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YMMV / The Lion King (1994)

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  • Accidental Innuendo:
    • Zazu's line in "I Just Can't Wait to be King" song:
      Zazu: I've never seen a king of beasts with quite so little hair.
    • Banzai's complaint about the fact he won't "be able to sit for a week". It explains why Ed could not stop laughing.
  • Accidental Nightmare Fuel: Both versions of the crocodiles in the "I Just Can't Wait to be King" song. The original ones are just downright creepy, whereas the new ones are freakishly creepy in the manner of Jay Jay the Jet Plane.
  • Alternate Aesop Interpretation:
    • Stemming from the Fridge Brilliance/Horror, Simba starts out bragging in his song "I just can't wait to be King". But the irony here is, the only way he will ever be king at all is if his father passed away, abdicated or named him coruler (and the first would be true even if Scar didn't kill Mufasa). So there's a hidden message here that one shouldn't wish too much to grow up, especially in regards that one's parents won't be around forever.
    • Heavy is the head that wears a crown. Simba may not have wanted to return to the Pride Lands, but after his talk with Rafiki, he still went back knowing it was his duty as the rightful king.
    • Popculturebuffet brings up on in his review of the movie that there's an unintentional anti-racism aesop from Mufasa's treatment of hyenas and Scar using Mufasa's mistreatment of them to get the hyenas on his side in order to overthrow Mufasa. Thereby showing racism is, in his words, "ultimately pointless and self destructive and that hating someone just for being another race… ends up destroying you."
    • The fall of the Pride Lands under Scar's rule works as an allegory for a Green Aesop. Scar lets the hyenas overhunt everything to the point that animals leave the land and the ecosystem starts to fall apart, a parallel to recklessly exploiting natural resources until there's nothing left at all. Scar's position also contrasts Mufasa's lecture to Simba that all animals, even the lions, have a role to fill in the Circle of Life, stressing the importance of living in balance with nature and understanding your place in it.
  • Alternate Character Interpretation: Scar gives the task of killing Simba to the hyenas rather than kill Simba himself when he had the chance. Given that he was plotting to kill his nephew, he has no moral qualms about harming a child, so it seems odd he wouldn't do his own dirty work especially since he had just directly murdered his brother only moments earlier. Perhaps when it comes to children, he finds it more difficult to make himself do the killing, which would be Scar's only potential redeeming quality.
  • Alternative Joke Interpretation:
    • When Simba asks, "When I'm king, what will that make you?" and Scar responds, "A monkey's uncle." Was he calling Simba a monkey, or was he saying that it was unlikely for Simba to become king?
    • When Zazu says that Simba is getting "wildly out of wing", is it just another way of saying, "out of control" meant to rhyme with "king" in a goofy way, or is it a Hold Your Hippogriffs for "out of hand"?
    • During the "Hakuna Matata" song, Pumbaa mentions that he was downhearted and is about to rhyme it with "every time that I farted", but Timon interrupts him with "Not in front of the kids!". Some viewers have interpreted this as a fourth-wall breaking joke about the child audience, but other viewers think it refers to unseen animal kids and Simba.
    • When Zazu sees Scar talking to the mouse, he says "Didn't your mother ever tell you not to play with your food?" Is this just an indication that Zazu is a snob or is it an implication that Scar is, at heart, a Psychopathic Manchild and Zazu is making fun of him for how childish he really is?
  • And You Thought It Would Fail: During the Disney Renaissance, films that were based on either fairy tales or legends were extremely popular while those that weren't tended to flop with critics and at the box office. As such, Disney's executives put much more of their focus on Pocahontas, which was in production as the same time as The Lion King. Jeffrey Katzenberg once even remarked at a meeting with the animation staff that he believed that Pocahontas was going to be a "home run" while The Lion King was simply going to be a "base hit." The Lion King would go on to be one of the best reviewed and financially successful animated films of all time while Pocahontas opened to mixed reviews and is often regarded as the start of the Disney Renaissance's decline.
