'''As a Fridge subpage, all spoilers are unmarked [[Administrivia/SpoilersOff as per policy.]] Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned.'''

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[[folder: Fridge Brilliance ]]

* In Disney's Tarzan, Professor Porter says that Rudyard Kipling would be delighted to meet Tarzan; the reason why is [[Literature/TheJungleBook obvious]]. Plus, that's actually a ShoutOut. Kipling was amused by all the takeoffs on his work, but ERB's most of all. He said it "jazzed" the original motif.
* It wasn't until the latter half of the 20th century that the public image of "{{Killer Gorilla}}s" was debunked by the works of George Schaller and Dian Fossey. In the early half of that same century, Jane and her Father are going on an expedition to prove this wrong. This is meant to foreshadow that they'll remain in Africa, since they never returned to civilization to share their findings on how Gorillas are not man-eaters.
* Tarzan can communicate freely with gorillas, elephants, baboons and other jungle animals, which are conveniently anthropomorphized and makes the movie a talking animal picture. At first glance, this makes the fact that [[DiscOneFinalBoss Sabor]] is totally inhuman and true to her nature seem somewhat strange. However, it makes perfect sense considering leopards would be an animal that Tarzan would ''not'' get chummy enough with to learn their language.
** However, you do hear him imitate her a couple of times - he is talking to her, but what he's saying is leopard battle-talk because this is the only situation he seems to have been in with leopards - it doesn't translate to ape.
** Somewhat undone in the cartoon series, where Jane finds an orphaned leopard cub and Tarzan is both wary of his previous leopard encounters and unfairly prejudiced against them like Kerchak was with him. They end up returning the cub to its mother and she, in turn, keeps the other leopards in her territory from laying a paw on them and even brings her cub back for a friendly visit at the end of that particular episode. Despite befriending Tarzan, these leopards still don't speak like humans.
* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfTarzan'', [[GodSaveUsFromTheQueen Queen La]] is for some reason depicted with tanned skin and white hair. Some ArcWelding that never actually got on the air was going to give her an Atlantean heritage, and therefore she looks like the Atlanteans from ''WesternAnimation/AtlantisTheLostEmpire''.
* In the original books, Tarzan and Clayton were relatives. Now notice their similiar facial structures, particularly the jutting chins.
** Could also be considered a minor case of fridge horror, seeing as they're family, fighting each other to the death.
* Tarzan can mimic things like an elephant, Clayton's voice and a gunshot so brilliantly because of his acquired affinity for mimicry, having had to learn a good deal of it to communicate with the various animals of the African coast.
* At one point during his youth, when floundering in the water, he 'waves' at the other young gorillas with one of his feet, as a gorilla would.
* Why did Tantor look so freaked out by that skull in ''Trashin' the Camp'', despite presumably never seeing one before? Because elephants can recognize bones easily, including those of humans. So to Tantor, the sight of a human/ape-like skull gives him the impression that something resembling one of his friends may have died there.
* In the prologue, Terk starts warming up to Baby!Tarzan when he starts playing with her hair. He was essentially grooming her, [[ShownTheirWork which is how social primates bond with each other]].
* Tarzan is seriously lucky he was found by a mother who had lost her newborn baby. When his biological mother died, she couldn't nurse him anymore, and Kala probably still had a lot of milk when she lost her biological baby, which she gave to Tarzan instead.
* "Son of Man" contains the line "Someday you'll walk tall with pride". This isn't just a reference to Tarzan aging from a short child to a tall adult, it's a reference to Tarzan learning that he is a human and starting to walk upright, rather than on all fours like a gorilla.
* In the Disney film, Tarzan simply killing Sabor isn't what earned him Kerchak's initial respect and care. It was the fact that Tarzan not only helped Kerchak protect their family, he unknowingly avenged the death of Kerchak's infant son, which Kerchak himself nearly failed in doing, that turned their relationship around.
* The reason Tarzan wears a loincloth despite the jungle having no nudity taboo (other than the fact it needs to be family-friendly)? Being found in a diaper might have something to do with it. Alternatively, there's the fact that humans have the largest penises of all the great apes, while gorillas have the smallest...no one wanted to see Tarzan's freakish, abnormally oversized nonconformity.
* A possible explanation for Tantor (elephant) and Terk (gorilla) seeming to speak the same language could simply be that ''Tantor'' is speaking gorilla, since the few times we see him speaking to other elephants, Tarzan and the gorillas are not part of the conversation.
* Even though many people consider Sabor an antagonist, deep down she isn't evil. Her killing Kala and Kerchak's baby and killing Tarzan's parents was simply in her nature. Like all carnivores Sabor only kills in order to survive and she probably saw Tarzan and his family as a threat.
* The AdaptationalNationality the Porters receive in the Disney version can actually be explained away. In the opening paragraphs to ''Tarzan of the Apes'', Burroughs notes that he changed some details to protect Tarzan and the other characters on the off chance that they actually existed. The Porters' nationality could easily be one of these details that were changed.
* Clayton's death by hanging is a perfect fate for him. Why? He had incited a mutiny on a ship, and Britain at the time dealt with maritime crimes very harshly, especially mutiny. If he had been captured and tried for his crime in Britain, he would have likely be sentenced to death by hanging.

