Gorillas are a genus of large great apes native to the forests and mountains of the African continent on Earth. Two species exist in the genus: The Western Gorilla (Gorilla gorilla) and the Eastern Gorilla (Gorilla beringei).
Biology[]
They are highly intelligent and generally gentle gregarious creatures with a mainly herbivorous diet, gorillas are recognized as one of the closest relatives of the Human species. In the early 19th century the genus was usually regarded as folkloric by Europeans, until skeletal specimens were officially described by Thomas S. Savage and Jeffries Wyman in 1847. Popular culture has often done injustice to Gorillas by depicting them as overly aggressive brutes. Gorilla's are indeed strong, due to their huge forearms. It usually adopts a quadrupedal stance, and engages in knuckle-walking for locomotion.
Gorillas in science fiction[]
- An alien spacecraft crashed in the African jungle in the DC Multiverse resulted in the rise of hyper-intelligent Gorillas with psychic abilities, which built a civilization known as Gorilla City, from which the villainous Grodd was banished. Another Gorilla, Monsieur Mallah, is not a native of Gorilla City but was given higher intelligence by his master, the Brain.
- A gorilla individual was contacted by the Forhilnors and took part in the expedition to find the creator entity in the Betelgeuse system in Robert Sawyer's novel Calculating God.
- Highly Intelligent Gorillas make up part of the Evolved Apes' population in the Planet of the Apes franchise. An extraterrestrial equivalent is also present among the Sororian Apes.
- They are some of the Earth creatures which have been genetically modified, gaining higher intelligence, in the web comic Schlock Mercenary.