My Lion King Forum

in Simba's Pride Zira yells at Kovu about Nuka's death and says that he killed him? How? I thought that the river logs crushed him?, not Kovu. I'm confused.

Yes, in fact the river logs killed Nuka. But Zira blamed Kovu for it, because if Kovu had catched Simba, then Nuka wouldn't have gone to catch Simba, and the logs wouldn't have crushed Nuka. In other words, in Zira's view, Kovu was responsible for Nuka's death.

^ Exactly. It's like when Scar tells Simba, "what have you done?" after the stampede scene. Simba didn't kill Mufasa obviously, but his actions led to his death.

I'm pretty sure it's due to the fact Kovu rejected to step into the fights and retreated away, causing inexperienced Nuka to try and take his place, ultimately result9in his death. If Kovu had stepped in, Nuka would not have taken his actions.

It was the log that actually killed Nuka, but Zira was calling Kovu a coward for not killing Simba so therefore he "caused" Nuka's death. People blame others a lot for a death after the fact as hindsight is 20/20. Parents who lose children in accidental deaths such as pool drownings say "Well, if you had been watching him/her they wouldn't have died!"

What's most interesting about that scene is that Zira shows compassion for Nuka, proving that she's not really evil, just misguided.

He indirectly killed Nuka, and I think was angry with Kovu already since didn't want to kill Simba, so she tried to make him think that his decision not to kill Simba had lead to the death of a close one.

Its what's known as a metaphor: its not actually literal. Zira felt that Kovu was responsible for Nuka's death because he didn't even attempt to help kill Simba, and Zira is kinda nuts to begin with.

Honestly that entire scene was one of the best-written in the whole movie imo.

Obviously, Kovu didn't kill Nuka, and it's not Kovu's fault that Nuka recklessly chased Simba up the log pile. If anyone's to blame for Nuka's death, it's Zira. But Zira would never admit that she's to blame, and wrongfully placed the blame on Kovu since she resented him for not killing Simba. Which is a very realistic reaction, to be quite frank, as people more often than not are quick to blame everyone but themselves. Really humanizes Zira.

No, Kovu had nothing to do with his death really; but I always thought that Zira, in her crazed way, was trying to make Kovu feel more like Scar, or make him believe he was becoming like Scar.

"You KILLED your own BROTHER!"

Idk, maybe that's just me but that's how it always sounded to me.