Mufasa: The Lion King had its world premiere at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on December 9, 2024, and will have a wider release this Friday. The critical response to the photo-realistically animated feature has been largely lukewarm, resulting in mediocre scores on the review aggregating site Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, which utilizes a weighted average to rate a project.
Mufasa: The Lion King gets mixed reviews from critics
Mufasa: The Lion King has garnered predominantly mixed responses from critics. Jonathan Sim of ComingSoon advised the audience to be “prepared for aesthetic mediocrity” in his review and gave it a five out of 10 rating.
BBC’s Nicholas Barber called it “pointless” and a “contrived cash-in” and mentioned that the movie had animation and screenplay problems.
Evan Dossey of Midwest Film Journal defended the movie’s director Barry Jenkins by writing that “there just wasn’t much to be done with a story where the protagonist’s fatal flaw is that he’s the best Lion King to ever do it.”
The Globe and Mail’s Barry Hertz noted that Mufasa: The Lion King, which serves as both the sequel and prequel to the 2019 remake of 1994’s The Lion King, excels in certain matters compared to Jon Favreau’s directorial venture. However, Hertz added that the movie was “constantly weighed down” due to the virtue of being a prequel.
Not all the responses to Mufasa: The Lion King are negative. Justin Clark of Slant Magazine observed that the movie, “unbound by having to recreate large swaths of the original Lion King whole cloth, was clearly allowed to be a product of its director.”
Meanwhile, The Times’ Kevin Maher praised Jenkins for diving “truly deep for a tale of orphanhood, family conflict and the reluctant fight for a throne.” Comparing the newer movie to Gladiator II, Maher opined, “It’s often thrilling to watch a film featuring only anthropomorphic animals where the central characters are more rounded than most of their human counterparts at the mainstream multiplex.”
Mufasa: The Lion King’s Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic scores aren’t praise-worthy
Mufasa: The Lion King currently has a 59% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes after 83 reviews, and 58 out of 100 after 36 reviews on Metacritic, denoting a mixed to average response. These aren’t promising numbers, but the movie is yet to face its biggest test. And that will only happen when it debuts in theaters.
