Wild theory about original Madagascar movie will completely change the way you watch it

A fan theory about the classic kids' movie Madagascar might be more wild than the animated group of animals themselves, but once you hear it you'll likely never see the film the same way again.

Now, movie theories aren’t anything new and chances are they go back as far as cinema itself, but with that said... they still can be pretty fun.

In fact, if you search just about any movie there is bound to be some wild or strange fan-theory about things not being as they seem.

Those that believe in the theories tend to come up with some evidence or reasoning and an enthusiastic Reddit user did just that for the first Madagascar movie that released way back in 2005.

The theory only came about after the viewer, Reddit user qtpiebunnyforever, saw it again on streaming platform Peacock.

The fan theory is pretty bizarre but is interesting all the same (Dreamworks)

The film is also reported to leave the streamer on September 1, so if you want to visit the animated classic and test this theory, you better get moving.

For those that have forgotten the plot of the film, it centers around four New York Central Park Zoo animals who end up stranded in Madagascar.

The four main character are Melman, a giraffe, Gloria, a hippo, Marty a zebra, and Alex, a lion.

Long story short, Marty gets curious about the world, they end up on a shipping vessel and later the seemingly deserted wild island.

But this theory stipulates that the majority of the movie is actually a ‘fever dream' or hallucination of the protagonist, Alex the lion.

While the entire theory is a little too long to get into here, it pretty much boils down to: everything that happens after the animals fall off the ship isn’t real.

The Redditor drew attention to the fact that Alex's crate appears to float off in a different direction to the rest of the animals, adding: "When he crashes on the island there is a sequence showing how he starts to develop what appears to be hallucinations due to starvation and fatigue from the intense heat he is ironically not prepared for...

"As soon as he starts to have these heat and starvation induced hallucinations, he miraculously 'snaps out of it' (at least we are lead to believe) because he miraculously sees Melman just feet away from his struggling to get out of his own crate.

"But how can Melman be there when we clearly saw that he, Marty, and Gloria got washed away into a completely different section of the ocean, just trailing behind the ship?"

Why aren't you watching the film again with this theory in mind? (DreamWorks)

Addressing another noteworthy moment in the movie, the Reddit user continued: "Around the middle of the movie, the four main animals get shown the center of the island by the lemurs and to everyone’s astonishment, the middle of Madagascar looks EXACTLY like the mural painting of the ‘island oasis’ seen back in their home zoo in NYC.

“NONE of them can believe it. Which would make sense if its not real and Alex is just dreaming of the perfect story to make himself feel better after the events on the ship."

Admitting they were 'rambling' about their theory, the Reddit user explained that all of the evidence led them to believe that what happens after the penguins take over the ship is 'a hallucination of Alex’s because he is really stranded and alone on some random island with no one and nowhere to go'.

"He is slowly dying and wishing he could do things over with his friends and try harder to be more open to the outside world like Marty wanted before he dies alone," they claimed.

Admittedly a bit bleak for a kid’s movie, but hey, you never know!