Maybe I just subconsciously wanted the story to different from the dime-a-dozen Physics-Domain stories. 
But more seriously, in looking at the story, I felt Being most closely represented the struggles in the story. Simba’s whole thing is he wants to Be king, but he doesn’t really understand all the responsibilities that comes with that. Scar, meanwhile, wants to Be king in order to earn the respect he never felt while living in Mufasa’s shadow. In order to properly Be king, they have to develop Ability that matches their Desire–Scar fails in his hubris, but Simba succeeds.
As to the Timelock… I don’t know. I’ve been following that thread (didn’t want to interject in the middle of a roiling conversation), but I don’t know how convinced I am. For me, the fundamental sensation of a Timelock is urgency: time is running out, and we have to act fast before success slips away from us. An Optionlock, by contrast, is about deliberation: we have to consider every option before picking the wrong one and letting the correct choice get away from us. The death of the Pridelands due to the reign of a false king has been a slow, painful death, but it’s still been continuous. And if, in an alternate version of the story, Simba was training instead of being lazy, and he said, “All right, I’ll come save you–just in a couple years, once I’m ready,” that wouldn’t work. The Pridelands are dying; they don’t have time for him to improve. I’m not as certain about earlier in the story, but my argument about how Scar needed to act to remove Simba from the picture before he grew old enough to take over for Mufasa feels legit. I can see that Scar executes two different options in attempting to kill Simba/Mufasa, but… I don’t know. I guess that doesn’t feel “Option-y” enough. 
As to the Protagonist bit. Looking purely objectively, only one character Pursues the throne: Scar. I suppose you could argue that Simba Considers ruling justly like Mufasa, while Scar Reconsiders the arrangement between lion and hyena. That makes them non-archetypal Protago-Antagonists. (Nala isn’t a Protagonist; she’s the Sidekick, I’d wager. Mufasa’s Conscience, Rafiki’s Help, Zazu’s Hinder, Timon and Pumbaa are Temptation…) I think that clears up my concerns about the Protagonist deal. With two oppositional characters filling the Protagonistic elements, either one succeeding could potentially be Success, depending on framing.
But by all means, I’d love to see further thought on this. Let me know what you think a better storyform would be. (I just thought it was a shame Lion King hadn’t gotten a full analysis yet.)