  • Anvilicious: Don't run away from your problems. Learn from your mistakes.
    Simba: I know what I have to do, but going back means I'll have to face my past. I've been running from it for so long.
    *Rafiki hits Simba over the head with his stave*
    Simba: OW! Jeez, what was that for?!
    Rafiki: It doesn't matter! It's in the past!
    Simba: Yeah, but it still hurts.
    Rafiki: Oh yes, the past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it, or... learn from it.
  • Award Snub:
    • After Beauty and the Beast was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, many fans felt this was definitely deserving of at least the same, if not winning it outright (despite a very cramped list of worthy selections that year, including ultimate winner Forrest Gump).
    • It's arguable as to whether or not Jeremy Irons should've won the MTV Best Villain award over Dennis Hopper for Speed.
  • Badass Decay: Scar suffers from this when he becomes King. Gone is the charismatic manipulative schemer of the story's first half, replaced in the final half with a far less intelligent, spoiled brat of a tyrant instead. His laziness and self-indulgence alienated any potential followers, and his taunting of Simba during the final battle leads to him confessing to Mufasa's murder, giving his nephew and the lionesses the determination needed to turn the tables on him.
  • Base-Breaking Character:
    • Adult Simba. Opinions are divided into three camps: he's either a likable, sympathetic protagonist; the least interesting character of the movienote ; or a jerk who was willing to let everyone starve until Rafiki, Nala, and Mufasa forced him to fight Scar.
    • Timon and Pumbaa are either hilarious comic relief characters who provided a welcome moment of levity after a very serious scene or annoying characters who overtake the movie and aren't funny. It didn't help that outside of Young Simba, they were the most aggressively marketed characters of the entire movie.
    • Scar is considered either one of the best, if not the best, Disney villain with a malicious song or an annoying Manchild who acted in the most blatantly immature way after he took the role of the king. Generally, his haters can't understand why he is so praised and argue that other antagonists in Disney films had done a better job at being evil. However while many of his fans ignore his behavior in the second half of the movie some actually think his immaturity makes him a more interesting character as it shows he's a reflection of what Simba could have become.
  • Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
    • The "I Just Can't Wait to be King" scene (which also counts as a Disney Acid Sequence) and the scene where Timon does the hula. Justified in that they were both meant to be distractions. The first one does get a brief callback later during Simba and Nala's reunion.
    • The "When I was a young warthog" bit. It comes out of nowhere and is instantly forgotten once Timon stops Pumbaa from making a Precision Fart Strike. Timon was originally planned to have a verse going into his backstory as well, but it was cut for time.
  • Broken Aesop: Rafiki's message of "the past can hurt, but you can either run from it or learn from it" is broken by the narrative. Simba tries to confront his fears, but his fears start to win when Scar again puts the blame on Simba for causing his father's death, and Simba starts to doubt himself again. The other lions start doubting him too. It's only when Scar has Simba in a situation where he will probably die that he confesses that he was the actual murderer. This gives Simba the confidence to finally defeat Scar and when he does this, all the others finally accept him in their midst. Of course, had Simba never tried facing his past, he would have never learned the truth, and Scar would still be king.
  • Catharsis Factor: After Scar killed Mufasa and caused famine upon the Pride Lands for an unknown number of years, watching the hyenas he tried to throw under the bus gang up on and eat him alive (with him desperately trying to talk his way out of his situation) is an immensely satisfying sight to behold.
  • Common Knowledge: In regards to the relation between Kimba the White Lion and The Lion King, there are several unverified rumours of uncertain origin which have entrenched themselves into the conversation across the years, but nowadays they've all been debunked.note  These include:
    • "The stories of the two properties are essentially the same." Kimba is an episodic show with weekly self-contained plots and a rotating cast of characters, and fairly little in the way of an overarching story. Beyond the premise of a lion prince whose father has been killed (by humans in Kimba, by an animal relative in The Lion King), the two share few similarities in plot.
