Hello there fellow wiki users! While I’ve been a user myself here for about 2 months now, I have yet to propose a villain for the Pure Evil category in the new, current format. I did propose a couple of characters who I thought deserved to be there when we were still using the old format, but since then, I honestly haven’t thought of any others that I thought were overlooked and worth bringing up.
However, as pretty well everyone here knows, new works of entertainment are constantly being released, which always presents the possibility of new candidates… and having watched the new live-action Aladdin movie, I witnessed what seemed like the single most notable and surprising case of “adaptational villainy” so far in this recent set of live-action remakes of Disney classics. Therefore, I thought this would be a great opportunity to finally try my hand at the new proposal format, and see if anyone else feels the way I do about the new version of a certain classic villain.
So, seeing as how today marks two weeks since its theatrical release, and since I have reserved the right to discuss it, let’s open the discussion without any further delay…
On a side note, due to changing my username since posting this, for some weird reason, you can't see the votes anymore. If you want to see them, and by extension, the proof that this was approved, follow the redirect here.
What’s the work?[]
As many people are probably aware, Aladdin (2019) is the live-action remake of the well-known animated film from Disney in 1992. Most people probably already know the plot, but for those that don't, there's this great site I use that reviews movies both parentally and artistically which already has a solid synopsis for the film, and I'll simple borrow theirs since I doubt I could word it much better myself:
“In the long-ago city of Agrabah, Aladdin (Mena Massoud) is a common street thief who, along with his pet monkey Abu, steals to stay alive. He always manages to elude the palace guards who try to catch him, and manages to impress Princess Jasmine (Naomi Scott) upon their chance meeting. She's ventured out into the city pretending to be her handmaiden, Dalia (Nasim Pedrad), and isn't recognized by the masses due to being unseen for years. That's because her widowed father, the Sultan (Navid Negahban), wants to protect her until he finds a proper prince suitor to marry her. That doesn't sit well with her, what with wanting to eventually take over for her father, something both he and his Royal Vizier, Jafar (Marwan Kenzari), remind her is against their long-standing laws. But Jafar has ulterior motives in that he wishes to become the Sultan and knows that a magic lamp located in the Cave of Wonders can make that happen.
The only problem is that so far no one has been nimble and smart enough to abide by the rules of the cave, but he thinks he might have found the right person in Aladdin. With Jafar promising to make him rich enough to impress Jasmine in exchange for him obtaining the lamp, Aladdin enters the cave and through a series of events ends up trapped inside there with Abu, a magic carpet they've rescued and a genie (Will Smith) who emerges from the lamp. With Genie informing Aladdin he can grant him three wishes, Aladdin hopes to use them to impress Jasmine enough that she'll fall for and maybe marry him, but must then contend with Jafar wanting to get his hands on that lamp to get his own set of wishes.”
So with that description out there for anyone who’s not familiar with the story already (though I’m sure most people already are), it shouldn’t be much of a surprise who the topic of discussion is here… but what could be is how much nastier the character is than how you remember him from before. So let’s go over this film’s version of Jafar.
Who is Jafar and what does he do?[]
Jafar is the main antagonist of the story and the evil Grand Vizier to the Sultan of Agrabah who secretly wants to usurp the Sultan and gain the authority and power he feels he deserves by using a magic lamp hidden in the Cave of Wonders. He is introduced forcing at least one prisoner to go into the Cave of Wonders, only for them to be swallowed by it for being deemed unworthy (in contrast to the original, where Gazeem was a partner-in-crime, and at least partly entered of his own accord). He then quickly establishes his murderous streak when he rants to an underling about, among other things, the “bodies he’s buried” to get to where he is now, before proceeding to knock the man down a deep well to his death just for telling him he’s already second in power only to the Sultan in an attempt to dissuade him from his intent to overthrow him.
It’s important to note, however, that this version of Jafar doesn’t just want to overthrow the Sultan as the ruler of Agrabah; as he reveals to Aladdin before sending him into the Cave of Wonders, he himself had a poor upbringing as a street rat, not unlike Aladdin and many others, and this has caused him to develop an intense hatred for the neighboring kingdom of Shirabad, the place where he grew up and spent 5 years in prison. Because of this, he tries to brainwash the Sultan with his staff into declaring war on them despite the fact they're one of their closest allies only to be interrupted by Jasmine during an attempt to do so. This also ties into why he schemes to get Princess Jasmine to marry a prince; so he can manipulate their army into carrying out this task.
