What Animal Is Mort From Madagascar?

Dreamworks' "Madagascar" franchise is mostly filled with fuzzy critters that are exactly what they look to be. Alex (Ben Stiller) is a lion, Melman (David Schwimmer) is a giraffe, and King Julien XIII (Sacha Baron Cohen) is a ring-tailed lemur –- that sort of thing. But "mostly" means that some of the animals have a slightly more complicated genetic makeup than what they appear to possess. Take Mort (Andy Richter), for instance. 

On the surface, Mort seems to be a standard Goodman's mouse lemur. Google a picture of Goodman's mouse lemurs and you'll immediately understand that Dreamworks did its research when creating a cast of characters that would naturally inhabit Madagascar (there are a lot of things to notice in "Madagascar," if you pay attention). Mort's even got those terrifying anime eyes that mouse lemurs are rocking in the wild.

Granted, mouse lemurs tend to enjoy a more nocturnal lifestyle than Mort does. And they don't embody horrors quite like Mort does, but they're tiny little fur babies just like Mort is. So that's neat. But you're not still reading because you wanted to know that mouse lemurs are super small. No, you're still reading because you want to know what Mort is hiding. Because Mort is hiding something, just not very well. The thing is... Mort is technically a bear.

Yes, Mort is technically a bear. As in grizzly. In "All Hail King Julien," a 2014 Netflix original series that serves as a prequel narrative for the lemurs of "Madagascar," Mort reveals that he's only 40% mouse lemur. Mort then claims that his father is a literal bear. But that doesn't mean that he's 60% bear because that would make far too much sense.

As confirmed by Dr. S. (Jeff Bennett), a self-taught doctor snake, Mort's DNA also features components from spiders, which allows him to produce webs, and starfish, which allows him to regenerate lost limbs. No, seriously. The spin-off creates more questions than answers.

The most robust conclusion to the question that is Mort is that he's functionally a Goodman's mouse lemur with a thing for feet. He just also happens to contain multitudes, including multiple Mort personalities he's absorbed from other Morts. Please... don't ask. 

If you want to dive into Mort's story for yourself, "All Hail King Julien" and "All Hail King Julien: Exiled" are streaming on Netflix. You might as well, since we're still waiting on a concrete release date for "Madagascar 4."