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In thrilling BBC video, one lion fights 20 hyenas -- with a twist

Forget The Lion King: Life can be rough for the King of the Jungle

Gael Cooper
CNET editor Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, a journalist and pop-culture junkie, is co-author of "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s," as well as "The Totally Sweet '90s." She's been a journalist since 1989, working at Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, Twin Cities Sidewalk, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and NBC News Digital. She's Gen X in birthdate, word and deed. If Marathon candy bars ever come back, she'll be first in line.
Expertise Breaking news, entertainment, lifestyle, travel, food, shopping and deals, product reviews, money and finance, video games, pets, history, books, technology history, generational studies. Credentials
  • Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year"​ award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
Gael Cooper

The Lion King trailer made life as the King of the Jungle look pretty glamorous. But a video clip released last week that's since earned millions of views shows real life is a lot tougher.

Footage from the BBC series Dynasties, narrated by Sir David Attenborough, shows Red, a male lion, stumbling into a pack of 20 hyenas. One-on-one, a hyena has zero chance against a full-grown lion, but a pack of 20 at once has Red whirling around trying to keep them off his flanks while attempting to go on the attack himself.

It looks like the hyenas might have landed themselves a mane feast -- when something happens that gives this clip an unexpected ending.

The clip has earned more than 5 million views in just five days. It's quickly joined the ranks of such Attenborough-narrated animal clips as "baby iguana fleeing killer snakes" and "giraffe kicks lioness in the face." Nature is indeed a lot harsher than any Disney flick.

Badass animal GoPro photos

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