The hyenas are Scar's cackling sidekicks in Disney's animated film The Lion King, first released in 1994, where Shenzi, Banzai and Ed provide much of the film's dark comic relief. Their distinctive laughing, based on the real yipping call of spotted hyenas, became closely associated with scheming villains and gleeful mischief. As short clips from the film circulated on soundboards and social media, the laugh took on a second life as a reaction sound, still instantly recognisable decades later because it needs no words to convey mockery.