For a little while afterwards, he mostly carries out the same actions he did in the original movie; when Aladdin retrieves the lamp, he tries to take it from him and let him fall to his death. He then tries to kill him a second time when he sees through the Prince Ali disguise he’s donning using his first wish from Genie by tying him to a chair and throwing him into the sea to drown him so he can take the lamp. When Aladdin survives thanks to Abu and the carpet bringing him the lamp and Genie bending the rules to save him, he promptly reveals Jafar’s treachery to the Sultan, who sends him to the dungeon once he also discovers that he’s been brainwashing him with his staff (which Aladdin solves by smashing it on the floor). However, thanks to his trusty parrot Iago snatching the keys, he quickly frees himself and steals the lamp from Aladdin off the streets of Agrabah by using a diversionary trick he learned during his time on the streets.
Quickly proclaiming himself the Genie’s new master and making his way back to the palace, Jafar uses his first wish to make himself Sultan, and tries to have Hakim, the head of the palace guards, lock up the Sultan and Jasmine while he has Agrabah’s forces launch a full-scale invasion on Shirabad. However, Jasmine manages to appeal to Hakim’s honor and convince him that Jafar’s not worthy of his position, enraging Jafar into using his second wish to become a powerful sorcerer. He then quickly uses his new power to presumably banish all the guards and Jasmine’s pet tiger Rajah to the dungeon, and banishes Aladdin and Abu to the north to freeze to death. Stating that he could kill the Sultan, Jasmine and her handmaid Dalia right then if he wanted to, he decides that’s too good for them for all their supposed abuse and disrespect towards him. He then uses dark magic with his new staff to torture and threaten to kill the Sultan and Dalia by causing them visible internal agony to cow Jasmine into marrying him… not because it gives him any additional authority, but solely to make Jasmine suffer by forcing her into an unwanted marriage, and to make the Sultan suffer, because he will have “lost her”.
However, Aladdin and Abu are saved from freezing in the Arctic by the carpet, who was sent there by Genie, and get back just in time to save Jasmine from the forced wedding, who also escapes with the lamp. Jafar then uses his new staff to turn Iago into a giant bird of prey to steal the lamp back, having him fly right through the streets of Agrabah, completely uncaring of the collateral damage this could cause. After smashing several buildings in the process when landing (but thankfully with no visible casualties) and stealing the lamp back, the Sultan separates him from his new staff to turn Iago back to his regular size. However, Jafar then uses his personal magic to summon a sand tornado to bring them all back to him, which destroys the magic carpet in the process, immobilizes Jasmine, the Sultan and Dalia in suspended bubbles of magic, and starts torturing Aladdin with the same dark magic he used previously.
However, at this point, Aladdin exploits Jafar's hate of being second-best to anyone by pointing out that Genie will always be more powerful then him, and will eventually cease to serve him. Taking the bait, Jafar then wishes to be made “the most powerful being in the world”, which prompts Genie to make him none other than a powerful genie himself. Reveling in his new power, Jafar quickly declares that the first thing he’ll do is “lay waste” to the “fools in Shirabad”, and starts building up a concentrated orb of silver energy to annihilate the kingdom with. However, this is where Aladdin reveals that, oops… he’s now a genie without a master, which makes him a prisoner of a lamp of his own. Angrily swearing to get revenge for doing this to him, Jafar uses his last free moments to pull Iago down with him into the lamp so he at least won’t be stuck there alone. Genie then tells him that hopefully, spending a thousand years in the Cave of Wonders will cool him off before chucking the lamp far into the distance, with everyone now being freed from the dungeon and his magic, and both kingdoms now being safe from his tyranny for the foreseeable future.
Does he have any redeeming qualities or a valid excuse for his actions?[]
This part is actually kind of interesting. Unlike his animated counterpart, he’s not simply power-hungry here, but comes from a poor and impoverished background, and he even states that he served 5 years in prison back when he has in Shirabad. At least in theory, this should make him comparably more sympathetic, since he clearly wants to rise above his previous circumstances and in a way, this is understandable, due to how unfairly the poor are treated and looked down upon.
However, this never materializes into a truly sympathetic or valid excuse for his actions, and if anything, it mostly just motivates him to attempt things that it doesn’t justify whatsoever (more on that later). As Genie says to Aladdin early on, when you go down the path of pursuing money and power, you get to the point where you can never have enough of them… and Jafar is clearly the embodiment of that philosophy. In spite of his background, he never shows any compassion or sympathy towards others like Aladdin who share his former struggles, and is consistently shown to only be concerned with his own well-being. He’s also not shown to be content with merely having a high-ranking position and a solid amount of respect, which he clearly already has; he won’t settle for anything less than being above absolutely everyone and everything, and anyone in his way is an obstacle to dispose of, regardless of whether they’re rich or poor, as shown with how he tries to repeatedly murder Aladdin. The one time he truly tries to paint himself as well-intentioned is when he has a brief argument with Jasmine after he makes himself Sultan about how he’s concerned with seeing Agrabah’s glory restored, but this is very obviously a weak attempt to look good in front of Hakim and the guards, and Jasmine puts it simply and accurately when she retorts he just wants glory for himself. His spite and hatred for the Sultan, in particular, comes off as downright petty since other than scolding him when he goes too far by suggesting they wage war on one of their closes allies (that being Shirabad), he’s shown to treat him just fine.
