The Wildebeests are minor characters in The Lion King franchise. Unlike the other characters of the film, they appear a little more than just non-communicative animals.
Appearances
The Lion King
Wildebeest are first shown in the song "Circle of Life", heading towards Pride Rock for Simba's ceremonial presentation. Later in the film, Scar has Simba placed near some shade on top of Wildebeest Valley and tells him to "work on his little roar". Then, in the movie's most iconic and tragic scene, Shenzi, Banzai, and Ed are near a wildebeest herd waiting for Scar's signal to chase the herd into the gorge, which is part of Scar's plot to kill Mufasa and Simba. Shenzi, Banzai, and Ed attack an ill wildebeest upon Scar's signal, thus triggering the stampede (Banzai, being the hungry one that he is, is about to kill one prematurely, until Shenzi stops him and tells him to await Scar's signal shortly before Scar arrives). Meanwhile, Simba practices his roar on a small chameleon, which eventually scares it off, and notices a massive wildebeest stampede hurling toward him. The wildebeest stampede chases Simba deeper and deeper into the gorge, while Zazu and Mufasa take notice of the stampede and Scar informs them that Simba is in the stampede. The two lions run toward the stampede and encounter Simba dangling on a dead tree, crying for help. Mufasa saves Simba in time, and places him near a ledge while Mufasa struggles to save himself.
Luckily, Mufasa jumps from the stampede onto a cliff and climbs up. On top of the cliff, Mufasa requests Scar's help, but Scar latches his paws onto his older brother's paws and releases them sending Mufasa to die in the stampede. Watching the final moments of his father, Simba climbs down the cliff and searches for his father. Simba later hears an approaching wildebeest which it leads him to locate his father's corpse, to his complete sadness with tears in his eyes. Finally, some wildebeest are also later shown after Scar was killed by the hyenas and the Pride Lands are revived when Simba becomes the king.
The Lion King II: Simba's Pride
A mother wildebeest is shown during "We Are One", assisting her calf on how to walk. The young calf eventually begins to sprint and run, but its mother prevented her calf from running too far. The wildebeest that were part of the stampede that took place in the first film also appeared during Simba's nightmare, where he tries to save Mufasa from falling into the stampede, but is stopped by Scar, who turns into Kovu and throws Simba into the stampede after Mufasa.
Some wildebeest later briefly appeared when Simba exiles Kovu, driving him away from the Pride Lands along with the rest of the animals during the song, "Not One of Us".
The Lion King 1½
When Timon and Pumbaa choose the gorge as their dream home, Timon complains about the gorge's searing heat, and the two friends notices a wildebeest stampede racing down from the gorge. The two friends decide to run away, and eventually during the stampede, they land on a wildebeest's bare back until Timon notices the wildebeest heading toward a cliff. The wildebeest halts at the edge, and drops Timon and Pumbaa. They fall into a river (which they notice later on led to a waterfall), while a wildebeest herd is shown in the background grazing in the grass.
Timon & Pumbaa
One appears multiple times in the episode "Cooked Goose". Another named Herman had a prominent role in "Beauty and the Wildebeest". Unlike the other wildebeest, this one appears to have the ability of speech.
The Lion King (2019)
Wildebeests are first seen along with the other animals attending Simba's presentation during the musical number "Circle of Life". They later appear in the background during the musical number "I Just Can't Wait to Be King". A notable difference is that during the gorge scene, wildebeests do not appear until Simba roars at a harmless chameleon because of Scar prompting him to roar like an adult lion. After a while, dozens of wildebeests begin stampeding across the gorge where the hyenas chase them but they fail to catch one. One scene shown in this film is where Simba hides behind a rock to avoid getting trampled by the wildebeests whereas in the original version, this did not occur. Later when Zazu arrives on the dead tree Simba is clinging on to avoid getting trampled, he tells Simba that Mufasa is coming to rescue him from the stampede. Mufasa then arrives and tells Simba to jump on him before the branch snaps. One of the wildebeests is then seen pushing the dead tree with Mufasa telling Simba to jump. After putting Simba to safety, Mufasa gets hit by one of them as Simba watches his father trying to seek for help. Like in the animated film, Mufasa has trouble escaping the stampede and tries to ask Scar for help, but he refuses to. Scar then decides not to help Mufasa, leaving him to fall to his death on the stampeding wildebeests. One last wildebeest is seen running across the gorge while Simba tries to look for Mufasa only to find him lying dead due to the fact that Mufasa got run over by their hard hooves.
Wildebeests are also seen briefly during the part where Scar is overhunting for more food when the Pride Lands are turned into a deserted wasteland, causing tyrannical destruction towards the Pride Lands. After Scar's death, wildebeests later appear returning to Pride Rock after Simba becomes king with the Pride Lands revived.
Video games
Kingdom Hearts II
The wildebeest makes a brief appearance on the first visit to Pride Rock, which shows Scar murdering Mufasa as he did in the movie before it shifts to the arrival of Sora, Donald and Goofy at the present day.
Gallery
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Trivia
- For the stampede, several distinct wildebeest characters were created in a 3D computer program, multiplied into hundreds, cel shaded to look like drawn animation, and given randomized paths down a mountainside to simulate the real, unpredictable movement of a herd. The whole process took almost three years to complete.
- In the first film, the wildebeests stampede to the right when Mufasa falls to his death. In the second film, during Simba's nightmare, they stampede to the left.
- The Wildebeests were mentioned in the 1999 Disney animated feature film Tarzan by Clayton saying his story about his safari in Zambezi. The Wildebeests then made their appearance in the 2005 midquel Tarzan II.
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