My Lion King Forum

This is something I wondered the last time I watched the movie. As the hyenas (seemingly all of them and not just the three known by name) are closing in on Scar after he was thrown from Pride Rock, the entire scene bursts into flames. The next screen shot makes it appear that everything but the rock itself has been consumed by the fire. Do you guys and girls think that the hyenas burned with Scar or did they live to fight another day, just without giving Simba any more trouble?

I was just telling my friend SCHD to make a thread like this. We watched the movie together less than an hour ago, and he asked the same question during that scene. All I can think of is that they got burned alive when eating dessert. lol. Either that or the hyenas as a whole were damaged psychologically and physically from all the lionesses attacking them and having their leader betray them. Remember that at least a few of them left the Pridelands as hinted in Nuka's comment from Simba's Pride.

I don't think that the hyenas, or Scar for that matter, got burned. Here's why: What we do see is are the shadows as the fire closes in. Shadows are caused by a directional light source. The only way for the wall to get shadows on it is for the fire to emit light towards Scar and the hyenas, which will block some of it off with tier bodies, while the rest travels to the rock, getting the nice shadows we see.

But if Scar and the hyenas burned up, they would be covered in light emitting flames (ouch!). This means that their bodies won't block off the light, and while you might get shadows, they will be faint at best. Not the nice dark silhouettes we see in the movie.

You know it honestly never occurred to me until about a 2 years ago when I was talking to a Scar-fan internet friend of mine that the hyenas might've died too.

No seriously, I never thought that they were supposed to have. I left the theater as a 12 year old and me & my kidhood friends spent many a playtime pretending the glowy green ghost of Scar was haunting the Hyenas afterward for killing him, but never once felt they were supposed to be dead at the end of the movie.

Anyway, leaving the Wildwood Ave clan out of it.....



It may have been meant to be implied that the hyenas died too, the entire land being cleansed of ALL evil, etc., but it would be impossible to irradicate that many animals and it started pouring 2 seconds later.

I think it's entirely fitting to the hyena trio's part in the TLK mythology for them to simply skate off. They're these frenetically chaotic beings that are entirely loose-canon agents of discord, it's damage done & then they're out & off again from whence they came, like the Furies. It was Scar's mistep to invoke/deal with them in the first place.

I don't particularly like SP but I can use it at-will. SOME of them lived for sure, and if they were planning on Banzai being in it for a time before *Zira* made them change their mind, then evidently Disney didn't think they ended there either, at least 4 years later they didn't.

Besides, I give the trio credit for being self-serving if nothing else, they let Simba run away out of personal comfort & I doubt they'd stick around at the cost of their own hides when things started getting uncomfortable.

I think they survived, they turned against Scar at the end and I doubt they would have stuck around to be burned or killed by Simba and the lionesses, my impression is that many of them ran off after being beaten in the fight, and when Scar fell, that was pretty much it. I'm sure some died, but for the most part, I simply think they ran off and since then keep a respectful distance from the pridelands for good reason

Geeze, I'm glad I didn't think about that till now haha they were my favorite characters as a kid.
I'd like to think that after they took care of Scar, they skedaddled out of the pridelands in search of a new home with more equality and civil rights or at least a place with lots of wildebeest and few lions

I always wondered that if the hyenas that killed Scar died, but I conclude that they survived based on two probable statements that they most likely SURVIVED:



[*] STATEMENT #1: THE RAIN QUICKLY WASHED AWAY THE FLAMES: Look at this image above very carefully. Now that you bring this issue into account, most of the flames appear to be out IN FRONT of Pride Rock than from behind where Scar and the hyenas were. Then, again, I'm just looking at just one camera angle. Also, take into account, the lionesses, Timon, Pumbaa, and Rafiki were nearby, and they emerge from the flames unburnt and alive. The same can be applied to the hyenas's situation.

[*] STATEMENT #2: THE HYENAS WERE TO APPEAR IN THE SEQUEL: Noah found an article some months ago that stated Cheech Marin finished reprising his role as Banzai for the sequel. It is also said they were to be Zira's allies.

[quote="The New York Daily News"]In addition to "Bridges," Marin will be busy writing a Warner Bros. film, "Cheech the Bus Driver," based on his hit 1994 children's album of the same name. He also has just reprised his voice role as a hyena in Disney's straight-to-video animated sequel to "The Lion King."[/quote]

It appears in Disney's mind at the time that he and the other hyenas survived the battle at Pride Rock. Since Disney didn't go in that direction of having them being Zira's allies, it's plausible they ran off, and were never heard from again.

^ Good point about everyone else surviving somehow.

In short, I believe the flames were just meant as a transitional film device to change the scene and curtain Scar being torn to bits

Excellent point about everyone else surviving LionPrince. Combined with the article that Noah found about Cheech reprising his role, I'd say that's pretty conclusive that they survived. Given that they never make any further apperances in any TLK media to my knowledge, I'd say the safest bet is that they ran off afterwards.

No way could they have burned alive! If they had, I would have been as upset---perhaps MORE as when Mufasa died!

Yes, I really love the hyenas.

Plus they didn't deserve it. They were funny villians.

I believe it was officially confirmed that they survived in an old interview. Sadly, no one knows about that interview, hardly. If they had appeared in the sequel, or been shown after the battle in 1.5, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Sadly, they did not.

I consider the series canon, and consider it as proof that they survived. Sadly, no one else is considering it canon.

I hope if a 4th movie is made, it will be about the hyenas. I really love them, and think they deserved to be in 2, and in movie 3 wayyyyy more. They had two scenes, unless you count the scene where Pumbaa gassed some hyenas who may have been them, or might not have been.

But they definitely lived. Someone I asked this said, "Whoever says they didn't deserves to get bitten in the butt by Shenzi!"