Other than that, it’s pretty obvious that, like his animated counterpart, Jafar has no truly positive or honorable qualities. In fact, while that Jafar at least had a charismatic sense of humor that added some genuine levity to his actions and ambitions, this one doesn’t even have that going for him; he has practically no sense of humor, almost constantly seems on the verge of losing his temper, and in general, he and his actions are treated very seriously, making him a much darker character that elicits very few laughs, and earns much detestability. Obviously, his relationship with Iago’s not an issue, because compared to the original film, Iago acts much more like a typical parrot, and is simply a useful pet/tool to him, and just like that version, he has no problem dragging him down with him to share his fate of being trapped in a lamp for as long as an eternity. Finally, while the rather creepy and lustful attraction he developed towards Jasmine in the original is absent and may make him look slightly better in that particular respect, it’s simply replaced by the same hatred and desire to make her suffer that he has towards the Sultan coupled with a degrading and misogynistic attitude, making it all the more obvious he has no care for her whatsoever in this version.
Is he heinous by the standards of the work?[]
Now, as usual, this is probably where people’s opinions are most likely to differ, but regardless, there are some important facts here that must be considered. First of all, for all his ambition and desire for power in the original, Jafar never actually killed anyone, and even including attempts, only had those same attempts to kill Aladdin to his credit, and let’s face it; the vast majority of Disney antagonists have tried to kill the protagonist, some in much nastier ways than him, so this is completely standard for Disney film villainy. That and, again, he probably ended up eliciting almost as many laughs and amusement as he did hate for many people. In addition, when you take the direct-to-video sequels and TV series into consideration, there were other villains who were treated more seriously, particularly Mozenrath from the latter, who was probably just as heinous, if not possibly more so than him.
As far as we know now, this should be a standalone film like every other live-action remake so far, which takes the possibility of other villains entering the picture and raising the bar out of the equation. And frankly, even though this film still deals with the concepts of poverty and prejudice, and many like Aladdin needing to lie and steal to survive, in some ways, the film is even more tame than the original version; for example, when Jasmine gave food to starving children from a vendor in the original, the man actually threatened to cut her hand off, whereas here, he only grabs her by the wrist and makes no reference to attempting this. It also removed a couple of references to slavery, like changing a lyric in the original Prince Ali song to only refer to him having many servants instead. All in all, it’s actually a pretty tame setting with a low in-universe standard.
With all that established, this Jafar? While it’s offscreen villainy, he establishes himself as very murderous from the beginning by implying he has done this to many people to get where he is, and quickly gives us a demonstration by killing a jailor for merely mentioning he’s second to the Sultan (and for bonus points, he meant it as a compliment). However, while that does effectively set the tone for his character, it’s his actions when he rises to power, especially concerning Shirabad, that really make him stand out for an otherwise light and family-friendly film; he intends to invade and wage ware on a neighboring kingdom, all because of a big chip on his shoulder for growing up poor and being imprisoned there for a few years. And then, when he temporarily becomes a genie? He uses his very brief time as one to try flat-out destroying the entire kingdom, and there is very little ambiguity to what that would cause; if Shirabad is anything like Agrabah, it would result in an enormous amount of casualties, and it wouldn’t just kill the rich and wealthy types who looked down on him, but any regular citizens and those who are poor, just like he was.
Not only is this massively disproportionate to any ill treatment he’s implied to have suffered and far eclipses anything his animated counterpart ever attempted, but it’s surprisingly dark and severe for this kind of movie, period, and it certainly helps that there aren’t really any other antagonists in it for him to compete with. That’s obviously the biggest argument for his case, but sending a monstrous, magic-enhanced Iago through the crowded streets with no regard for any possible collateral damage and torturing and threatening to kill the Sultan and Dalia just to force Jasmine into marrying him solely to make her and the Sultan suffer also seem like fairly heinous actions that could contribute to him qualifying.
So what’s the verdict?[]
As usual, that’s really up to what others think, but frankly, I was surprised at how nasty this Jafar ended up being, and after giving it some careful thought, I personally believe he makes the cut. He has almost none of the charm and levity that the original had, and he’s given more of a backstory that has the potential to be sympathetic, only to completely undermine it by becoming an insatiably power-hungry warmonger with a massively disproportionate taste for revenge.
All in all, I think he’s about as dark and heinous as he can be without the movie straying too far from the original story or risking making it too dark. At the very least, he certainly comes closer to earning the “Pure Evil” label than the original, but if you still don’t think he makes it or feel otherwise, please feel free to share your opinion. I hope I did a good of explaining everything I felt was important, and I apologize if it’s a little long for some people’s liking; that’s just my writing style, and I will try to trim it down if it helps anyone. Thanks for reading!