Review: Mufasa: The Lion King answers all the questions no one was asking

2024 has been a good year for Disney. They've churned out a number of huge hits, filled their coffers with little creative effort, and effectively rebounded from a staggeringly underwhelming 2023. But for those of us who are on the receiving ends of Disney's theatrical output, this year has been brutal. These hits have largely been regurgitated nostalgia, shoving familiar faces onto our screens, telling the same stories with slight variations, creating new merchandising opportunities at every turn. Inside Out 2 and Moana 2 basically told the same stories as their predecessors. Deadpool & Wolverine was more a parade of cameos than anything resembling a movie. And now we have a curious capper to the Mouse House's year: Barry Jenkins' Mufasa: The Lion King, a prequel to the "live-action" retelling of the 90s classic that shows how Mufasa became the king of the Pridelands. Since, you know, we were all wondering.

Which is a problem every prequel has to grapple with. So often, prequels are chiefly concerned with answering questions that no one was asking. It ends up feeling so baldly like a money-grab that it's hard for anyone to pretend that it's anything else. I definitely felt that way here. Mufasa offers up answers to questions like "How did Rafiki get his staff?" (it broke off of a tree) and "How did Pride Rock form?" (earthquake, duh). Most maddeningly, the film's chief question is "How did Mufasa and Scar meet?" It's a bizarre premise, since I just took it at face value that they were brothers. Maybe there's some animal kingdom reason there couldn't be two male lions in the same pride, but like...this was an animated musical spin on Hamlet. It's okay if there's a little fudging of biological fact along the way.

And yes, despite what Disney may say, this is an animated movie. Just like 2019's The Lion King was. I don't know why they want to pretend otherwise. Maybe they don't want the movie to stand in the way of a potential Oscar win for one of their other movies (hopefully not happening this year, anyway). Maybe they think the movie being live-action makes it more prestigious or accessible to audiences. I really don't know. But what I do know is that for the two hours I was watching this movie, I was looking at animation. Very impressive animation that looks ultra-realistic a lot of the time, but animation, nonetheless. It's weird that a studio that builds so much of its business on the backs of animated movies still sometimes treats animation like it's a dirty word, somehow less worthy, but I guess that's just always going to be the case in Hollywood. It's lame.

Even lamer than the bizarre exercise that is Mufasa. When Barry Jenkins was brought on as director, my interest was certainly piqued. He's a true auteur, a thoughtful and empathetic filmmaker, a master storyteller. So if he was willing to take a step back from his usual fare, I was expecting something special, a blockbuster with more soul than we expect from the usual Disney rehashings of their storied vault.

Sadly, that just isn't the case here. I don't know that I really felt Jenkins' fingerprints on this at all. Which I honestly don't even blame him for. How can you get your voice through when you're trying to tell a story with photo-real animals that can barely emote? It feels like such an exercise in futility, like something anyone would fail at. I kept staring slack-jawed at the screen, wondering why this story was being told, and why Jenkins was the one telling it. It feels like such a waste of time for all involved: the studio (it's barely making money), the filmmakers (who could have been making better, more interesting movies), and for audiences (Jesus, I chose to see this before Babygirl or Noseferatu? Okay, that one's on me).

The gist of this is that Rafiki, while babysitting Simba and Nala's daughter along with Timon and Pumbaa, regales the cub with the story of her grandfather. Every once in a while, we pop back to the cave where this frame is taking place, which provides some welcome bursts of comedic relief in an otherwise pretty joyless movie. Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen steal the show as Timon and Pumbaa, providing some fun color commentary that often veers into the meta, referencing legal threats and the Broadway show. The humor feels little weird in the context of the film -- more in line with Lion King 1 1/2 -- but at least it mostly lands. It was a smart move by the filmmakers to find a way to include this lovable duo, since they couldn't otherwise be shoehorned into the story.

Mufasa's tale is a pretty bland one. He gets swept away by a flood, taken in (reluctantly) by a pride of lions, and becomes brothers with Taka (who, of course, becomes Scar). A dangerous group of outsider lions causes havoc, which leads the two brothers on a journey to a sort of promised land. Along the way, they meet up with some other familiar faces who help along the way. It is very dull.

There is some added pep provided by the soundtrack, particularly the songs by Lin-Manuel Miranda. It isn't his finest film work -- some of the songs are pretty forgettable, including the villain song "Bye Bye" (yes, really) -- but they all at least break up the monotony of watching a bunch of lions walk through various brown-gray landscapes. My favorite, by far, is the clunkily titled "I Always Wanted a Brother," which is a true banger and maybe the song where you most hear Miranda (it sounded a bit similar to his work in Vivo). I thought it was funny how much the movie was edging with its clear desire to use "He Lives in You" from the Broadway show, but never actually did. Instead, the characters just say that phrase like five different times.

But there's a bigger issue with the songs, which is how do you craft exciting choreography with realistic-looking animals? The simple answer is: you don't. It's one of the many problems that is just baked into the conceit of making a movie like this. All these animals can do is move around like animals actually do, barely emote, and yeah, that's all there is. It's also an issue when trying to differentiate between certain characters. One lioness isn't going to look vary different from the next, so there were times, including a scene toward the end that I imagine was intended to provide some emotional impact, where I was like, "I'm assuming that's _____" It's just...so soulless, such a stupid exercise. 

And ultimately, that's really what this feels like, just like its predecessor did, and even just like The Jungle Book remake did (but to a lesser extent, maybe because it came first, and was pretty good). This feels so much more like a showcase for impressive CGI rather than a heartfelt artistic exercise, a tech demo rather than a story. 

I fear Disney is going to take the wrong lessons from this film being a failure. Instead of realizing that audiences want movies that tell original stories, that have heart, that tread new ground, they're probably going to think "Oh, audiences don't want original stories. They only want 1:1 remakes of our IP. Everything is content that must be regurgitated over and over again with as little variance as possible!" I pray they're wrong. I hope they figure out a path forward that features more originality, more excitement. But as long as junk like Deadpool & Wolverine and Moana 2 keeps raking in the big bucks, I can't say I expect any sort of course correction anytime soon. In the eyes of Bob Iger and the precious shareholders, there's no correction needed.