Bagheera (Hindi: बघीरा; Urdu: ‫ بگیڑہ‬Baghīrā/Bagīdah) is a fictional character in Rudyard

Kipling's Mowgli stories in the Jungle Book (coll. 1894) and the Second Jungle Book(coll. 1895). He
is a black panther (melanistic Indian leopard) who serves as friend, protector and mentor to the
"man-cub" Mowgli. The word bagheera is Hindi/Urdu for black panther-- although the root word bagh
means tiger.
Everybody knew Bagheera, and nobody dared to cross his path; for he was as cunning as Tabaqui,
as bold as the wild buffalo, and as reckless as the wounded elephant. But he had a voice as soft as
wild honey dripping from a tree, and a skin softer than down.

— Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book

Contents

 1Character history
 2Media portrayals
o 2.1Disney animated versions
o 2.21994 Disney live-action film
o 2.32016 Disney live-action film
 2.3.1Reception
o 2.4Other media
 3See also
 4References
 5External links

Character history[edit]
Born in captivity in the menagerie of the Raja of Udaipur, Rajasthan, India, Bagheera begins to plan
for his freedom after his mother dies. Once he is mature and strong enough, he breaks the lock on
his cage and escapes into the jungle, where his ferocity and cunning nature win him the respect of
all its other inhabitants, except for the very incredibly conceited Shere Khan The Tiger. Bagheera
reveals all this to Mowgli later. None but Mowgli ever learn that Bagheera once wore a collar and
chain, explaining the cat's special insight concerning men. Bagheera's brief description of his
imprisonment and escape is this, “I had never seen the jungle. They fed me behind bars from an iron
pan till one night I felt that I was Bagheera - the Panther - and no man's plaything, and I broke the
silly lock with one blow of my paw and came away; and because I had learned the ways of men, I
became more terrible in the jungle than Shere Khan.” Because he had learned the ways of men, he
was also more loving to the abandoned human child who came to be under his care and protection.
When Father Wolf and Mother Wolf of the Seeonee (Seoni) wolf pack adopt the human "cub" Mowgli
and the pack demands that the new cub should be spoken for, Bagheera buys Mowgli's life with a
freshly killed bulland helps to raise him as one of the pack. Because his life has been bought by a
bull, Mowgli is forbidden to eat cattle (coincidentally, just as the Hindu villagers of the region are also
forbidden). Bagheera will frequently remind Mowgli of this debt by swearing an oath referencing his
own previous captivity. As Bagheera swears, "By the broken lock that freed me," so Mowgli answers
back "By the bull that bought me."
At one point, during one of Mowgli's many lessons in the Laws of the Jungle under the tutelage of
Baloo the Bear, Bagheera says “I am more likely to give help than to ask it," as Mowgli learns the
many sacred words needed to call on the assistance of all kinds of species of animals living in the
jungle. Bagheera, having freed himself from the captivity of humans, is a proud animal aware of his
own abilities and ferocity among the other animals of the jungle, though he acknowledges Mowgli's
growing power over each of them as the boy grows older. Bagheera shows Mowgli that none of the
animals may stare into his eyes, even those who love him.
Bagheera shares in many of Mowgli's adventures as he grows, but eventually the time comes when
the man-cub becomes a man and has to return to human society. Bagheera frees Mowgli of his debt
to the wolf pack by killing another bull, and Mowgli returns to his adopted human mother Messua.
Bagheera is one of Mowgli's mentors and best friends. He, Baloo and Kaa sing for Mowgli "The
Outsong" of the jungle. He also calls out to Mowgli in farewell, "Remember, Bagheera loved thee...
Remember, Bagheera loved thee."

Media portrayals[edit]
In some film and television series adaptations of the Jungle Book Bagheera is an Indian leopard. In
other appearances, he has a black pigmentation, which is why he is commonly referred to as a
black panther.

