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Post by Kieran on Jan 22, 2012 4:11:08 GMT 2
No, I did not even care. It never even crossed my mind. I only thought something like 'oh, cute - now they have a child', and that's all. In my fan activity I only cared about the story I just saw and fell in love with, not about some minor character that appeared 10 seconds at the very end. As it was clearly there just to make a closure to the story's theme of Circle of Life and the film itself didn't make a big deal about the cub in any other way. So, years later when I looked into the online fandom, I was surprised to find out that instead of just writing their personal preference fanfiction, many fans had made a huge deal about its "intented gender". The controversy was especially surprising after I found out that on the commentary track ever since 1995 which was after all the books, Disney had made clear that it's a unisex/genderless cub called "Fluffy". Like, the character appeared for 10 seconds, Disney itself never made a big deal about it, and had said that "This is Fluffy!" and by it literally denying the books. Yet somehow the matter of this minor side character had become as big as the story that happened before it.  I have the tendency to become a fan of and especially interested in side/least told characters in stories. But not THAT minor characters...  |
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Post by imvula on Feb 4, 2012 1:13:27 GMT 2
I never really thought about it at the time as I was only around five or six when I first watched the movie. I always just assumed that the cub meant that the circle of life continued and that didn't really have a massive meaning. Obviously when the sequel came out, I just assumed that "Fluffy" was a girl. Then I came across the books, purely by chance of course, and then I was like "So, that cub at the end of TLK was a BOY??" Really annoyed me because I didn't know which to believe; these books which were just published fanfiction and not acknowledged by Disney, or the second film which was made by Disney and thus in my head, considered canon.
I still say that the cub at the end was female because of TLKII, but then if there was no sequel, I still wouldn't care what gender the cub was. It would be guaranteed that I'd make my own fanfiction at somepoint to take off when the first film left off with my own idea on what gender the cub was. Either way, it still really doesn't matter to me. Fluffy can be a boy or a girl if people want it to be. I'm sticking with canon though.
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Post by Kieran on Feb 6, 2012 17:25:58 GMT 2
Heh. I keep forgetting that many fans were too young to even start to think about such a matter, so I guess the "no" option will win by far. Welcome to the forums, imvula!  |
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Gemma
New Member
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Post by Gemma on Feb 16, 2012 19:54:03 GMT 2
Kind of.
Basically, I wondered what gender the cub was - but only as much as I wondered what the cub's personality and life would be like too. So it's not really as though it's gender was my first concern about the cub, it was one of the many things I wondered about it.
I was another one who was quite young when I first saw the film (I was seven) and at that age I didn't think too hard about things like that. But I didn't completely ignore it either. I do remember really looking forward to seeing Simba's Pride when it was first announced in the UK though, and that was mostly because I wanted to find out more about Simba's cub and what their life would be like. That said, I can live with or without the sequel. It's cool that they created a movie about Simba being the king and raising a cub, but the original film is wonderful on its own too.
So that's what I mean by "kind of". I was interested in finding out the cub's gender, but I don't think it would have mattered to me too much if I had never found out.
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Post by squash on Dec 31, 2012 16:47:09 GMT 2
Nope, not at all. I was just a kid at the time though, and for me the baby basically just meant "happy ending! They have a kid and everything's ok now!". I didn't even ask myself the question about the characters' future, so the cub stayed just a cub until recently when I watched the movie again and fell in love with it Since I've not been in the fandom for long, I didn't knew this was an issue. I think I just assumed it was male, since the cub looked like Simba and I thought he was meant to be the next King in the Circle of Life. I checked it out when I saw the question arise on the internet though, and as I've said in the F.A.Q., I think the cub is male (his belly fur isn't connect to his chin fur, unlike females). I've seen people become fan of characters much more minor... At least this one appears on screen and is very closely related to the main characters, so he's not a completely empty shell. |
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Post by Chakaandzambi on Oct 16, 2013 23:33:15 GMT 2
No one really knows, actually.
'Fluffy' was mention as an 'it', though in a Disney Magazine, it said "Everyone thought it was a king, but it was a queen!", but whether they were talking about Fluffy or Kiara is unclear. I always enjoyed pretending it was Kopa, and that he just grew up and left the pride to start his own while Kiara was still very young - but that's not even my theory. I know Fluffy is neither gender, and Kiara was the official cub of Simba and Nala.
I always thought it was a boy as a child, since the book I had of it said 'Simba and Nala had a son' in it.
Confusing, huh?
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