Don't have time to sit through the remake? Watch this instead!
(Image credit: Cas van de Pol)
Disney's weird sort-of live action CG remake of The Lion King might have unsettled plenty of fans by transferring the action from the African plains to the uncanny valley complete with creepy almost-realistic character design, but that doesn't seem to have done it any harm.
Despite decidedly mixed reviews that have criticised it for being a joyless retread of the original – not to mention its typographically-infuriating logo – the remake is absolutely killing it at the box office and looks set to make a lot of money for Disney.
Before you grudgingly head out to watch it, though, here's a little something that could save you approximately 116 minutes of your life, and that's not including the time it'll take you to get to the cinema and back. It's the work of Dutch animator Cas van de Pol, and it crams the entire Lion King story – or at least the salient bits – into a breakneck two minutes of glorious cartoon fun.
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Cas has called it The Ultimate "The Lion King" Recap Cartoon – we prefer to think of it as Tiny Lion King – and it does the job absolutely perfectly. Not only does it cover just about every major plot point that you need to know about, it's also fantastically executed.
There's a wonderfully rough and ready look to it that reminds us more of the work of animators such as John Kricfalusi and Butch Hartman than anything Disney has ever put out, and there are some brilliant comic beats along the way.
Get all the traumatic bits out of the way in seconds! (Image credit: Cas van de Pol)
It's a whole lot of fun, and not only is it a great alternative to trudging out to see the remake, it's also the perfect way for anyone who somehow has never actually seen The Lion King – apparently such monsters really exist and actually walk among us – to get up to speed on the story without much effort.
The really impressive thing is that van de Pol animated the whole two minutes of Tiny Lion King single-handedly, with other artists stepping up to provide the music, sound design and stunning voice work.
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"Remember, the Force will be with you... always." (Image credit: Cas van de Pol)
You can find more of Cas van de Pol's work on his YouTube channel, and if you want to support his endeavours then there's a Patreon page here that you can sign up to.
Jim McCauley is a writer, performer and cat-wrangler who started writing professionally way back in 1995 on PC Format magazine, and has been covering technology-related subjects ever since, whether it's hardware, software or videogames. A chance call in 2005 led to Jim taking charge of Computer Arts' website and developing an interest in the world of graphic design, and eventually led to a move over to the freshly-launched Creative Bloq in 2012. Jim now works as a freelance writer for sites including Creative Bloq, T3 and PetsRadar, specialising in design, technology, wellness and cats, while doing the occasional pantomime and street performance in Bath and designing posters for a local drama group on the side.