Disney animated versions[edit]

In Disney's 1967 animated adaptation, Bagheera the panther is, as in the book, male, and voiced
by Sebastian Cabot. The panther is portrayed as an intelligent, mature, and logical character, quite
similar to the Bagheera in the books. In the film, it is Bagheera and not the wolves who first finds
Mowgli, a young village child. It is Bagheera who brings Mowgli to the care of the wolves and
ensures that the baby survives. He is also the one who takes him back to the village, for his own
safety, as he knew for years that Mowgli would eventually need to leave his adoptive animal family
to return to his place in the human world. During the film, Bagheera often lectures Baloo, for he
knows that as long as Shere Khan is in the jungle, the jungle is not safe for Mowgli despite all of
Baloo's attempts to protect him. Bagheera is also the narrator of the film's story.
The 1967 cartoon film adaptation of “The Jungle Books” was Walt Disney’s final film, though he died
before he could finish supervising the completed movie. According to a short documentary video
about the making of the film, which is available on YouTube
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhAZEDiKSsM&t=13s), Disney told the screenwriters and
artists to forget what they had read in Kipling’s original stories—the direction he wanted to take for
his film was a different approach. Although the original concept art was described as “dark,” Walt
Disney scrapped those images in favor of a whimsical, musical jungle scene. Bagheera’s past is one
of the darker elements that Disney omitted in the movie. The violence of Kipling’s stories is also
toned down. Bagheera, for instance, never physically confronts Shere Khan in the 1967 film even
though Baloo defends Mowgli while the protective black panther shelters the boy. No scars are
visible on the cartoon Disney drawings of Bagheera to hint at his captive past either.
Bagheera is also one of the major characters left out of the TaleSpin series which used
several Jungle Book characters. However, many of Shere Khan's employees and military personnel
are black panthers very similar in appearance to Bagheera.
In the prequel cartoon series Jungle Cubs, Bagheera was voiced by Elizabeth Daily and Dee
Bradley Baker, and was often made fun of by his friends, especially the bully Shere Khan. He is also
called "Baggy" by Baloo. Like Shere Khan and Hathi, he too has an English accent in the 1967 film,
but has an American accent in this series.
In The Jungle Book 2, he is voiced by Bob Joles and reappears as the mature Bagheera. He tries to
reason with a depressed Baloo that Mowgli's place is in the Man Village, and that the jungle is not
safe for him because Shere Khan has returned to get revenge on Mowgli for humiliating him. Baloo
is certain that with their help, Mowgli can handle the tiger a second time, and bypasses Bagheera.
Frustrated, he calls upon Colonel Hathi and his troops to block Baloo's path. When the villagers try
to find Mowgli, he suspects that Baloo has brought him back. Bagheera confronts Baloo with the
news and expresses his thoughts that maybe he has seen him. Baloo hides Mowgli from Bagheera
and convinces Bagheera that he is not with him. Bagheera does not entirely believe this. He later
joins Mowgli's younger adoptive brother Ranjan and Baloo as they hurry to save Mowgli from Shere
Khan. When they reach the temple built on a lava lake, Bagheera waits outside with Ranjan and
warns Baloo to be careful before he goes inside to help Mowgli. After Shere Khan is trapped, Mowgli
introduces Bagheera to Shanti, the girl who is Mowgli's best friend at the village. Near the end of the
film, Ranjan is shown playing with Bagheera's tail. At first Bagheera is scared, but he later enjoys
playing with him while Mowgli, Shanti, and Baloo sing the reprise of "The Bare Necessities".

