About

Aladdin is an animated Disney musical film following the titular character who uses the help of a magic genie to win the heart of the princess Jasmine. Released during the period of the Disney Renaissance, it is one of the company's most popular films and has been adapted into a Broadway musical and an upcoming live-action film adaptation.

History

Aladdin is directed by Ron Clements and John Musker with a musical score by Alan Menken. It stars Scott Weinger as Aladdin, Robin Williams as the Genie, and Linda Larkin as Jasmine. The film takes place in the fictional city of Agrabah, where the Grand vizier, Jafar, conspires to take the throne from the sultan by using the power of the genie trapped in a magic lamp. He enlists Aladdin to get the lamp for him, but plans go awry when Aladdin enlists the help of the genie to help him win over the heart of the princess Jasmine.^[1]

The film has a rating of 94 on Rotten Tomatoes^[2] and Metacritic.^[3] Critics praised Williams' performance as the genie, the musical score, and the animation, particularly the mastery that went into making the film's magic carpet an expressive character. The film won Academy Awards for Best Original Score and Best Song ("A Whole New World"). "Friend Like Me" was also nominated for Best Song.

The film had two feature-length sequels, The Return of Jafar and Aladdin the King of Thieves,^[5] a television series, and a Broadway musical adaptation. Aladdin has over 7.9 million likes on Facebook.^[6]

Live-action Remake

In October of 2016, Disney announced a live-action remake of the film was in development with Guy Ritchie directing. In July of the following year, it was announced that newcomer Mena Massoud had been cast as Aladdin, Naomi Scott as Jasmine, and Will Smith as the Genie.^[4] The first trailer for the film debuted on October 11th, 2018 (shown below). The film is set for a May 24th, 2019 release.

Will Smith Genie Reveal

On December 19th, 2018, Entertainment Weekly revealed their cover for the week's magazine, which featured the cast of the live-action remake, including Will Smith as the Genie^[7] (shown below).

Smith as the Genie prompted strong responses from Twitter users. User @hullojess tweeted that she wished she'd never seen it, gaining over 830 retweets and 3,600 likes (shown below, left). User @Kyle_Cardine tweeted a photoshopped image of a Simpsons scene, gaining over 1,600 retweets and 7,800 likes (shown below, right).

Twitter users also made comparisons between the appearance of Smith to Sinbad in the non-existent film Shazaam!, a classic example of The Mandela Effect. User @RJCity1 gained over 240 retweets and 1,200 likes making the comparison (shown below, left) and user @Bacon_House gained over 90 retweets and 570 likes (shown below, right).

Related Memes

Aladdin has appeared in many Disney-related memes. One of the most popular was a series of Name Puns centering around Jafar (examples shown below).

Skate or Die

Skate or Die is a slang catchphrase in skateboarding culture meaning if you're not skateboarding you may as well be dead. One of the most popular image macros to use the phrase is a Didney Worl picture of Aladdin with the text "It's skate or die, dude. You either skate, or you die" laid over it. The first known post of this image came on January 7th, 2014, on the Tumblr account babylizard.^[5] It has since gained over 176,000 notes (shown below). This image has grown into a meme on Tumblr, where it has inspired several variations.

Search Interest

External References