My Lion King Forum

Moved to Beyond TLK. Any talk about TLK's realism or lack thereof (how can lions talk? would Scar be allowed to live in Mufasa's pride in real life?) can go here

Thanks Mike x3

s'all good.

[quote="SnowyCheetah"]Real-life lions see no more meaning to love than, well, sex.[/quote]

Sorry, but I have to strongly disagree to this point. ^^ While lions do not mate for life like very few creatures do, they still can form life long bonds of love with both their mates and cubs. A male lion will fight to the death to protect his pride and it's not just for the sex. ^^ It's to ensure that his genes remain and carry on to future generations and for the safety of his family. If that's not love, I don't know what is. ^^

Also, lions wouldn't necessarily attack a monkey or bird as they are not typical prey for them to hunt. While it's true that they wouldn't interact with one another on a regular basis, it's not entirely far from the truth to have the different species interacting with one another like they do. Lions do use birds as information gatherers, mostly voltures though, to know when a kill has been made.

Lastly, the minor animals in TLK could talk, as proven by the song sequences in I Just Can't Wait To Be King, as well as One Of Us. ^^ They just never spoke outside the songs because the storyline never called for such actions. Aside from the opening scenes of the movies, there weren't a lot of opportunities for the other species of animals to get a word in anyways. ^^

Adding to that, humans and dolphins are the only creatures (or maybe one more I think) that have sex for pleasure. In a way lions would see even <more> to love than humans would, rather than less.

Guess they aren't really as dominated by instinct as I thought, lol.

I remember watching all the extras on the 2 disc special edition. They said something about the way Scar was jealous of Mufasa being related to real Lions in the way that they can get some form of jealousy over stronger members of their pride. I'm no expert on Lions but that sounds plausible enough for me to believe.

I never take realism into consideration in Films / Games, as IMO the escapism from reality is why I enjoy them. Unless it's definitely supposed to be realistic (Gran Turismo for example).

[quote]All others, such as the zebras, wildebeest, etc., seem to be regular animals lacking speech and intelligent though[/quote] Although not so much in Lion King 2's exile scene.

[quote]how did they decide what was the best level of realism?[/quote]
It's called having a director and using your brain. Let's take an unrelated example: The Spiderman Films.. Whether you seen them or not it's about as realistic as me winning the lottery in the next hour, not very at all lol. But the sucess of the Films is largely thanks to the Director and his decision to give the main character social issues aswell as unrealistic powers / villains. Like girlfriend troubles, his family struggling financialy and more. It makes the story more appealing to a wider audience as now those who want fantasy fighting will be pleased and those who want a good story can also enjoy it.
The same applies to the TLK Films and the messages they send.

That is why Disney are (or more so were) consistently succesful, you have talking Lions for the kids, then you have a pretty deep story for adults and some incredible animation for just about anyone else .

aslo when two rougue lions meet on one documentary i watched it said they for a life long friendship. so lions do probaly see more in love than just sex

Stories in which animals can talk and have human-like personalities are called fables, fables have been told for years to children to teach them about real life situations and life lessons in an entertaining way