Fossas (Madagascar)

Villains Overview Gallery

Hostile Species
Full Name	Fossas
Alias	Foosa
Origin	Madagascar (2005)
Homeworld	Madagascar
Abilities	Claws Speed Teeth Agility
Members	King Fossa Thrax Adult Fossas Fossa Cubs/Juveniles Mary Ann
Goals	Devour every lemur (likely temporarily succeeded). Devour Marty, Melman, and Gloria. Get rid of Alex the Lion for ruining their chance to rule Madagascar (both failed).
Crimes	Attempted mass murder Stalking Terrorism Psychological abuse Harassment
Type of Hostile Species	Obsessed Predators

“	Fossa hungry, Fossa eat.	„
	~ The Fossas' most famous quote.

The Fossas are the main antagonists of DreamWorks' 10th full-length animated feature film, Madagascar, and major antagonists in its Netflix prequel series, All Hail King Julien.

They are a pack of mongoose-like predators who have frequently attempted to hunt down the lemurs, lead by King Julien, for them to serve their shared appetites. However, such plan of theirs would later be interfered when the lemurs' newfound friends the Zoosters, which consist of Alex, Marty, Gloria, and Melman, have arrived on their presence. They serve as the lemurs' archenemies.

They were all voiced by Fred Tatasciore (who also voiced King Fossa, in the video game adaptation and Teetsi in the second film), Tom McGrath (who served as one of the directors of the film, while also being the voice of Skipper), and Eric Darnell.

History

Madagascar

When Marty, Melman, and Gloria come across King Julien's party, the fossas attack the lemurs and attempt to eat Mort. When Alex arrives, he inquires the fossas for directions to help him and his friends return to New York. However, a spider appears on Alex's back, causing him to scream in fear. The fossas, thinking that Alex is roaring at them, flee in terror. As a result of Alex scaring the fossas away, King Julien and his kingdom congratulate the four animals.

The next morning, during Julien's party with Alex and his friends, the fossas return to raid the kingdom, but Alex roars loudly, causing the fossas to flee once again.

The fossas made a short appearance during the "What a Wonderful World" scene, where they watch Alex walk through their territory after his predatory instincts forced him to attack his friends.

Marty later heads off into the fossa territory to convince Alex to come with them once the ship has arrived. The fossas plan to eat Marty and they chase him. The fossas manage to corner Marty and they pile up on him, but Melman and Gloria arrive in the nick of time and Melman manages to rescue Marty by swinging from a vine. However, Melman crashes into a boulder and the fossas continue to chase the three animals until they are stopped by the penguins. A battle is ensued until Alex arrives and breaks up the fight, declaring that Marty is his kill. As Alex approaches Marty, he secretly tells them his plan to escape and scare the fossas away. Alex clobbers the fossas, declaring Madagascar to be his territory, and he never wanted to see any of the Fossa there again. With a mighty roar, Alex scares the Fossas away for good. After that, the fossas never bothered the lemurs, Alex, and his friends anymore.

Behavior

In their debut film, fossas seemed to be obsessed with lemur-based dishes despite there were other choices of preys in their habitat and beyond, which only worsened their reputation as dangerous, ruthless, evil, mean, wild, murderous, power-hungry, selfish, greedy, and feral beasts in the eyes of King Julien and his people. In fact, they didn't care less if their obsessive hunting on lemurs would likely push their said favorite preys into extinction. Yet, at the same time, they are cowardly, terrified by the presence of more threatening rivals and enemies such as Alex himself.

Their iteration in The Penguins of Madagascar — a spin-off show which semi-canon to the films — appeared to share similar behavior and reputation. In "The Terror of Madagascar" King Julien was understandably wary of the presence of a baby Fossa which brought into Central Park Zoo before realizing him not as bad as he feared, which helped by the latter's young age.

Relationships

Enemies

Alex the Lion

Marty the Zebra

Melman the Giraffe

The Penguins

The Lemurs (archenemies)

Trivia

• Unlike their appearance in the film, fossas hunt alone instead of hunting in packs in real life. However, they do occasionally hunt in small groups to hunt larger lemur species.
• They are misspelled as "Foosa" in the film, the Netflix original, and the video game, likely due to King Julien XIII's mispronunciation of their species name.
• In the video game, they never have any speaking lines and are portrayed as more territorial and ruthless than their movie counterparts.
• They apparently have their own sovereign called King Fossa in the video game, who doesn't appear in the movie at all. He serves as the final boss and a playable character in the shuffleboard minigame. He also serves as a minor character in All Hail King Julien.
• At one point in the video game, Alex erroneously refers to the fossas as cats, partially due to a common misconception of them as a species of wild feline. In fact, fossas are more closely related to mongooses and civets.
• In real life, fossas are much smaller than depicted in the film and wouldn't be strong enough to take down animals like zebras. However, there's an extinct species of giant fossa that was twice as large as its extant counterpart and was capable of hunting down gorilla-sized lemurs, which also went extinct.
• The Fossas hold the record for being the first collective main antagonists in a DreamWorks film, since all of the previous main antagonists from the studio's preceding films before Madagascar are instead individual.
• Realistically, the Fossas aren't inherently evil. They're simply predators doing their job in the ecological system of Madagascar, much like real life.