Bat

Bat

Bats are mammals of the order Chiroptera; with their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals naturally capable of true and sustained flight. In many cultures, Bats are popularly associated with darkness, malevolence, witchcraft and death. In the dimension of Jumanji, Bats that resemble African Bats inhabit dark caves as terrifying nocturnal animals that attacks anything that agitate them with loud noises.

Behaviour

Most Bats are nocturnal, and many roost in caves or other refuges; it is uncertain whether bats have these behaviours to escape predators. Some Bats are solitary while others congregate in large clusters of up to millions. They are important in their ecosystems for pollinating flowers and dispersing seeds; many tropical plants depend entirely on bats for these services.

Bats provide humans with some benefits, at the cost of some threats. Bat dung has been mined as guano from caves and used as fertilizer. Bats consume insect pests, reducing the need for pesticides. They are natural reservoirs of many pathogens, such as rabies; and since they are highly mobile, social, and long-lived, they can readily spread disease.

Appearances

• 1995
• 1996
• MB
• TV

In the 1995 film, in the Parrish Mansion, Alan Parrish invited Sarah Whittle to play Jumanji, but she was uninterested and threw the dice onto the game board, activating her Rhino piece. As she was the first to make dice roll, her turn released a flock of Jumanji Bats inside the fireplace, which spooked the kids. Since Alan was about to put the game away, he was spooked again by the chiming clock and dropped the dice and his turn ended up taking him into Jumanji's dimension. Because Sarah was screaming in horror at what she was seeing, the Bats became agitated and flocked out of the fireplace to surround her, scaring her outside the house where they continued to chase her down the street. This experience haunted Sarah for the rest of her life, especially when no-one in Brantford beloved her story about Alan's disappearance.

26 years after Alan's disappearance, at least one Bat stayed inside the attic of the Parrish Mansion, which spooked Peter Shepherd when it stretched its wings, also scaring Nora Shepherd into phoning an exterminator. However, all the Bats seemed to have left the mansion after this and didn't return to bother the players again.

Once Alan Parrish finally reaches Jumanji's crystal ball and calls out the name, all the Bats and other animals were pulled back into the game's dimension and everything from the altered timeline was undone.

In the Jumanji (1996 Video Game), Bats appear both in the game and on the game's box art.

• Tiny Bites (Rhino Totem): The player controls Judy Shepard, alone in the dark attic, swatting away bats and mosquitoes with a tennis racquet, while avoiding spiders, which eat the other enemies but can also harm the player.

Secret symbol: Racquet

Number: 1

In the Milton Bradley board game, the Bat has it's own danger card. Rolling a Racquet on the rescue die within 1 second will defeat the Bat threat.

In the animated series, Bats inhabit caves and tend to hang upside down, preferring not to be disturbed. In The Palace of Clues, a swarm of Bats sleep inside a cave the explorers rest in, until they are woken up by Aston Philips roaring with self pride.