    • "Disney was in talks of doing a western animated adaptation of Kimba before mangaka Osamu Tezuka's death." No source for this claim has been produced, and some who repeat it list a year after Tezuka's passing as when the negotiations were supposed to have taken place.
    • "Matthew Broderick was initially told he'd be voicing Kimba when he hired as a voice actor." In the interview where he discusses the topic, Broderick puts the blame on himself, saying that he thought the movie would be based on the Kimba show he'd seen as a child, based on a misunderstanding on his own part.
    • The names Kimba and Simba are way too similar to be just a coincidence... except for the fact that "Simba" means "Lion" in Swahili. Kimba in turn comes from the same word, but the S was changed to K to make the character more marketable.
    • Some scenes and characters in Kimba are similar to those in The Lion King, but out of context the scenes are completely unrelated while the characters' similarities often stops at being the same species. Not to mention the screenshots are mixed in from both the 60s anime and the 90s films the latter which was released years after Lion King.
  • Complete Monster: Scar is the envious younger brother of King Mufasa who, upon losing his position as next in line to the throne by the birth of his nephew Simba, sought to take it by force. First tricking the young Simba and his friend Nala into entering the Elephant Graveyard to be killed by his hyena henchmen, Scar next orchestrates a wildebeest stampede and tosses Mufasa to his death after he attempts to rescue his son. Blaming a grief-stricken Simba for his father's murder, Scar forces him into exile before commanding the hyenas to finish him off. Upon taking control, Scar's incompetence as king leads to a famine, with Scar uncaring that he is sentencing everyone to death, even striking Mufasa's widow Sarabi unconscious when she criticizes his rule. Upon Simba's return, Scar takes advantage of Simba's lingering guilt over his father's death to attempt to execute him publicly, pausing only to mockingly reveal his role in Mufasa's death. Later, to save his own life, he attempts to foist the blame on his hyena henchmen before attempting to kill Simba, even after the latter spares his life.
  • Creepy Cute: Even though they're scheming during the scene, there's something almost innocently adorable about the hyenas during "Be Prepared", especially as they dance and jump around... underneath all the creepy glowing eyes and goose stepping, obviously.
  • Covered Up: Not a lot of people are aware that "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" existed for over thirty years before this movie came out with Timon and Pumbaa singing the song.
  • Crossover Ship: Scar tends to get paired with Shere Khan a lot.
  • Diagnosed by the Audience: Ed's eyes are always crossed, his only dialogue consists of obnoxious laughter (often at inappropriate times), and he's seen chewing on his own leg after fighting with Banzai. This suggests some form of mental impairment.
  • Do Not Do This Cool Thing: The song "Hakuna Matata", rather like "The Bare Necessities" in The Jungle Book, does a very good job of making a slacker life with no responsibilities seem like a fun and wonderful thing to adopt. Granted, that is kind of its point in-story (to offer Simba something so attractive it would make him get over his suicidal depression and forget the things that traumatized him), but the upshot is that the song's message and popularity make it pretty easy to forget that what it's endorsing is actually a bad thing (at least, if taken to the extremes Timon advises and Simba nearly loses himself in).
  • Evil Is Cool: Scar. His voice is cool, his design is cool, his Villain Song is cool, he's one of the few Disney villains to commit murder on-screen and actually succeed in his plans - even if it doesn't last, and he's also an awesome fighter. He's a fan-favorite among the Disney villains, and one of the few who can give Maleficent a run for her money in terms of popularity.
  • Fandom-Enraging Misconception:
    • Referring to the film as a rip-off of Kimba the White Lion is not going to end well, as this notion has been repeatedly debunked. Not only do the two franchises have little in common, but most examples used as "proof" that The Lion King copied Kimba come from the 1997 Kimba movie, which The Lion King predates by three years.
    • To a lesser extent, some fans will get frustrated at you if you just state that the Lion King is a direct adaptation of Hamlet. You'd also get in trouble if you try to argue that it has nothing to do with Hamlet or William Shakespeare. The general consensus is that the film is a loose adaptation of Hamlet, and also throws in concepts from The Bard's other tragedies (Macbeth being a commonly cited example)
  • Fanon: Has its own page.
