadays. (Seriously, it's everywhere. People seem to hate sequels of anything before we even get a trailer) I think Simba's Pride is just as good a movie as the original and it deserves this credit.

[crownofsimba]

They're different stories, tbh.

The first movie is very mythic and epic in scope, and I mean that in the literary definition. It's a bit shallow sometimes (aka Nala and Simba's relationship being fairly tacked on) but it evokes sort of universal feelings and morals and feels properly "big." It's not really a character drama so much as a dance of archetypes, the noble father, his evil brother, the noble son who is like the father, etc. etc.

SP has the problem of a lower budget (to the point that the Pridelands feel much less epic) and a less skilled team so that its a bit rough going. The story is imo more interesting than TLK since I like to think of it as Romeo and Juliet where Juliet has actual political power, but due to lower skill the dialogue is less well-written and the pacing is somewhat off. At the end of the day, though, its a character drama, with even the hints of political drama. The problem with character dramas is they don't hit the audience quite as hard as something as mythic as TLK, though I'm honestly not sure if it COULD have been.

It is most certainly one of the better Disney vidquels though. The main thing to remember is that TLK actually wasn't as much a critical darling as the prior Renaissance movies, its success is mainly due to it becoming a cultural phenomenon, which I tend to think can only happen in very particular circumstances.

[Elton John]

The only thing that really felt tacked on about simba and nala was their romance, their friendship as cubs felt a lot more believable.

[crownofsimba]

Oh yes sorry I meant their romantic relationship.

Whereas Kiara was flirting with Kovu from their first meeting.