Skip to main content

disney - Aladdin: Why Did Wishes Get Revoked?


In the 1992 Disney adaptation of Aladdin, by my count, at least two wishes get revoked without explanation.




  1. Aladdin becoming a prince gets revoked. Somehow. The answer here suggests that Jafar zapped him back to being a peasant, but I'm not sure that makes sense. It looked like Jafar was just revealing Aladdin to be a peasant--not transforming him back. Keep in mind, at this point, Jafar is still less powerful than the genie, and it took the genie several minutes to do the forward transformation.

  2. Jafar's wish of being Sultan gets revoked. And, in this case, there isn't any explanation I can think of. After Jafar wishes to become Sultan, he wishes to become the most powerful sorcerer. He never gives up being Sultan. Yet, somehow at the end of the movie, the real Sultan has his clothes back (how did that happen, anyway?), and he's Sultan again!


The question is: what justifies these?



Answer



The script is very clear on the first point. Jafar doesn't just remove his Aladdin's fancy clothes, he fully reverts him to being a peasant: He literally zaps [Prince] ALI back to [commoner] ALADDIN:



Yes, meet a blast from your past
Whose lies were too good to last
Say hello to your precious Prince Ali!



(JAFAR zaps ALI back to ALADDIN.) - Aladdin Disney Script



In the second case, Jafar doesn't just wish to become the most powerful sorcerer in the world (which he already is, courtesy of wish #2) but to literally become a genie. Now, I appreciate that there's no logical reason why you couldn't be both a sultan and a genie but the phrasing of the wish suggests he no longer wishes to be merely the sultan, he now wants to be a genie instead



JAFAR: Slave, I make my third wish! I wish to be an all powerful genie!


GENIE: (Reluctantly) All right, your wish is my command. Way to go, Al.



If we assume that Jafar stops being the Sultan, then the rightful Sultan would then resume his title and position (and because people need to see this visual change, get his clothes back too).


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Did Dolores Umbridge Have Any Association with Voldemort (or Death Eaters) before His Return?

I noticed that Dolores Umbridge was born during the first Wizarding War, so it's very likely she wasn't a Death Eater then (but she is pretty evil -- who knows?). After that Voldemort was not around in a way that could affect many people, and most wouldn't know he was planning to rise again. During that time, and up through Voldemort's return (in Goblet of Fire ), did Umbridge have any connection with the Death Eaters or with Voldemort? Was she doing what she did on her own, or was it because of an association with Voldemort or his allies? Answer Dolores Umbridge was definitely not a good person. However, as Sirius points out, "the world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters". Remember that he also says that he doesn't believe Umbridge to be a Death Eater, but that she's evil enough (or something like that). I think there are two strong reasons to believe that: Umbridge was proud to do everything according to the law, except when she trie...

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.

aliens - Interstellar Zoo story

I vaguely remember this story from my childhood: it was about an interstellar zoo that came to Earth with lots of bizarre and unusual species, and humans would file through and gape at all the crazy looking creatures from other planets. The twist came at the end when the perspective shifted to the other side of the bars and we discovered that the "creatures" were traveling through space on a kind of safari. They thought they were the visitors and we were the animals. Neither side knew that the other side thought they were the zoo creatures. Answer Got it. Zoo, by Edward D. Hoch. Published in 1958. Link to Publication History Link to PDF

harry potter - What is the difference between Diffindo and Sectumsempra?

In the Harry Potter books, Diffindo is called the 'Severing Charm' and it’s most commonly used to cut ropes and the like. However, in the last book Hermione uses it on Ron but misses, creating a 'slash in his jeans' and his knee gets cut, causing him to 'roar in pain'. We've only seen Sectumsempra used once on screen when Harry directly uses it on Malfoy in the sixth book, but there it's mentioned that he is 'waving his wand wildly'. Wouldn't Diffindo, if used in such a fashion also cause a similar effect? Similarly, if it was able to cut Ron, it would also be able to, say, chop off an ear (George's)? In that case, how are these two spells different, except for Sectumsempra seemingly used exclusively to hurt humans? Answer While Diffindo and Sectumsempra both can be countered by other spells, Diffindo is far more easily countered. Reparo, a relatively common spell, can completely reverse its effect when used once. “He pulled the old cop...