  • Genius Bonus:
    • With the "Circle of Life" monologue, Mufasa taught many of us the concept of homeostasis.
    • While calling it "genius" might be an exaggeration (it's second grade science), Mufasa's technically right about bodies becoming the grass when they die (albeit indirectly, through decomposition).
    • Simba's becoming the Lion King signaling the rains to come might seem a bit far-fetched, but it's only a slight exaggerations of the infamous real life Disaster Dominoes Yellowstone Wolf experiment, which illustrated why keystone species are so important to an ecosystem.
  • He Really Can Act:
    • In the 90s, no one really took Jonathan Taylor Thomas seriously as an actor. He was no more than a tween heartthrob with his only notable role as Randy on Home Improvement. Surprisingly, he does a great job voicing young Simba, especially during Mufasa's death.
    • Rowan Atkinson, who voices Zazu. Despite being known for deadpan comedy and slapstick comedy, he has surprisingly shown that he can pull off some good dramatic, serious acting chops, especially in how he conveys Zazu's distress during the stampede scene.
  • Harsher in Hindsight:
    • In the climax of the film, Simba tells Scar that he has put Mufasa's death behind him. While it's meant to be a Shut Up, Hannibal! moment, the sequel shows that Simba never really did manage to put the trauma behind him, and it results in him coming dangerously close to turning into a villain himself before he finally does manage to put it behind him thanks to Kiara.
    • Simba's and Scar's If You Kill Him, You Will Be Just Like Him! encounter is even more chilling in light of The Lion Guard, where the spirit of Scar regularly tortures Simba's son with the fear of becoming just like his great uncle. Scar may have lost this fight, but, in a way, he still got his Revenge by Proxy on Simba years later by almost corrupting his son.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Ho Yay: Timon and Pumbaa become huge Ho Yay targets during the film and the future appearances they would make afterwards. First off, they are mostly seen together. They also live together and travel together wherever they go. They also decide to raise a child together with that child being the lion cub Simba. This also may not count due to it not making it through the final cut of the film, but a deleted scene was supposed to have Pumbaa snuggling up next to Timon with Timon feeling a bit uncomfortable about it. For what it's worth, their actors consider them a gay couple. It also helps that the original script had Simba being taken in by a family of meerkats including Timon's wife, who were all then replaced with Pumbaa.
  • Hype Backlash: The film still holds a spot amongst the highest grossing films of all time and is well-regarded by most, often a contender for Disney's best animated movie, which says a lot. It's natural that some people are taken off by all this praise and consider the movie overhyped.
  • It Was His Sled: Scar kills Mufasa.
  • Jerkass Woobie: The hyenas. As much as they worked for Scar it was more out of desperation for food and being too stupid to realize that Scar was only using them. And once Scar achieved his goals and proved a terrible leader, they realize their lives have barely improved. It doesn't excuse their villainy, but it makes them fairly pitiful.
  • Like You Would Really Do It: After murdering Mufasa, Scar sends the hyenas after Simba. The hyenas refuse to venture into the thornbushes as Simba escapes through them, so they decide to let him go, assuming he'll die in the desert, and kill him if he returns to the Pridelands.
  • Love to Hate: Scar is a contender for Disney's most popular villain due to his delightfully dastardly demeanor in addition to striking acts of evil. That's not getting into Jeremy Irons giving the role his all in a charismatic, yet vile performance.
  • Mandela Effect: Several fans firmly believe that when they first saw the film in 1994, Simba and Nala had twin cubs at the end, not just one. Most likely they're thinking of the similar Babies Ever After ending of Bambi, which does feature twin fawns, or they could've mixed it up with The Lion Guard, where Simba and Nala had Kion when Kiara herself was a cub.
  • Memetic Mutation: Here come the memes, Father! Oh yes, it's the memes...
