In this loosely faithful adaptation Sandokan is a usurped and orphaned Bornean tiger prince, who travels the south-china seas as a pirate with his crew of predominantly tigers, leopards and other south-east-asian predators seeking to reclaim his rightful throne from James Brock, the usurper Rajah of Sarawak. Along the way, he washes up on the island of Labuan where Lord James came across him delirious and exhausted in the jungle and brings him back to the mansion where he serves as governor for the British empire. Sandokan wakes up to Lady Mariana playing a sweet melody in the garden just outside his window, but when the governor finds him about to collapse, he is led back to the bed. The two men get acquainted, and Sandokan fearing capture as a hated pirate; gives himself the false identity as the 'Crown Prince Sabbah of Rawa'. Finally introduced to Lady Mariana 'The Pearl of Labuan', he admits he finds her beautiful and the two develop feelings for each other during his stay. Her parents had died in the 'great famine of 45' (presumably referring to the great potato famine in Ireland in 1845-1852.) so she had been left with her uncle shortly before his deployment to Labuan. Mariana begs Sandokan to stay at least till Lord James' birthday celebration in two weeks and at the celebration, he gains Baron William's ire as he defeats the baron in the 'tournament of champions' and wins Mariana's complete affection after weeks of courting. She doesn't care for the evil Baron but he is set on having her hand in marriage regardless and ousts the 'Crown Prince of Rawa' as Sandokan on a dubious yet accurate suspicion. Shortly before he was found out he teases the truth of his identity to Mariana, which he then admits to when he has to escape capture by British soldiers led by the Lord and Baron. He escapes by stealing a uniform and impersonating a soldier, slipping away into the night seas with Jiro Batal.
What follows is a long and grand adventure on the high seas including escaping a siege on the pirate island of Mompracem, the liberation of Lady Mariana from Labuan, evading the British navy led by the Baron, Yañez meeting Surama, and Sandokan overthrowing the usurper Rajah of Sarawak.

These character tags may coexist with existing ones if they are for characters that exist in multiple adaptations of the original stories.

• Sandokan as Sandokan ("the Tiger of Malaysia", a Bornean king, usurped and turned pirate)
• Lady Mariana as Lady Marianna Guillonk ("The Pearl of Labuan", Sandokan's Italian-English wife)
• Yañez as Yanez De Gomera. In this series, Sandokan's brilliant second in command, a brown canid and master of disguises.
• Surama - An indian female fox Yañez falls in love with, and marries.
• San Biglion - Sandokan' pirate crew member, big rotund orange tiger.
• Bataan - Crew member, scaredycat yellow tiger.
• Crackers - Sandokan's pet parrot, and the series' comic relief character.
• Malcolm - Slender tiger that loves to nap but will always wake up for a battle.
• Jiro Batal - Short bearlike creature with whisker-thin fu manchu mustache, helmsman.
• Tybon - A tiger from the island of limba (?) after the evil Rajah raided his island.
• Basangu - A leopard pirate in Sandokan's crew that leaves to attempt to find Sandokan and Jiro Batal during their stay on Labuan, returning weeks later with a captive British soldier.
• Lord James as Lord James Guillonk (Governor and Mariana's uncle wants to kill Sandokan as he is a pirate in British territory.)
• Edward - The head butler in Lord James' employ, a rotund male panda.
• Lawrence - A red panda servant boy at Lord James' mansion.
• Oswald - another red panda servant boy at Lord James' mansion.
• Baron William - Sandokan's 'deadliest enemy', an officer in the British navy.
• James Brock, Rajah of Sarawak as James Brooke, the white Rajah of Sarawak
• Rajah of Sarawak As it is a title of royalty, this tag may be used interchangeably for Sandokan after the conclusion of the story, his father from the flashback or James Brock.
• Commandant An orangutan naval officer in the evil Rajah's employ and a henchman.
• Nazumbata (?) - Raja's head spy, a Dayako in the service of the Raja that dies stumbling into a cauldron of Dayako poison.
• Dayako - A tribe of (implied) cannibalistic simians, often aligned with the evil Rajah. Favoring poison-tipped spears. (species tag)