When The Lion King appeared over twenty years ago, the film easily became one of the best-animated classics—and for many it acted as an introduction into the Disney magic people had already come to love. As inspired by Shakespeare’s Hamlet, here was the coming-of-age tale of a prince gaining the courage to face his murderous uncle, to avenge his father and rise to his rightful place as ruler.
Added to this well-told story was a memorable score by Elton John & Tim Rice, as well as the first CGI animation the Disney Studios used for a feature-length movie.
And though the hero Simba achieved much acclaim in his Hamlet role, the characters set as Rosencrantz & Guildenstern fared even better. At points, Timon and Pumbaa literally stole the show, with their jokes and wise cracks. Also, they coined a whole new phase with “Hakuna Matata”—which despite its foreign origins is now known by most people throughout the world.
In fact, their popularity grew so great the Disney Channel dedicated a show to Timon & Pumbaa called simply: Timon & Pumbaa.
I must say that as a kid this held the charm most cartoons on the Disney Channel at the time did: they gave more of the characters we enjoyed from the classic Disney films. The voice actors were usually different but believable, and even if the characters were placed in different circumstances there was still a good flow to the style.
Viewing the show as an adult, though, some interesting features stick out about Timon & Pumbaa. They are not necessarily bad, but they are very noticeable when spotlighted.
For one thing, The Lion King took place in Africa with Timon and Pumbaa simply trying to live, as you would expect from the animals there—gathering food and protecting themselves from predators. That was the range of their knowledge in the film.
In Timon & Pumbaa, these characters are world travelers in the way only cartoon characters can be. An episode might open with them arriving in New York, or skydiving—much different from their capabilities in the movie.
Timon & Pumbaa being cartoons is what gets played around with in this series. They pull random things from behind their backs, they can survive falling from hundreds of feet in the air, they can stretch like taffy, and they are able to speak with the humans in their world without any difficulty.
Their character portrayals are also a little bit different as well. Timon, the self-proclaimed “brains of the outfit,” is quite vain and unceasingly self-absorbed. While the “film Timon” did show some vanity, he had more of a level head and compassionate disposition than the “cartoon Timon.” There is even one episode where Timon attempts to marry himself.
The two versions of Pumbaa are closer together, though in the cartoon the emphasis is on Pumbaa being Timon’s voice of morality.
Despite all this, Timon & Pumbaa is interesting because acting as cartoons was a prevalent theme in the shows on Disney channel in the 90’s. The idea these characters performed in skits like actors and lived in Toon Town held rein. It even turned into a big plot point for shows such as Bonkers and House of Mouse. They did not take themselves as seriously because they were “Toons,” and their biggest goal was to make people laugh—which the film Who Framed Roger Rabbit? exemplified all too well. In other words, Toons and the series they “starred in” became its own subgenera in Disney cartoons.
So beneath its altered exterior, Timon & Pumbaa was a perfect snapshot of how the “Toon” characters during this period acted or worked. The characters acted differently than their movie counterparts, it is true—but then their backgrounds were changed as well. The fourth wall did not matter in the latter case, and Toon Town took on all the qualities attributed to Hollywood.
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