1994 Disney live-action film[edit]

In the 1994 live-action film, (portrayed by a black leopard named Shadow) Bagheera serves as a
jungle animal friend to Mowgli and his pet wolf, Grey Brother. After Mowgli and Grey Brother are
separated from civilization, Bagheera finds them the next day. Hearing Shere Khan's roar from a
distance, Bagheera signals with his tail to Mowgli to grab on to it so as to lead him out of harm's way.
It takes a while until Bagheera finally brings Mowgli and Grey Brother to a pack of Grey Indian
wolves. Seeing as the child is young, friendly, helpless, harmless, and kind to a cub of their species,
the wolves accept them as members of the pack, much to Bagheera's delight.
Years later, Bagheera is seen most of the time spending time relaxing on a tree and occasionally
running with a fully-grown Mowgli, Grey Brother, and a new friend named Baloo, the bear, who was
saved as a cub by Mowgli on the day Mowgli is accepted into the wolf pack.
A few days later, after Mowgli has learned the ways of men and re-entered civilization thanks to
Katherine "Kitty" Brydon and Dr. Julius Plumford, Bagheera is seen being introduced to Kitty by
Mowgli along with all the rest of Mowgli's jungle animal friends. Bagheera and the other animals
watch as Kitty teaches Mowgli some dancing lessons, much to their amusement.
In a later tussle against soldiers working for Captain Boone, Baloo is shot and left for dead.
Bagheera is then seen running with Mowgli and the wolf pack to locate Dr. Julius Plumford to save
Baloo's life, only to find that the doctor has already left with Kitty and her father, Colonel Geoffrey
Brydon, to bring Katherine to the ship to England. Mowgli goes out and follows them with the wolves,
leaving Bagheera behind. After saving Dr. Plumford from death, Bagheera is seen charging along
with the wolf pack against Indian bandits.
After Mowgli is captured by evil British soldiers - Boone, Lt. Wilkins, and Sergeant Harley - and the
remaining Indian bandits - Buldeo and Tabaqui - Bagheera is seen with the wolves keeping an eye
on Mowgli, his friends, and enemies while staring at Boone and Wilkins mostly. When Wilkins asks
himself why Bagheera is staring at them, Mowgli replies, "Because to him, you are food". A reply is
hinted afterwards when Bagheera sticks out his tongue to show his hunger for them. The next
morning, Bagheera is seen biting through the ropes tying Mowgli to a tree, thus allowing him to
escape, and then later on, to rescue the left-out injured Colonel Brydon from death.
In the final scene, after Boone's defeat, Bagheera is seen crossing a bridge with Kitty and a
triumphant Mowgli while reuniting with the British Army sent out by Colonel Brydon, who was
successfully cured from his injuries by Dr. Plumford (who also manages to cure Baloo), to find them.

2016 Disney live-action film[edit]

Ben Kingsley voices the CGI character in the 2016 live-action film.[1] In an interview with Ben
Kingsley regarding his portrayal of Bagheera, Kingsley describes Bagheera as Mowgli's adoptive
parent, saying that his role in Mowgli's life is "to educate, to protect and to guide". Kingsley further
describes Bagheera as being analogous to military in his personality, specifically a Colonel; saying
that "he's instantly recognizable by the way that he talks, how he acts, and what his ethical code
is".[2] In this film, Bagheera plays the role of Mowgli's mentor and rescues him after Shere Khan kills
the boy's father. He is continually protecting Mowgli and teaches him to be a creature of the jungle
and a member of the wolf pack led by Akela. When Shere Khan threatens Mowgli's life, Bagheera
agrees to guide him to the man-village where he can safely live with other humans. However, en
route, Shere Khan ambushes them. Bagheera fights with Shere Khan and though he is beaten and
mildly injured by the tiger, he gives Mowgli enough time to escape. They do not reunite again until
much later, when Mowgli is helping Baloo gather honey (in repayment for Baloo saving him from the
python, Kaa) and announces he wishes to stay with Baloo, much to Bagheera's disappointment.
Bagheera later speaks with Baloo and after explaining the boy's predicament and tells Baloo to lie to
Mowgli and tell him they were never friends so as to ensure he ends up living in the man-village.
However, before this plan can be implemented, a group of monkeys led by the Gigantopithecus King
Louie, abduct Mowgli to try to learn of the secret of fire. Working together, Bagheera and Baloo fight
off the monkeys long enough for Mowgli to hide from King Louie, and the resulting chase causes in
the ape king's presumed demise. After word of the death of Akela by Shere Khan's hand reaches
Mowgli, the boy is furious with Bagheera and Baloo for keeping the news from him. He then runs
away and steals a burning torch from the man-village (accidentally starting a forest fire in the
process), and returns to the jungle to avenge Akela. Bagheera helps Baloo and the wolf pack fight
Shere Khan long enough to allow Mowgli to set a trap for the tiger, which allows Mowgli to lure him
over a fiery pit into which he falls to his death. After, Bagheera is last seen sitting with Baloo and
Mowgli, who has found his true home in the jungle.
Reception[edit]
While the Disney films and adaptations over the decades have strayed far from Kipling's original
characters, it is important to note that Bagheera's character changes the least. As the review snippet
below shows, the first Disney take on Kipling's work bore little resemblance to the story at all. Names
of characters remained the same, but the characteristics of those characters were generally taken
over in a musical new twist. Bagheera, though his captivity is not mentioned and his ferocity is
understated for the sake of small children watching, remains just as proud, refined, and protective of
Mowgli as he appeared in the writing of Kipling.
“What do you think of Kipling? I don't know. I have never Kippled. — Victorian joke Judging from The
Jungle Book, the last film he personally supervised, Walt Disney never Kippled either. Hardly a line
is left of the stories about Mowgli, the Indian "man-cub" who was raised by animals. Like Disney's
other adaptations of children's classics, The Jungle Book is based on the Kipling original in the same
way that a fox hunt is based on foxes. Nonetheless, the result is thoroughly delightful.”
The above review is from an April 15, 2016 Time Magazine Review of The Jungle Book 1967
(http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,841219,00.html).