  • Moral Event Horizon: Scar when he kills Mufasa, which provides the image for the trope's Disney page. The next notch up is when he tells Simba his father's death is because of him, further traumatizing a kid who has just lost his father. Even worse, he planned for Simba to die in the stampede as well.
  • Most Wonderful Sound: Mufasa's voice. Hands down.

    N-Z 
  • Narm Charm: The movie is generally overblown most of the time, but the images of Mufasa in the sky were just ridiculously cheesy and goofy, especially in the sequel. Others got a bit choked up, considering what a Tear Jerker both his death in the first film and his benediction to Simba when he took the throne were. In fact, the producers had thought about removing them for those reasons, before deciding to leave it in.
  • Never Live It Down: Scar throwing a temper tantrum when Zazu says Mufasa's name and saying "I am the king, I can do whatever I want" as both are extremely childish things for someone his age to do and it makes most people realize how immature he really is underneath that charming facade. However to some it actually makes him more interesting while, to others, it makes him less of a threat.
  • Newer Than They Think: The 2003 Platinum Edition release added a new song, "The Morning Report". Some viewers saw this as a case of Disney restoring a Cut Song originally intended for the film.note  However, the insert and sheet music for the Original Broadway Cast recording list a 1997 copyright date for "The Morning Report", three years after the theatrical release. On releases of the movie that relegate "The Morning Report" to the bonus features, the song has an introduction explaining that John and Rice wrote it especially for the Broadway musical.
  • Older Than They Think:
    • There are two lion brothers. One's the king, and his envious, childish brother, resentful of him, manages to get him out of the throne, so he can claim it himself. After he does, things go downhill, making everyone hate him. Sound familiar with Disney before this movie?
    • The part about a lion prince trying to do a proper roar (and failing to even scare vermin) is similar to a 1956 short titled "Lion in the Roar".
    • "Simba"'s name just means "lion". It is probably not going to be used much anymore, but prior to the film's release it wasn't uncommon to see lions in fiction with this name. For example, the 80s cartoon Jem had one episode featuring a lion named "Simba" . The same situation also popped up in an episode of the original Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, dating it all the way back to the late 60s.
    • While Toy Story is often credited as starting the shift towards animated films having the main characters voiced by A-list actors, with full-time voice actors largely limited to voicing supporting characters, this film actually beat it to the punch on that count by over a year — and in turn, both this and Toy Story were really building on what had begin with Aladdin, where the two most well-remembered characters, the Genie and Iago, were voiced by actors (Robin Williams and Gilbert Gottfried respectively) best-known for their live action roles.
  • Popular with Furries: The franchise is one of Disney's biggest fandoms and has a huge following amongst furries, particularly lion and hyena furs, despite almost none of the characters being anthro. During the formative years of the furry fandom in the 90s the film was even a staple, and it was often assumed that every lion OC was a Lion King fan-character.
  • Questionable Casting: Skinny, nerdy-sounding actor Matthew Broderick as a lion can seem like an odd fit. To some, though, he actually did well with the part despite this, while to others, he's the weakest actor in the film (especially given his arguably facepalm-inducing line reading during the "I killed Mufasa" scene).
  • Recurring Fanon Character: Tanabi, the name used for Simba and Nala's son that was popularized in the fanfiction Chronicles Of The Pride Lands, written before the release of the sequel, which showed the cub at the end to be a daughter instead. He went on to be used in many more fanfics despite the sequel, due to inconsistencies between the depiction of the cub presented at the end of the first movie and baby Kiara's presentation in the second, often shown to be a lost, killed, or kidnapped son who might later return, but gradually fell out of favor as more people found out about Kopa, the son of Simba and Nala who actually appeared in Expanded Universe books The Lion King: Six New Adventures, though some people just included them both. This also isn't getting into the much later advent of Kion.
  • Retroactive Recognition:
  • Signature Scene:
    • The opening "Circle of Life" sequence where Rafiki blesses the newborn Simba and presents the future king to his assembled subjects. So iconic that the 2019 remake made sure to duplicate it shot for shot.
