Caesar

From The Sacred Scrolls

For the proposed new movie Caesar, see Planet of the Apes: Caesar.

Caesar

Actor	Roddy McDowall
Gender	Male
Race	Chimpanzee
Born	1973
Died	?
Continuity	Movies
Appearances
First Appearance: Escape from the Planet of the Apes Last Appearance: Battle for the Planet of the Apes

Caesar - originally named 'Milo' after Dr. Milo, who had travelled back in time with Caesar's parents Cornelius and Zira to the Earth of Taylor's era - was given the name 'Caesar' by his human foster father Armando, a circus owner. (The reasons for the name change are not explained; Armando might have given him the name to conceal his identity, or inspire the young ape to take command of his species.) He was the chief instigator of the ape revolution in the fourth entry in the Planet of the Apes movie series, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, and the ruler of Ape City in the fifth and final film, Battle for the Planet of the Apes.

He first appears as a baby at the very end of Escape from the Planet of the Apes. His parents are fugitives on the run when Zira gives birth. To protect the child, she swaps him with the recently-born 'Salome', daughter of Heloise, a chimp in Armando's circus. When Dr Hasslein killed Cornelius and Zira, he also tried to kill baby Milo, but what he actually killed was the primitive chimp baby Salome, whose body Zira drops into the sea to prevent the discovery of the switch. In the final scene of the movie (by when some time must have passed) he is just beginning to talk. Presumably Heloise partly raised the young chimp in the intervening years between Escape and Conquest of the Planet of the Apes before Armando began raising Ceasar almost as a son.

In the opening minutes of Conquest, he and Armando are visiting a large city for the first time, and Armando leads him around on a chain. In private, though, Caesar stands nearly erect, and chats back and forth with Armando like a father and son. Armando critiques Caesar's "act" of behaving like a primitive chimpanzee, then gives him an idea of what to expect: In the years Caesar has been growing up in the provinces, many of the events his parents warned humanity about before they were murdered, in an attempt to prevent their occurrence, have taken place (albeit at a much faster pace than predicted) – the big one being the spaceborn plague that killed virtually all of Earth's dogs and cats, leaving humanity without pets. Monkeys at first took their place, then gradually apes, who progressed (so to speak) from companions to household helpers – to their present state of slavery.

Caesar tries to take what he sees (groups of apes being dispersed, chimps and orangutans being scolded or punished for honest mistakes – or for exhibiting apelike behaviour) in stride, but when he sees an ape (Aldo) first beaten by police, then shocked with a cattle prod, he impulsively cries out "Lousy human bastards!" When the police turn their attention his way, Armando insists that he was the one who spoke (and had said "inhuman", not what they thought they heard), but other people nearby swear differently. Caesar panics and runs away, leading them to suspect he understands what's going on – and perhaps he can speak.

Armando is released, and catches up with Caesar momentarily, but knows now their charade that Caesar is a mute, primitive ape might have failed. He instructs Caesar to hide among his own, and join a shipment of apes brought in by boat, if Armando can't convince the authorities that he's harmless – and only ran away because of the commotion. Armando goes downtown, to try to bluff their way out of trouble. When he fails to return, Caesar infiltrates a shipment of apes.

Passing his conditioning with flying colours, Caesar is next sold to Governor Breck, supervised by his assistant Mr. MacDonald, ironically an African-American descended from slaves. When Breck decides to formally name him, he takes out a reference book, turns to a page and points to a name at random, then bids Caesar to do likewise. Caesar chooses his adopted name, pretending to do so randomly, and is so registered. Next he is assigned to the city's "command post" – the communications centre for Ape Management, and its lockup for disobedient apes. He is also selected to mate with a female chimp.

When Caesar learns that Armando died while in custody, he decides enough is enough, and begins plotting an ape revolt, conspiring with other apes and driving them to turn on their masters. (In the script and in the Marvel Comics' adaptation of Conquest, one of his aides is Aldo (a gorilla) - Cornelius had previously declared Aldo to be the first ape to say "No!" to a human. Aldo has a prominent role in the sequel.) When Caesar is belatedly traced and discovered not to have been part of any ape shipment, he is captured and tortured by Breck, to see if he is indeed the talking offspring of two talking apes. MacDonald excuses himself from the scene, and changes the breaker settings for the electroshock table Caesar is wired to. He can't prevent Caesar from being shocked to where he finally chokes out the words "Have pity!", but he can prevent Caesar from being electrocuted.

Believed dead, Caesar kills the handler assigned to dispose of him, then throws the switch that opens all the cages in the ape lockup, and the revolt begins. Hours later, much of the city is in flames, the police and military have been beaten down, and the apes are in control, as Caesar predicts will happen around the world when word spreads. MacDonald tries to dissuade Caesar from further violence, while Lisa becomes the next ape to speak, telling Caesar "No!" when he condemns all humanity.

In the fifth and final movie, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, human and ape children gather around a statue of Caesar, now a legend who's been dead for six hundred years, as the Lawgiver tells them the story of how Caesar fought another battle, 27 years after the first, that both solidified his position as ape leader, and convinced him to give a joint ape-human society a chance, instead of one species dominating the other. Having overthrown human society and left it to destroy itself, Caesar led the freed apes and sympathetic humans to found a new colony. This was threatened by both vengeful mutated humans and by petty rivalries among the apes. Ceasar overcame his obstacles to try to ensure peace between the species. He has become the central figure in the apes saga - the intelligent ape from the future who creates the Planet of the Apes. The Lawgiver earlier in the series had laid down the command that humans were to be shunned and driven out; the sight of him regarding the children of both species alike at the end, is persuasive that the timeline had indeed been changed, and Caesar had given the world a better future (assuming that the Lawgiver's teachings were not distorted in later generations).

[edit] Notes

The voice of the infant 'Baby Milo' in the closing scene of Escape from the Planet of the Apes was provided by Walker Edmiston.
In the first story outline for Battle..., Caesar is shot dead by Aldo at the movie's climax.^[1]
Malibu Graphics/Adventure Comics' original Planet of the Apes comics had the spirit of Governor Breck somehow revived by the surviving mutant humans of the city, through an occult ritual. He then went on a rampage through the Forbidden Zone, killing any apes and unsuitable humans he found via his magical powers. Ultimately, the only thing able to stop Breck was the revived spirit of Caesar, who devoured Breck's evil presence.
MR Comics' Revolution on the Planet of the Apes comics details the events surounding Conquest. Here, Caesar had 'inherited memories' (as in the Pierre Boulle novel), partly due to his having travelled through time while in the womb (Zira was already pregnant by the time of Beneath the Planet of the Apes).
In 2008, Production Weekly reported Scott Frank was to direct a new Planet of the Apes film tentatively entitled 'Caesar'.