Koba (Planet of the Apes)
Koba is an animal film character who features in Planet of the Apes.
Contents |
Biography
Koba
On the day of resuming chimpanzee testing, Koba saw Will and chimpanzee handler Robert Franklin examining the chimpanzees. Determined to get to Jacobs in order to kill him, Koba made sure to get himself picked first by holding out his hand from the slot of his pen, catching Will's attention. As Will dropped a cookie in his hand, Koba quickly ate it and held his hand out to demand another, cementing Will's decision to pick Koba as the first test subject. As Will, Franklin and an assistant strapped him down, Koba noticed Jacobs knocking on the window and joined, satisfying the bonobo to start his revenge on the cruel and greedy man. After Jacobs dressed up in lab testing gear, Koba lied still as Will placed a canister of the new ALZ-113 in an aesthetic machine and placed a breathing mask on Koba's mouth. Waiting for the right moment, Koba breathed in the virus and felt strange before he initiated his surprise attack by bursting through the restraints and trying to lunge at Jacobs. In the process, Koba disconnected his gas mask from the machine and knocked off Franklin's mask. However, before Koba could fully get off the table, the scientist managed to restrain him. Despite losing consciousness after Will reinserted the tube back in the machine, Koba kept breathing in the virus as Franklin rubbed his jaw, unaware that he breathed in the 113. In a matter of hours, Koba felt his brain changed and was placed in a special room with a writing computer screen. Picking up Jacobs' scent as the human walked in, Koba wrote his name and turned to see an astonished Jacobs, displaying his new heightened intelligence as he conspired to kill him.
Koba was later freed by Caesar during the early stages of the Ape Rebellion and immediately admired him for liberating him along with the other experimented apes. It would seem that he went off on his own as he walked in the opposite direction of the apes during his escape but he later met up with the other apes as they were causing mass chaos in the city. He and the other apes then set their sights on the Golden Gate Bridge as their next target before escaping to true freedom. Koba acted as Caesar’s most ruthless and tactically aggressive field commander, transitioning from a liberated lab subject to a terrifying engine of war. As the ape army encountered a heavy police blockade shrouded in thick fog, Koba spearheaded the flanking maneuvers, utilizing the bridge's suspension cables to strike from above while the human forces were distracted by the frontal cavalry charge. He displayed a chilling proficiency with human tactics and weaponry, at one point hijacking a police horse and leaping through a wall of fire to dismantle a machine-gun nest that had pinned down his fellow apes. His actions were characterized by a visceral, retaliatory fury; he did not merely aim to bypass the human resistance but sought to systematically eliminate it, showing no mercy to the officers who stood in his path. This battle served as the definitive turning point for his character, as the adrenaline of combat and the taste of absolute victory over his former oppressors began to eclipse Caesar’s vision of peaceful isolation. By the time the apes successfully breached the blockade and vanished into the Muir Woods, Koba had established himself as the colony's premiere warrior.
Overview
Personality and attributes
In appearance, Koba was a large and muscular evolved bonobo whose frame stood nearly as tall as a chimpanzee, though he possessed the characteristically darker face and leaner physique of his species. His grizzled, jet-black fur was often thinning, marked by several missing patches that resulted from years of self-harming behaviors induced by laboratory isolation. Most striking were the deep physical deformities he carried from a lifetime of human abuse; he suffered from scoliosis, which gave him a pronounced hunched posture with a distinctly raised left side. His face was a map of past trauma, dominated by a long, jagged scar that slashed from his left forehead through his eye and down into his cheek. This injury left his left eye blind and milky white, while his healthy right eye, originally brown, had transformed into a striking vibrant green following his exposure to the ALZ-113 virus. Additional visible scars marred the left side of his neck and his right forearm, and his right ear was distinctively notched. During times of war, he further altered his look by painting his torso and face with white chalk to resemble a skeleton, a visage that complemented his feral and intimidating presence.
Powers and abilities
Koba was a member of the bonobo species that were a type of great ape that was closely related to the chimpanzee but typically characterized by a more gracile and slender build. Being a bonobo meant that his natural physiology was geared toward a more upright posture and a lighter skeletal frame, which granted him a high degree of flexibility and agility. On a basic level, these species-specific traits provided him with exceptional dexterity in his hands and feet, featuring opposable thumbs and big toes that allowed for a powerful, vice-like grip. His anatomy also favored bipedalism more than that of other apes, allowing him to stand or move on two legs with relative ease. Despite the typical peaceful nature of his kind, his specific development as a large and muscular male of the species gave him significant physical strength and endurance, though his bone structure remained inherently less robust than that of a common chimpanzee. Ultimately, his biological makeup provided him with a versatile physical toolkit that combined the nimbleness required for arboreal climbing with the raw animal power necessary for grounded confrontation.
Notes
- Koba was created by Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver where he featured in the setting of the reboot prequel series of the Planet of the Apes universe.
In other media
Novels
Appearances
- Rise of the Planet of the Apes:
External Links
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