Long Live The Lion King

“Look at the stars. The great kings of the past look down on us from those stars.”

Rest in Peace, Samuel E. Wright Original Broadway Cast, Mufasa

There are bunch of places in the new movie where dialogue has been reworked or cut out entirely, so I’m not 100% sure, either.

As far as iconic lines go, maybe they’re referring to “I’m surrounded by idiots”? That line, and the hyenas’ lion jokes preceding it, are not in the new one, though this cut makes perfect sense to me since this version A) makes Scar less sarcastic/sassy, B) frames the hyenas as less “idiotic,” more calculating, C) frames the Scar/hyena partnership as more of partnership of equals working for a common goal rather than as a leader with bunch of minions. The idiot line wouldn’t make sense in this context, imo.

Disney’s “The Lion King” has jolted the North American box office back to life with an opening weekend in the $180 million range, estimates showed Saturday. “The Lion King” will record the second-best opening of 2019 — and could replace “Incredibles 2,” which launched last year with $182.7 million, as the ninth biggest North American launch of all time.

The film is outperforming pre-release forecasts, which had been in the $150 million to $180 million range at a record 4,725 domestic locations. Disney reported that “The Lion King” delivered a massive $78.5 million opening day domestically, becoming the 10th highest opening day in industry history.