I don't order tickets in advance for movies -- and getting them has never really been a problem, even on opening day -- but I am planning on going to see it on either the first Tuesday after it releases or just make my way to one of the theaters in a nearby town that currently has an $6 for everything summer sale; depends on how I'm feeling and if I actually make plans to see it with friends.
The novelization is currently available for sale; not sure exactly how reflective it is of the film itself, but you can read some excepts here:
https://books.google.com/books?id=4OaZD ... on&f=false The first two chapters cover the opening of the film (Simba's presentation while Scar sulks in his lair and toys with a mouse) and then the other part given describes the "Be Prepared" scene and Scar leading Simba into the gorge (which the book doesn't call Embamba Canyon even though Favreau and the crew on-set apparently do; like I said, not sure how accurate the book is the the movie). It's an interesting enough read, content-wise; kind of bland in terms of presentation style though. The dynamics between the lions and hyenas do get a bit of fleshing out in the way I'd anticipated, although Scar's relationship to the hyenas doesn't quite add up to what I'd hoped they'd do, at least not based on the viewable excerpts of the book. (And again, could be different in the film.) One review I found mentioned a new subplot for the lionesses, but that seems like one of the bigger twists/deviations for the movie so I won't go into it here -- not that there's much detail given to it in the review.
What I don't mind discussing is the hyenas; nothing huge with them as far as I know, but there are some changes so I'll put it in a spoiler tag in case you want to be as fresh as possible for this:
The hyenas are more of a legitimate threat here or at least are more organized and not really the comedic agents of chaos they are in the original movies. Shenzi in particular is a much more serious character than her cartoon iteration and is clearly established as the dominant female. (No mate or offspring mentioned though.) She doesn't seem particularly close to Kamari and Azizi; they're described as her "main minions" mostly because they're just always hanging around her, but she doesn't care much for them. Kamari and Azizi themselves are definitely Banzai and Ed renamed, although their characterizations and the dynamics between them are a bit more similar to Janja and Cheezi/Chungu; their back-and-forth dialogue (yes, Azizi talks) is almost exactly the same as those Lion Guard characters'.
Posted: June 20th, 2019, 5:15 pm