    • The Villain Song "Be Prepared", featuring pyrotechnic effects that were mind-blowing to see in animation at the time, and widely considered one of the best of its kind in Disney history.
    • The wildebeest stampede, which initially got a lot of press for featuring an unprecedented amount of CGI a year before Toy Story really showed what could be done with it, but quickly became hugely regarded for its emotional impact, both the Nightmare Fuel of the stampede itself and the Tear Jerker of Mufasa's death.
    • The "Hakuna Matata" music number is famous for introducing Timon and Pumbaa, two of the film's most popular characters, providing a much-appreciated lighter mood after the stampede, and featuring a tremendous earworm that provides its own important story progression with the montage of Simba growing to adulthood halfway through. Additionally, the seven-second scene of Adult Simba climbing out of the water and vigorously shaking his mane dry for its memetic images involving hair and its amusing combination of Rule of Funny and Rule of Sexy.
    • Simba talking to Mufasa's spirit in the clouds, who convinces him to take back his responsibility to rule Pride Rock, which probably more than any other scene has been subjected to countless parodies without losing any of its original power.
    • Simba and Scar's climactic slow-motion duel, one of the few times that a Disney hero and villain get to have a real knock-down, drag-out fight, and fully living up to the entire film building up to it.
    • Simba's ascent in the rain, combined with the instrumental "King of Pride Rock" (which is also part of the Simba-Scar duel) at its most rising and triumphant. A mostly dialogue-less scene, yet considered the other emotional powerhouse moment of the movie (after Mufasa's death).
  • Signature Song: "Hakuna Matata" is currently the most famous song from the movie, but "Circle of Life" and "Can You Feel The Love Tonight" are well remembered as well. All three were nominated for the 1994 Academy Award for Best Original Song, with "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" winning it. As for the movie's score, Mufasa's haunting, majestic theme "This Land" serves as the main instrumental theme of the film.
  • Spiritual Successor: Scar is basically a more serious and competent version of Prince John from Robin Hood. Like John he's an effeminate lion whose jealous of his brother's success as king and finds a way to take over the throne. Also, like John, they are both overgrown cubs who care more about the power of being king than doing anything worthwhile with the power and constantly throw temper tantrums whenever things go badly for them.
  • Squick: In one deleted scene, Scar wanted to have a family and he tries to force Nala to be his Queen. Just remember that Nala was a young cub while Scar was a full grown adult.
  • Strangled by the Red String: Simba's and Nala's romance as adults blossoms in around 5 minutes, even though they initially attacked each other (although they didn't recognize each other then) and Simba outright states that he doesn't want to marry her when he was a cub. While seeing her grown up might have caused him to change his mind, the movie never really gives a clear explanation of where these sudden feelings come from.
  • Superlative Dubbing:
    • Timon and Pumbaa seem to have less of a Base-Breaking Character status in certain other countries (some examples being the French, Norwegian and Polish dub) as people have noted their voices to be "more enjoyable" than the English.
    • The German dub is superbly cast (Thomas Fritsch as Scar, Joachim Kemmer as Rafiki, Eberhard Prüter as Zazu and Ilja Richter as Timon are notable standouts), and the songs are very well translated.
    • Timon and Pumbaa are absolutely adored in the Swedish dub, courtesy of being voiced by two guys part of a famous national comedy group named "Galenskaparna & After Shave".note  In fact, when Timon's VA died in 1997, most of the Swedish-speaking fandom would never accept The Other Darrin as the true Timon. Frank Ådahl is also considered a more fitting VA for Adult!Simba than the original. Lest Scar should be mentioned, being voiced by the late Rikard Wolff; many Swedes agree that he couldn't be more perfectly cast even if you tried.
    • In general: for people who don't care for Matthew Broderick's voice, many will find a lot of Adult!Simba's dub voices to be superior to the original.
    • The Norwegian dub is also highly beloved for using an All-Star Cast with incredibly fitting voices, the crowner going to young Simba voiced by Eirik Espolin Johnson, adult Simba being voiced by seasoned voice actor Håvard Bakke, and Timon by famous comedian Åsleik Engmark.
