Archetypes In The Lion King

In the world, Archetypes are found in all sorts of fiction. Archetypes are patterns in characters that have been seen throughout books or movies. Characters who fall under certain archetypes follow the same pattern that many other follows. In the movie, The Lion King, most characters can fall under one of these archetypes. Scar represents the shape shifter or the villain, the hyenas represent the tricksters, and Timon and Pumbaa can represent the jesters. The archetype that each character falls under is able to define their character and shape their actions throughout the movie.

In The Lion King, Scar represents the shapeshifter. A shapeshifter is a character who serves the purpose of misleading the hero. Throughout the movie he lies to Simba to put Simba in dangerous positions. He also kills Mufasa in order to gain power and continues to lie to Simba to force him to leave. Towards the end of the movie while speaking to Simba he states, “I’d hate to be responsible for the death of a family member.” Scar says this to lie to the other characters and pretend to be different than how he actually is. As well as being the main antagonist in the movie, Scar falls under the shapeshifter archetype.
Tricksters enjoy chaos and usually cause some kind of change. In the movie, they follow Scar in order to cause chaos in promise of some kind of power in return. However, when that is taken away, they are quick to leave. The hyenas characters do as they want in order to gain more power and cause chaos. The environment the hyenas are put in is able to change their actions, but they remain under the trickster