The portrayal of Bagheera as well as Ben Kingsley's voice acting were praised in the 2016 film.
Rotten Tomatoes top critic James Berardinelli stated: "Ben Kingsley brings the appropriate level of
gravitas to the strait-laced Bagheera".[3][4] Todd VanDerWerff from Vox gave Bagheera the top spot
on a ranking of all the talking animals from the film from best to worst stating: "By the very nature of
the story, Bagheera has to be sidelined for a time — so that Mowgli is forced to confront the dangers
of the jungle alone — but this version of the tale really made me feel the cat's absence. That's a
good sign" "-any iteration of The Jungle Book is only as good as its Bagheera. He's the concerned
parent, worried about what his child will find around the next corner, the big cat who knows he has to
let go just a little but can't find it in himself to do so".[5]

Other media[edit]
 In the 1967 animated Soviet film, Adventures of Mowgli, Bagheera is portrayed as a female. This
may be related to the fact that the Russian word for "panther" is a feminine noun, and a name
ending with 'a' is considered to be a female name in the Russian language (a male panther
would have been named Bagheer). In this version, she has three cubs, one black and two yellow
 with rosette patterns. Bagheera is portrayed as friendly, loyal, trustworthy, and protective, yet
somewhat cunning and tricky.
 In the Japanese anime Jungle Book Shōnen Mowgli, Bagheera is one of Mowgli's closest friends
and strongest allies. Voiced by Hiroya Ishimaru in the Japanese and Arthur Grosser in the
English Dub. Like in the literature, he was formerly a pet panther, but instead of breaking free on
his own, he is set free on purpose, mainly to protect him as his owner was a cruel man, though
the man's daughter Linda was compassionate to him and even went as far as taking a gunshot
for him to ensure his escape. Bagheera later told Mowgli about her and also mourns her.
 In the 1991 song "Bagheera" by Blues Traveler, Bagheera is depicted with blood-stained fur
drinking at the bar, counseling a young man-cub about his choice to live as man or as a free
creature. Mowgli remembers when he was in the midst of his decision to live with the world of
Man or to return to the jungle and be free. The line says "some say if you could have seen him
then, you would have noticed a tear fall from his majestic eye."
 In the 1996 Hungarian play version, Bagheera is again a female panther. Her main role is
bribing the wolf pack with a bull, so they accept Mowgli as Akela's cub, teaching Mowgli with
Baloo about the Rules of the Jungle, and advising him throughout the play.
 In the 1998 film The Jungle Book: Mowgli's Story, Bagheera is portrayed as a female, voiced
by Eartha Kitt.
 In the 2002 comic book series Fables, Bagheera appears as one of the characters living in exile
on the Farm in upstate New York. He participates in the farm uprising and, along with the other
"Kipling" fables, he assists Goldilocks in tracking down Reynard the Fox. Bagheera actually
succeeds in tracking down Reynard, though the Fox manages to escape from him. It is implied
that Bagheera's primary motivation for capturing the Fox is to show up Shere Khan after Khan
arrogantly rejects Bagheera's offer of help. After the uprising is defeated, a remorseful Bagheera
agrees to imprisonment rather than forced labor. However, as he reveals to Mowgli, he has the
memory of urinating on the deceased Shere Khan's grave to amuse himself.
 A 2007 Swedish play version of The Jungle Book spoofed the confusion of Bagheera's sex in
the media by portraying him as a transvestite.
 In the 2018 Netflix film Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle, Christian Bale voiced Bagheera.

See also