    • The Hebrew dub is considered among Israelis to be one of the best of Disney's Hebrew dubs. Timon's VA, comedian Tomer Sharon AKA Tomash, is especially lauded by fans young and old. For his part, Tomash has embraced the role, even admitting he's similar to Timon himself. Another VA universally lauded by Israelis for his role in the Hebrew dub is Eli Gorenstein as Scar, who voiced many Disney villains with his distinct baritone.
  • Sweetness Aversion:
    • Cub Simba and Nala can come across as too cute to some. Simba's Mouthy Kid and slight Royal Brat tendencies help balance the cuteness, though, as does Nala's skill at sassing back at him.
    • "Can You Feel the Love Tonight?" is especially egregious, since the song was initially meant to be comedic, until Elton John stepped in and turned it into a more straightforward love ballad. The end result was a song and sequence which some consider so cheesy that even the schmaltziest person might want to gag. Again, though, the liveliness and playfulness of Simba and Nala's interactions during the song help to balance this, especially in the funny moment when Simba pulls Nala into the freezing cold water.
  • They Copied It, So It Sucks!: There used to be a lot of much controversy over whether this film is a rip-off of Kimba the White Lion or not. However, animation and manga historians have debunked this claim and every "proof" that The Lion King copied Kimba, showing that, instead, later installments of Kimba have taken some inspiration from this movie.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
    • Sarabi is relatively underutilized despite being The High Queen of Pride Rock. Her character is a voiceless cameo in the sequels, though sadly that was because Madge Sinclair had passed away by that point.
    • Zazu could have been a well-written and sympathetic character, but he spends pretty much the entire movie as a Butt-Monkey.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Simba's years growing up in the Jungle with Timon and Pumbaa is entirely glossed over, although The Lion King 1 ½ does touch upon this by showing him being raised by Timon and Pumbaa.
  • Tough Act to Follow: This movie was the tough act the rest of the Disney Renaissance had to follow. It most notably affected Pocahontas, which is the only Disney Renaissance film to be graded Rotten on Rotten Tomatoes, and Hercules, which got strong reviews but a relatively paltry take at the box office (and earned a lot of hatred in Greece). The closest ones that debatably came close to reaching this film's fame, praise and legacy were The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Mulan and Tarzan.
  • Unconventional Learning Experience: How many 1990s kids knew about African fauna such as meerkats, hornbills, wildebeests, and hyenas before this movie?
  • Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Crossing into What Do You Mean, It's Not Political? below - a number of critics, professional and otherwise, note that the movie's attempted aversion of Predators Are Mean creates a system of government literally built on killing and otherwise exploiting equally sentient creatures by having the predators continue to prey on other animals. Mufasa's "Circle of Life" speech is meant to assuage such implications, but it's not hard to see that as cold comfort to the gazelle or wildebeest who winds up on the lions' menu for no other reason than circumstance of birth. And of course, some critics take it a step further and use the whole movie as proof (or scorn it as denial) that any and all exploitative systems of government (capitalism, monarchy, etc.) are inherently bad even if a "good" leader is in charge.
  • Values Dissonance: A minor but very obvious example; during the "Hakuna Matata" musical number, Timon prevents Pumbaa from saying the word "farted", telling him, "Not in front of the kids!", implying that it would be inappropriate for children to hear. Nowadays, explicit references to farting are not shocking to hear in a kids' movie at all. The remake actually cracks on this, with Pumbaa getting to say "farted", and then asking Timon in confusion if he's going to stop him. Jon Favreau outright said that, by 2019, kids have heard worse than "farted".
  • Viewer Gender Confusion: Lots of viewers have mistaken Shenzi for a guy, which is rather hilarious when you consider how real female hyenas are near-identical to the males for very strange reasons.
  • What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?: Some have argued that the movie supports a fascist/social darwinist ideology, since it upholds a world in which every animal has a "proper place" in the hierarchy of society, which is biologically determined by their species.
