DisneyToons Review: Aladdin and the King of Theives

 

DisneyToons 4th film.

http://putlocker.is/watch-aladdin-and-the-king-of-thieves-online-free-putlocker.html

My opinion right after watching movie

My opinion right after watching the film is that it is a lot better than The Return of Jafar, and it has a lot of creativity to it. It took a place that has not been explored in the other two films, which is exactly what a sequel should do. I do dislike that most of the other characters have little to nothing to do though.

Production

So after the success of The Return of Jafar, in 1995, they announced another sequel to the film. Joe Rath apologized to Robin Williams for the breach of contract for Aladdin, and he was forgiven, saying that he will return to this film. All of the recordings of Dan Castellaneta were cut from this film in favor of Robin Williams.

Story

So the film starts off with a bunch of clear bandits walking into a lineup, which eventually ends at the palace, since it is Aladdin (Scott Weinger) and Jasmine (Linda Larkin)’s wedding day. Razoul complains about them getting married, and Genie (Robin Williams) tells him to suck it up, before going on to sing Its A Party Here in Agrabah, which I have to say is a nice song. Everyone is singing about their opinion on the scandalous couple, Jasmine is thrilled about marrying her first friend, and Aladdin is excited, but is sad that he did not have a father to teach him how to be a man and to raise a family. He went to grab the knife that was his fathers, and tells Genie that he died a long time ago.

He reaches the wedding, and Jasmine walks down the aisle.Right as they were about to say their vows, the King of Thieves named Cassim (John Rhys-Davies) and his crew planned to steal the jewelry from the palace, though their main goal is to get the Oracle, which they put into motion, by poking an elephant to run and break up the palace.

So the crew quickly steal many of the possessions that the guests had on, and the gifts the couple received, though Aladdin had to fight Cassim for the Oracle. I have a slight nitpick about this; How did Cassim and his group of thieves know that the Oracle staff was at the palace? It seems like something that would have been important for them to elaborate on…..just a little.

The Oracle (C. C. H. Pounder) is activated, and she explains to Aladdin, that her power is the Rule of One, meaning that she can only answer one question. Iago wastes his question when eh asks her, but that is not really important. Aladdin is sure of his future (Jasmine), but he has a bunch of questions about where he came from, which the Oracle replying that he can ask his father those questions, causing him to stop in his tracks, realizing that his father is alive. She shows him who he is, and it is the King of Thieves.

They are back at his home on the rooftop, and he is shocked by the news. Him and Jasmine sing about how he will be a fine father, and how Sultan was a good man, and pretty much singing about the role of a father figure, which he never had, but Jamsine had the luck of having. I believe the title of the song is called Love Is Not Out of Thin Air or something. Aladdin asks her where Cassim is, and she tells him that he is trapped within the Group of Theives, and to follow their path to their hidden world. Jasmine tells him to take all of the time he needs to get the info that he has longed to know.

Aladdin travels with Carpet, Iago (Gilbert Gottfried), and Abu (Frank Welker), and follows their path. They watch the bandits yell the secret words “Open Sesame” to reveal their secret passageway, which leads to their liar. Aladdin and crew fly through the trail, and they see the lair of the 40 thieves himself. One of the thieves named Sa’Luk (Jerry Orbach) tells Cassim that his time is up, pissed that they still do not have the Oracle. Aladdin sees this, and attacks SaLuk, thinking that his father is trapped and is in real danger. The knife falls out of Aladdin’s pocket, and Cassim realizes that it is his son, knowing that his name is Aladdin.

Hold up, hold up, hold up. So a knife causes you to recognize that he is your son (saying his name before he ever told you it, or said anything), but when you are at the wedding (where MANY are saying Aladdin’s name over and over again), you had NO inkling that he was your son form then? You fought him, and you did not know it was him? You knew his name, and were around him and his mother to know his name, but from going to the well publicized wedding, you did not know that the man who was marrying the princess was your son? This is an issue to me.

So they have a reunion, which is cut short when Sa’ Luk reminds Cassim of the rule that intruders need to be instantly killed. To get his son out of certain death, Casism demands him to do “The Challenge”, which is really the fight to the death, where Sa’Luk puts himself in the position to be the one to fight Aladdin. Al is getting destroyed by Sa’Luk, and falls, only for him to kick Sa’luk off the cliff, and to fall into the river. Aladdin is now deemed as the replacement of Sa’Luk, now officially a member of the 40 thieves (which they felt like needed to put into a song). Wouldn’t it be smart to return him to marry Jasmine, so she can ship them some money? I am sure she would not have an issue financially supporting her father in law.

Speaking of Jasmine, she is worried about Aladdin, since she thought he would be back by now. genie cheers her up by healing her plan her wedding (which has her dressing up as Snow White and Cinderella), which cheers her up for a bit. Again, I wish she does more in this film. Back at the 40 thieves, Aladdin invites his father to the wedding, but Cassim does not feel comfortable, since he is now of the best criminals around. Cassim then tells him that they are after the Hand of Mitis, which is why he left Aladdin and his mother, hoping that he could find it, and so they can receive a bunch of riches to get out of their rough lifestyle. Iago tells him that his son’s wedding is the last chance he has to get The Oracle.

Turns out that Sa’Luk is alive, and managed to make it back to Agrabah, where he sells out Cassim to Razoul (Jim Cummings), telling him about the secret hiding spot. The next day, Razoul  goes to the hideout, and tries to do all of the instructions that was given to him to get to the hiding spot, but fails. Cassim and Aladdin returns to the place, and Genie is ready to arrest him, though Aladdin tells him to stop. For some reason, Genie felt the need tossing a song about father and son bonding time.

