Nala's Father

[Mike]

Yeah =3 Nala's mother was never a question I think.

[WildSimba]

Unlocked upon request.

[SimbasGuard]

I am of the mind that Nala is in no way related to Simba. My personal theory (which is very similar to others in this thread) is that Sarafina was the Queen of another pride, who (being Pregnant with Nala at the time) fled when her husband was deposed and then became pat of The Pride Rock Pride. I like to think Nala was chosen to be betrothed to Simba because she was the daughter of another pride's King. Rather than just because she was the only available option.

As for what the creators said, (if memory serves me) there first response was that: They never gave any thought to who Nala's father was because they didn't think anyone would wonder.

As for them stating that Nala's father was likely to be either Mufasa or Scar, well I feel that, if they were serious. It was a very uncreative response from some very creative people.

If they were joking (a possibility which I had not considered before reading this thread). well then ha ha, but still a disturbing thought.

For those of you who feel that the creators were serious and that Nala's father was definitely Mufasa or Scar. Let me ask this hypothetical question:

If Disney were to actually make a movie (with the original creators making it) that actually explained who Nala's father was, does anyone really think they would have Nala's father be Mufasa or Scar?

I am not trying to deny anyone their opinions, I just want to provide a different way of looking at the Mufasa or Scar father of Nala theory.

[TheIvanMuse]

Let me ask this hypothetical question:

If Disney were to actually make a movie (with the original creators making it) that actually explained who Nala's father was, does anyone really think they would have Nala's father be Mufasa or Scar?

I am not trying to deny anyone their opinions, I just want to provide a different way of looking at the Mufasa or Scar father of Nala theory.

That is also a very good example as to why it's such a bad theory that Mufasa or Scar could be the father. It just doesn't make sense on too many levels.

[Misiziri]

Meh. My personal explanation is that Mufasa is a very sweet lion and Sarafina had mated with a rogue lion and left her pregnant to fend for herself, and Sarabi found her, the two became good friends, and Mufasa accepted her into the pride.

[KentuckyWildcat]

Personally, I wouldn't take that as an official statement that either Mufasa or Scar is her father. It seems like they joked about it quite a bit before spitting out some kind of answer based on the behavior of real lions. As others have already mentioned, the characters in TLK behave more like humans than real lions in several key aspects such as having a hereditary monarchy and marriage. I'm going to say that they just didn't think much about it since it wasn't too important to the story. Nala's father is pretty much up to our imaginations.

Another reason I wouldn't take that as an official confirmation is the bad publicity it could create. Could you imagine the PR nightmare if the "sex in the sky" conspiracy theorists found out that the movie's main romance was incestous?

[SimbasGuard]

Another reason I wouldn't take that as an official confirmation is the bad publicity it could create. Could you imagine the PR nightmare if the "sex in the sky" conspiracy theorists found out that the movie's main romance was incestous?

You're absolutely right, with as PR sensitive as Disney is they would never officially state something like that.

[DGFone]

But what I really find funny/ironic is that one certain scene in "Can You Feel The Love Tonight" got no bashing despite being painfully obvious for people old enough.

So even though The Lion King had a barely filtered steamy scene, other scenes were the ones that got burned and scrutinized.
Makes me wonder about the intelligence of conspiracy theorists.

But for the actual topic, I believe that Nala's father is some rogue or other lion that Sarafina met before.during her time in the Pridelands. I don't think that Mufasa or Scar mated with her, nor do I think that she's royalty from another pride.

[TheLionPrince]

Contrary to most fans' belief, the directors DID think about who is Nala's father, but hoped nobody would notice it. Brian Tiemann wrote on this website in which he asked Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff (the directors) about who is Nala's father (to which they stated it could be Mufasa or Scar). Both directors stated they "joked about this during production, tossed around some off-color gags, and eventually decided that they just "hoped nobody would notice"".

I don't know what they mean by "off-color gags", but it sounds to me that Nala's father was mentioned in the script, but was deleted like Bhati, Mheetu, Tesma, and Iggy were during production.

Now about the Mufasa or Scar being Nalas father, Tiemann mentioned Rob "muttering into his sleeve", while confirming Nala's father was "either Scar or...Mufasa." Based on that gesture of muttering into his sleeve, it tells me he doesn't sound very confident in his answer.

[KentuckyWildcat]

The thought just occured to me that maybe Scar was originally assumed to be Nala's father during production since he was originally meant to be a rogue as explained in this interview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYwlwYJFCxs&feature=related

Once he was changed to being Mufasa's brother, he couldn't officially be her father to avoid the overtones of incest, but creating a needless character just to be Nala's father probably wasn't on the agenda. I guess Nala's exact heritage is up to our imagination.