  • What Do You Mean, It's Not Symbolic?: In a Film Theory video about whether or not Scar ate Mufasa (he didn't), MatPat purposes the idea that the reasons the Pride Lands fell into disarray wasn't due to overhunting but because Mufasa died outside the Pride Lands and was unable to play his role in the Circle of Life ("we become the grass"), and that it was only with Scar's death fulfilling the role of the king dying within his kingdom that balance was able to be restored.
  • The Woobie: Being darker and more tragic than most Disney films, it’s not surprising that there are several.
    • Main character Simba. As a child, his father is murdered by his uncle, who makes him think it was his own fault.
    • Mufasa is betrayed and murdered by his own brother, whom he trusted implicitly.
    • Nala’s best and possibly only friend runs away from home after his father is killed, leaving her as the only cub in the pride; she subsequently grows up under Scar's despotic rule.
    • Sarabi’s husband is murdered and she’s forced (albeit, unknowingly so) to serve the guy who did it. For years, she believes her son to be dead too.
  • Woolseyism:
    • The DVD Commentary talks about a Japanese Woolseyism they didn't even realize they had made at first. Specifically, the commentators mention that they got no reaction at all from the first Japanese audience they showed the film to, up until just before Mufasa's evening talk with Simba where Zazu says "Simba... Good luck," which brought down the house. Upon asking about it afterward, they learned that "Good luck" is something Japanese people often say to each other when they're about to go get reprimanded, which they unwittingly paralleled with the scene.
    • In both the European and Latin-American Spanish dubs. In the scene where Banzai is kicked in the rib cage by Shenzi before he mentions Mufasa again. In the original English, he says "¿Qué pasa?", a Spanish line that means "What's up?". In the Spanish dubs, the line was dubbed as "¿Con mostaza?" which means "With mustard?". This was likely done because of phonetic similarities, but since this comes right after Scar jokes about the hyenas eating Zazu, it fits the scene perfectly (the Latin American dub also uses the same wordplay). Likewise in the German dub he says "Mit Wasser?"note  which sounds pretty similar to "Qué pasa". In the Polish version, Banzai says "Kiełbasa" note , which is pronounced "Kieubasa" and sound phonetically similar to the original.
    • In the original English version, when Rafiki first starts bothering Simba, Simba simply calls him a "creepy little monkey." In the German dub, his line is Was soll denn das Affentheater? Idiomatically this translates as "What's with the crazy antics?", but Affentheater, which means "farce" or "craziness," translates as "monkey theater." In essence, not only is he saying Rafiki's crazy, but it's a clever Stealth Pun on his species. (A similar English pun could've been, "Will you quit with the monkey business?")
    • In the Latin-American Spanish dub, during the final duel between Simba and Scar, Simba's voice became much deeper and creepier, compared how his voice sounds in the original English version, when he speaks louder than usual, and how he normally sounds before that battle in that dub, probably to emphasize he's going to kill Scar for good this time.
      • In the Japanese dub of the same scene, Simba uses kisama on Scar for the same effect, while his voice tone goes between the English version (louder) and the Mexican one (deeper). Oddly enough, Scar doesn't use kisama on Simba, despite being the main villain and the one who wants to see Simba dead more than anyone else.
    • Also, in the Japanese dub, Scar speaks with a thick French accent in his voice, not to mention he uses sometimes adieu rather than sayonara, possibly to simulate Scar's British accent.
    • In the Latin-American Spanish dub, Pumbaa's famous THEY CALL ME MR. PIG! was changed with ¡YO SOY UN CERDO DECENTE, NO SOY UN PUERCO! (literally: "I'm a decent PIG, not some HOG" or more idiomatically, replace "hog" with "stinky pig"). As a matter of fact, "puerco" is also a very old Spanish slang for a Jew converted to Christianity. It also means that Pumbaa got offended with him being compared with his more smelly, domestic cousins, being a wild warthog.

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