So Cassim makes a good impression on Jasmine and the Sultan, as they see some similar characteristics that Aladdin has, and it is revealed that Aladdin and Genie decided to tell Jasmine and her father that Cassim is NOT the King of Thieves, and was a captive for years. Sigh he CONTINUES to LIE to her in this film too? Are you serious? When will eh ever learn? I do not know if this is flanderization, but he still continues to lie to her, which is not growth. It is just frustrating.

So Razoul manages to capture the other thieves, who are pissed off that Sa’Luk sold them out, only for him to not be persecuted as well. Sa’Luk tells Razoul that Aladdin is one of the 40 thieves, which causes him to rush to the palace, right in time to see and capture Cassim and Iago stealing the Oracle. They are arrested, and it is known that Cassim is the King of Thieves. Aladdin is extremely pissed off that his father screwed things up by his own greed, but is convinced by Genie that he still needs to support his father Aladdin decides to dress up (I have to say the arabian clothes in this film are very creative and an upgrade from what we saw in the past 2 films), break into prison, and to release his father, so they can part ways for good, since Aladdin sees that he is better off without his father.

The guards chases Aladdin (disguised as his father) throught he time, but when that is soon discovered, Cassim saves his son form being locked up by Razoul. The both of them run out of town, and Cassim tells him that he is sorry for everything he lost, but he cannot go back to Agrabah, with Iago telling him that they have the treasure of the Oracle. Aladdin dismisses them, and tells his father that he chose money over him again, and he will not abandon Jasmine, like his father abandoned him and his mother.

SaLuk goes to the hideout to see the remaining 8 thieves (the other 40 were locked up, and hates Sa’Luk), convincing them that Cassim sold out the other 40 thieves. When Cassim and Iago go to the hideout, they are ready to kill Cassim, but they tie him up to a boat, and they keep him hostage.

Aladdin is at the palace, and is sulking, still mad over his father, offering to turn himself in. Jasmine tells him to lighten up, since she would have done the exact same thing if it was her father……… I guess that makes him lying to her fine. Sultan says that he cannot overlook his father’s crimes, but brushes off Aladdin’s helping a criminal break hostage, since he was willing to take responsibility and the consequences for it, also revealing that they should not push back the wedding anymore. Iago flies to them, and tells them that Cassim is captured, and convinces Aladdin to go after his father.

The crew all go to the location where the Hand of Mitis is, and reunites with his father. Sa’Luk forces them to find the Hand of Mitis, which they do. Right when things are looking good, Sa’Luk shows up, and threatens Cassim to give him the Hand of Mitis, or he wil kill Aladdin. Cassim gives him the hand, since he is not willing to lose his son, but Sa’luk has the “fuck it” mentality, and goes after Aladdin anyways. The problem is that Sa’Luk directly touched the golden hand, causing him to turn into gold, and falls to plummet in the water. Cassim gives up the hand, and throws it, where it lands on the boat, causing the boat and the other thieves to somehow sink…… I guess.

Aladdin and Jasmine soon get married, where Cassim witnesses from the back with no mask or cover. Iago and him leave Agrabah, to go on a bunch of unplanned adventures, and the peddler that was was narrating in the beginning of Aladdin reappears to close out the story. The married couple fly by them, say goodbye to a horse ridden Cassim and Iago, and thee film ends with the couple having a naughty kiss.

I have always liked the Aladdin series, and I will continue to like it, because the world is very interesting. For a sequel, it continued the story pretty good, though there were some loopholes that they could have better paid attention to that hurt the film. The film added something new to the series, and it was a pretty decent conclusion to the entire franchise. I just wish a lot of the other characters had more to do.

Characters

The characters were somewhat better handled in this film. While I did not like some of Aladdin’s actions, and I felt like most of the other characters had nothing to do, it is the same cast I fell in love with in the first film.

I liked how we got more backstory on his family dynamics, and insecurities about being a man thanks to having a lack of a father figure. You felt his pain, though I did not like how he always resorts to lying for an immediate solution.

He is a bad father, as he let his greed take over, since he thought he had no family. He acknowledged that he wronged his son, but the sense of adventure is too good for him to become completely domesticated. He was a decent character, though there is a lot questionable about him.

Sa’luk was one of Cassim’s allies, but it is clear that he was always jealous of Cassim. As a villain, eh was just plain gutter, and acknowledges that he is the lowest of the low, who will do the lowest of the low to get what he wants.

She had a……. bit more of a part in this film? She stayed back at the palace fro most of the film, and told Aladdin to support his father. She feels like much more of a side character than a deuteragonist in the later additions of the franchise.

Even with Robin Williams being back, Genie’s jokes were still stale, and he still had no use in the film.

The other characters are too useless to even mention in this section.

Animation

The animation is still animation only for television, but you can definitely tell that there are some improvements. The character designs match much more closely to the original film (there is still huge differences),  and there is more detail and color in the overall film with the animation department. It is not a complete sore to the eyes.

Music

The music for this film is actually original music (while The Return of Jafar just reused many scores from Aladdin), and I felt like the songs were definitely better placed, had more significance, and was more soothing to listen to in this movie.

Reception at Release

When the film was released on August 16th, 1996, it was reportedly outselling its immediate predecessor, but Disney refused to actually say if it did (it probably did), and garnered around $130 million.

Critically, it was panned, but many agreed that it was better than The Return of Jafar, which does not really say much.

Reception Today

Well today, some people say that this is one of the only good DisneyToons films, and is much better than The Return to Jasfar, though many do realize that it is severely flawed.

Final Score

Story: 6.5/10

Characters: 5.5/10

Animation: 6/10

Music: 7/10

25/40 = 63%

Next time…

Review: February 2nd, 2015

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