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[[folder: Fridge Horror ]]

* It's a good thing that Prof. Porter and Jane were among the first humans Tarzan ever interacted with. If for some reason Clayton and his henchmen had entered the jungle without any "scientific research" cover, Tarzan would have come to the conclusion that HumansAreBastards with no redeeming qualities whatsoever, making his identity crisis even worse.
* Some people suspect that Sabor is more interested in killing her prey then eating it; partially because Tarzan's dead parents' bodies are still on the floor when she hunts down Kala and baby Tarzan. However, Sabor might've seen baby Tarzan as one of her kills; considering he's defenseless and basically immobile. Tomorrow's dinner in the fridge, if you will. That would mean that Kala was *stealing* her meal. Sabor's not ignoring her former kills, she's fighting for her catch!
* Before it's revealed that [[TimeSkip Tarzan grew from baby to child]], it seems that Kala's being afraid and frantic she can't find baby Tarzan is only natural (she'd be worried he crawled away too far). Once you learn Tarzan's a child, it leaves one wondering [[FridgeLogic why would Kala be getting herself worked up over a child grown enough to go wherever he has a mind to]]? ...Until one realizes with chilling clarity that [[ContinuityNod she must've lost her first baby the same way: waking up to find the poor thing suddenly missing]].
* At the start of the film we see Tarzan's father lowering the last lifeboat into the water with his wife and baby inside, the ship is on fire and sinking. It's a large ship that must have a large crew to match it yet it looks like the only survivors are the Greystokes. What happened to the rest of the crew?
** In the original book it was a mutiny that left Tarzan's parents abandoned. It's not impossible that pirates looted much of the ship and then burned it.
* In the final battle between Clayton and Tarzan, Tarzan instantly sees that Clayton is about to accidentally hang himself with the vines. To be able to recognize it instantly, either Tarzan has already seen some jungle animal (possibly a sentient one) hang himself before, which is horrifying, or an awkward discussion of death penalties was omitted in the montage where the Porters teach him about human society.
** Or he just quickly deduced that someone falling down with a vine around their neck would suffocate them. Tarzan is implied to be exceptionally intelligent and good at deduction, so it's not unreasonable to think he could quickly put the two and two together.
** Also, putting this theme aside, there's the fact that while Clayton is falling from the tree, as he's screaming, ''[[WideEyesAndShrunkenIrises his eyeballs proceed to bulge out]] from the sockets'', to which it means that once the vine stops, '''his eyeballs proceed to ''[[EyeScream graphically pop out from the sockets while they dangle from the optical nerves!]]''''' Now talk about an already brutal death being made even much more gruesome because of ''dismemberment''...
* In Disney's ''WesternAnimation/{{Tarzan}}'', at the end of the movie, [[{{Tearjerker}} after Kerchak's acceptance of Tarzan as his son]], Tarzan becomes the new leader of the gorillas, announcing it to all the characters by hitting his chest repeatedly, typical gorilla demonstration of power... nothing is bad with that... unless of course you know that the Leader's responsibilities are not only of protecting the group and guiding them... [[{{Squick}} but also the reproductive function of the Silverback who have the exclusive breeding rights to all the females]]. In reality, there are gorilla troops with more than one silverback in charge so... maybe Tarzan delegated that particular task to some male gorilla friend, but still...
** It's not squick, but more like tragic if he didn't give that task to a male gorilla. He probably wouldn't try to reproduce with gorillas (in real life, he couldn't). His group will either begin to die off with no offspring or go off and look for males.
** The gorillas seemed to understand that Tarzan isn't quite the same (read: an entirely different species) than them. They probably would understand that he would only possibly be breeding with Jane, if anyone.
** In some gorilla groups there are also Blackback males - not fully grown, but already sexually mature males, usually the dominant Silverback's sons; occasionally they can also mate with the females. Maybe in Tarzan's group the Blackbacks (there's a handful of them, like Terk's buddies Flynt and Mungo) fulfill the reproductive function entirely.
** Maybe Kago and Uto from the prequel would get that role?
** Other males get no chance to breed because the Silverback actively warns them off if they display interest in the females. If Tarzan makes no effort to monopolize the females for himself, then the other males will be free to mate. To maintain his power and the strength of the group, he would only allow loyal and healthy males to mate.
** At least in the TV series, there is a young silverback named Moyo who challenges Tarzan for leadership once. Although Tarzan remains the leader of the family, Moyo can still be the father of the young ones.
* If Kala never found Tarzan when he was a baby, he would have starved to death or been eaten by Sabor.
