toby kebbell was koba in dawn of the planet of the apes.
who is koba in dawn of the planet of the apes?
toby kebbell
toby kebbell, who portrayed koba in "dawn", had expressed interest in reprising his role or performing as other characters. plans to include koba in a larger role in the film were abandoned early, with bomback saying, "if you stayed until the very end of "dawn of the planet of the apes", you hear koba's breathing. we did that to give us a tiny crack of a possibility that we could revive koba if we wanted to. very early on in spitballing, we realized there was nothing more to do with koba—certainly nothing that would exceed what he had done in the last story. but we knew we wanted to keep him alive as an idea. in playing out the reality of what happened at the end of the last film, caesar would be traumatized by having to kill his brother. that would have resonance, and we wanted to make sure that did not get lost. so the answer was that we could go inside caesar's mind at this point and revisit koba that way."
war for the planet of the apes
koba returns in the "dawn of the planet of the apes" as the main antagonist. he is now a lieutenant and close friend of caesar, who treats him like a brother. however, when surviving humans appear, koba's darker nature reemerges and he begins pushing for open war against the humans, considering them a threat and remembering all the torture he suffered at their hands. caesar wants peace with the humans, putting him and koba at odds, and eventually leading to a brutal brawl between the two which nearly kills koba. despite being spared and forgiven for his insolence, koba decides to overthrow caesar and shoots him with a human rifle under cover of darkness, causing him to fall off a cliff. framing the humans for caesar's "death", koba leads the ape colony in a vicious attack against the humans. despite heavy casualties, koba and the apes win, killing many humans and imprisoning the rest to show them what it feels like to be in a cage. however, caesar is revealed to have survived koba's assassination attempt, and the two fight for leadership of the tribe. caesar eventually manages to overpower koba and tackles him, leaving him clinging for dear life on the ledge of a shaft in the centre of a partially finished skyscraper. koba hypocritically begs for mercy, but caesar disowns him as an ape and lets him fall to his death.
list of planet of the apes characters