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The story of The Lion King takes place in the fictional Pride Lands of Africa, where a lion rules over the other animals as king.
At the beginning of the film, Rafiki, a mandrill shaman, presents Simba, the newborn cub of King Mufasa and Queen Sarabi, to a gathering of animals at Pride Rock. Meanwhile, Mufasa´s younger brother, Scar, realizes that he is no longer the heir to the throne and plots to kill Simba and Mufasa.
Scar plants curiosity in Simba about the elephant graveyard, a place beyond the borders of the Pride Lands where Mufasa has forbidden Simba to go. Simba takes his friend, Nala, to the elephant graveyard, where the cubs are chased by Shenzi, Banzai and Ed, Scar´s spotted hyena minions, only to be rescued by Mufasa. Scar becomes very angry as he intended for the hyenas to kill the cubs. Plotting further, Scar gathers more hyenas and buys their loyalty by claiming that if he were king they would never be without food. Later, Scar lures Simba into a gorge for a ´surprise from his father,´ while the hyenas engineer a wildebeest stampede down into the gorge where Simba is. Alerted by an insincerely dramatic Scar, Mufasa races to rescue his son from the stampede, and after saving Simba, Mufasa is killed by Scar, who thwarts his attempted climb to safety over an edge of a cliff. Scar convinces Simba that that he was responsible for his own father´s death, and recommends that he flee the Pride Lands, never to return. To compound this, Scar sends his hyena henchmen to kill Simba, but as Simba reaches a thorny embankment, the hyenas let him escape, hurling threats that he will be killed if ever seen again. Informed that both Mufasa and Simba were killed, the pride regretfully allows Scar to assume the throne as the closest of kin.
Simba collapses in a distant desert, where he is found by Timon, a meerkat, and Pumbaa, a warthog, who adopt and raise Simba under their carefree ´Hakuna Matata´ lifestyle. When Simba is grown, he encounters his childhood friend Nala, who relays that Scar´s tyrannical reign has devastated the Pride Lands. She demands that Simba return and take his rightful place as king, but Simba refuses, still guilty about supposedly causing his father´s death. However, after some advice from Rafiki and the ghost of his father, Simba returns home along with Timon, Pumbaa and Nala.
Once back at Pride Rock, Simba confronts his uncle and the truth about Mufasa´s death is revealed by an overly confident Scar. A fierce battle breaks out between the lionesses and the hyenas while Simba fights Scar. Rafiki, Timon and Pumba joins the battle and fights off Shenzi, Ed and Banzai. In the midst of their fight, Scar tries to surreptitiously blame everything on the hyenas, but they overhear his conversation with Simba. Simba eventually triumphs over his uncle and kicks him over a low cliff, where he is surrounded by the now resentful hyenas. The hyenas surround their traitorous fallen leader and kill him by devouring him alive.
With Simba and Nala as the new king and queen, the Pride Lands are restored. The movie concludes with Rafiki lifting Simba and Nala´s newborn cub high into the air, thus continuing the circle of life.
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