Planet of the Apes Characters: Who Is Who Across Every Film

The Planet of the Apes characters fall into three runs: the five original films from 1968 to 1973, Tim Burton's standalone remake in 2001, and the modern films from 2011 to 2024. Names repeat across those runs (Caesar, Cornelius and Nova each appear more than once), so it helps to read the cast by era. For the order the films were made and the order the story runs, see planet of the apes movies in order, and for the full list of titles see planet of the apes movies.

The original series follows a human astronaut, then two chimpanzee scientists, and finally their son, who becomes the ape leader. The main figures are these:

• George Taylor (Charlton Heston): the astronaut who crash lands in Planet of the Apes (1968) and learns the planet is a ruined Earth. He dies in Beneath the Planet of the Apes when he sets off the doomsday bomb. His own page is Taylor in Planet of the Apes.
• Zira (Kim Hunter): a chimpanzee scientist and the most prominent female ape in the original run. She dies in Escape from the Planet of the Apes. See Zira in Planet of the Apes.
• Cornelius (Roddy McDowall in Planet of the Apes (1968) and Escape, David Watson in Beneath): Zira's husband and fellow chimpanzee scientist, killed by a sniper at the shipyard in Escape. See Cornelius in Planet of the Apes.
• Dr. Zaius (Maurice Evans): the orangutan leader who has long known the truth about the planet and destroys the evidence in the Forbidden Zone. See Dr. Zaius.
• Nova (Linda Harrison): the mute human woman who travels with Taylor. She is killed during the underground battle in Beneath. See Nova in Planet of the Apes.
• Caesar (Roddy McDowall): the talking son of Cornelius and Zira, who leads the ape revolt in Conquest of the Planet of the Apes and rules a shared settlement in Battle for the Planet of the Apes.

Several supporting figures matter as well. Brent (James Franciscus) is the second astronaut in Beneath, Mendez (Paul Richards) leads the telepathic mutant humans, and General Ursus (James Gregory) pushes the apes to invade the Forbidden Zone. Dr. Hasslein (Eric Braeden) is the presidential science advisor who hunts the apes in Escape, Armando (Ricardo Montalban) is the circus owner who hides Caesar, and Breck (Don Murray) is the governor Caesar confronts in Conquest. In Battle, the gorilla general Aldo (Claude Akins) breaks the law against ape killing ape and Governor Kolp (Severn Darden) leads the mutants.

Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes (2001) is a standalone remake with its own characters. Leo Davidson (Mark Wahlberg) is the pilot who follows a test chimpanzee through a storm. General Thade (Tim Roth) is the brutal chimpanzee commander, and Ari (Helena Bonham Carter) is the chimpanzee who sympathizes with humans. Attar (Michael Clarke Duncan) and Limbo (Paul Giamatti) fill out the main cast. In the ending, Leo lands in Washington, D.C. and finds the Lincoln Memorial now honors Thade.

The modern run begins with Rise of the Planet of the Apes and tracks one ape's life, then the generations that come after him. There is no 2012 film in the series, so searches for characters from 2012 almost always mean Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011) or Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014).

• Caesar (Andy Serkis): a chimpanzee born to the test subject Bright Eyes and raised by Will Rodman. He leads the apes through Rise, Dawn and War for the Planet of the Apes, where he dies. See Caesar in Planet of the Apes.
• Koba (Christopher Gordon in Rise, Toby Kebbell in Dawn): the ape tortured in a human lab, who shoots Caesar in Dawn and is let fall to his death from the tower. See Koba in Planet of the Apes.
• Maurice (Karin Konoval): the orangutan who befriends Caesar at the shelter and is still beside him at the end of War. See Maurice in Planet of the Apes.
• Rocket (Terry Notary): Caesar's close companion in all three films.
• Will Rodman (James Franco): the scientist who raises Caesar in Rise.
• Malcolm (Jason Clarke) and Dreyfus (Gary Oldman): the human survivors on opposite sides in Dawn.
• The Colonel (Woody Harrelson): the ruthless Alpha-Omega leader in War.
• Bad Ape (Steve Zahn): the lonely chimpanzee who guides the group to the prison camp in War.
• Nova (Amiah Miller): the mute orphan girl Maurice names in War.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes moves many generations after Caesar and introduces a new lead. Noa (Owen Teague) is the young chimpanzee falconer who sets out to rescue his clan. See Noa in Planet of the Apes. Raka (Peter Macon) is the wise orangutan who teaches him Caesar's ideas. Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand) is the king who has enslaved many clans and borrowed the name. See Proximus Caesar. Mae (Freya Allan, credited as Nova / Mae) is the human who can still speak, and Trevathan (William H. Macy) is Proximus's human advisor. Sylva (Eka Darville) is the gorilla who leads the raiders that burn Noa's village.

It could be argued that the series reuses names on purpose, and that the reuse is the quickest way to read the lore. Caesar is the son of Cornelius and Zira in the original films, an unrelated chimpanzee in the modern ones, and a title that Proximus borrows in Kingdom. Cornelius also returns as Caesar's own son in Battle for the Planet of the Apes and War for the Planet of the Apes, and Nova is a different mute human in Planet of the Apes (1968) and in War. The planet of the apes timeline places each era in story order, and the planet of the apes cast shows who played whom across all ten films.

A new film is in development. TheWrap reported on May 6, 2026 that 20th Century Studios has Matt Shakman directing an untitled Planet of the Apes film, written by Josh Friedman, and that it is a new original story rather than a sequel to Kingdom. No release date has been given, so any cast or character news is still open. Updates on the Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes sequel follow the film as it develops.