* When Kerchak and Kala [[ForcedToWatch watched their baby being eaten alive while helplessly screaming in fear and pain]]...
** Well, listened, more like.
* In the final battle scene, a hunter starts menacing Jane with a bludgeon, and she is saved by the baboon pack that stole her boot earlier in the film. Funny and all, yeah. But there was a reason the Romans would use baboons in the arenas. If the baboons did catch the hunter when they ran to him... Well... [[FamilyUnfriendlyDeath You get]] [[GoryDiscretionShot that]]. Maybe too much for a [[PunchClockVillain Punch Clock Villain]].
* Tarzan's parent's bodies are just left there in the treehouse to rot.
** Actually, I believe that large cats like Sabor have a tendency of taking their kills back to their den to eat at their leisure. Not that that particular thought is any more pleasant, but still.
** Furthermore, it wouldn't be a stretch to believe their vermin-stripped skeletons would be lying there when Tarzan returns decades later.
*** Considering the fact that the story occurs in the Congo, the average temperature is 24.6 °C. This means that it would take 2 months for the parents bodies to completely decompose. Bones are largely a fibrous matrix of collagen fibres, impregnated with calcium phosphate. In warm, damp environments, bacteria and fungi will attack the collagen protein and the skeleton will crumble over the course of a few years. Depending on a variety of conditions (animal predation, temperature, acidity of soil, exposure to air, etc.), your skeleton could be preserved for many years or almost completely decay in as little as 1 year. If a body is exposed to water, insects, open air, or highly acidic soil, then bacteria and fungi will be able to invade that porous network, and seek out the proteins of the collagen within the bones, which causes those bones to break down and eventually crumble to dust! In a well ventilated area like the treehouse means that the skeleton would breakdown into nothing but clothes remnants. Basically, there are no bodies when Tarzan returns to the treehouse, just dust. And even then, Tarzan is able to point out where their bodies were in an episode of The Legend of Tarzan, much to the horror of Jane's friends from England.
* Had Tarzan's Parents never had shipwrecked into Africa at the beginning of the film, [[EgomaniacHunter Clayton]] would have [[TheBadGuyWins successfully captured all the gorillas]].
** Not so, unfortunately. Kerchak and the gorillas aren't stupid. The instant they heard those gun shots, they quickly made it their business to evacuate the area. [[{{Irony}} For being a hunter]], Clayton would've never found the gorillas at the rate he kept shooting and slashing at the forest like an arrogant blowhard. He only found them ''[[NiceJobBreakingItHero because of Tarzan]]''. Sure Clayton is foiled all the same, but it still set off consequences were Kerchak was ultimately downed by Clayton's bullet.
* Sabor may have also claimed other human victims before Tarzan's parents. If you consider the [[WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfTarzan animated series that followed the movie]] as canon, it turns out that there were already humans in the jungle before it's events; the Waziri tribe. The gorillas were unaware of their existence, likely because they don't stick around the same place for too long and have no reason to seek out other species in the first place, but Sabor is a different story. Predators that taste human flesh and realize that it's far easier to kill humans than most of their natural prey often become man-eaters and hunt for more victims whenever they can. This may be the reason why Sabor killed Tarzan's parents and seemed so [[SuperPersistentPredator obsessed with killing Tarzan himself]], even as he grew up and became more of a challenge; she had already killed humans before and associated them with easy meals.
* At one point during the baboon chase, Jane gets caught on a vine and separates from Tarzan. She's left defenseless hanging on the vine as the baboon tribe swarms her, causing the vine to break. She screams as she falls, but Tarzan comes in just in time, [[HandyFeet using his feet]] to grab Jane by her one bare foot. [[Awesome/{{Tarzan}} Awesome moment]] and all, but it makes you realize that if Jane didn't [[LosingAShoeInTheStruggle lose her shoe]], she may have potentially fallen and died at this moment.

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