Aladdin

Ward-Alan Walton 2nd

Aladdin



In the first film, street rat Aladdin meets a girl in the marketplace. He falls in love with her at first sight, but their meeting is interrupted by guards who arrest him. She reveals that she is actually [|Princess Jasmine]. She demands the guards to release Aladdin at once, but they tell her that she has to deal with [|Jafar] first in order to let him go.

In prison, Aladdin meets an old man (who is actually Jafar in disguise) who mentions a cave filled with treasure and that he needs Aladdin to enter it. The old man reveals a secret exit, and Aladdin escapes with him and follows him in to the desert. He enters the Cave of Wonders, where he meets a sentient [|magic carpet] and is commanded to only get a magic lamp. He gets it, but Abu's grabbing of a giant gem causes the cave to collapse. Aladdin, [|Abu], and the carpet are left in the cave. Abu delivers the lamp to Aladdin, and when he rubs it, a giant blue [|Genie] appears, telling Aladdin he will fulfill three wishes. After leaving the collapsed cave with the Genie's help, he decides to become a prince in order to win Jasmine's heart.

In the first [|direct-to-video] [|sequel], //[|The Return of Jafar]// (1994), Jasmine later begins to question her choice in Aladdin, wondering if he was trustworthy enough after he defends Iago, Jafar's former pet parrot who had terrorized her father. Meanwhile, Jafar is freed from his lamp by a clumsy bandit named Abis Mal, and immediately plots his revenge against Aladdin.

Finally, in the second [|direct-to-video]/DVD movie and third film in the series, //[|Aladdin and the King of Thieves]//, Aladdin discovers that his long-lost father, Cassim, is still alive, and sets out to find him. Cassim had left the family shortly after his son's birth. Aladdin's mother died when he was just a child. At the climax of the film, Jasmine and Aladdin are finally wed, and Aladdin makes peace with his father. //The Return of Jafar// and //Aladdin and the King of Thieves// together serve as bookends to the [|Aladdin (TV series)] as its [|prologue] and [|epilogue], respectively, though the episode of the //[|Disney's Hercules]// series //Hercules and the Arabian Night// is clearly set after the end of "King of Thieves" as Jasmine refers to herself as married.

Hercules

Real version

Disney version

Hercules's [|Latin] name is not directly borrowed from Greek //Heracles// but is a modification of the [|Etruscan] name //Herceler//, which derives from the Greek name via [|syncope], Heracles translates to "The Glory of Hera". An oath invoking Hercules (//Hercle!// or //Mehercle!//) was a common [|interjection] in [|Classical Latin].

In Roman works of art and in Renaissance and post-Renaissance art that adapts Roman iconography, Hercules can be identified by his attributes, the [|lion skin] and the gnarled [|club] (his favorite weapon): in [|mosaic] he is shown tanned bronze, a virile aspect. Hercules was the illegitimate son of Zeus and Alcmene, the wisest and most beautiful of all mortal women. Hera was enraged at Zeus for his infidelity with Alcmene, and even more so that he placed the infant Hercules at Hera's breast as she slept and allowed Hercules to feed, which caused Hercules to be partially immortal, thus, allowing him to surpass all mortal men in strength, size and skill. However, Hera still held a spiteful grudge against Hercules and sent Hercules into a blind frenzy, in which he killed all of his children. When Hercules regained his sanity, he sought out the Oracle at Delphi in the hope of making atonement. The Oracle ordered Hercules to serve [|Eurystheus], king of Mycenae, who sent him on a series of tasks known as the [|Labors of Hercules]. While he was a champion and a great warrior, he was not above cheating and using any unfair trick to his advantage. However, he was renowned as having "made the world safe for mankind" by destroying many dangerous monsters.

In their popular culture the Romans adopted the Etruscan **Hercle**, a hero-figure that had already been influenced by Greek culture — especially in the conventions of his representation — but who had experienced an autonomous development. Etruscan Hercle appears in the elaborate illustrative engraved designs on the backs of Etruscan bronze mirrors made during the fourth century BC, which were favoured [|grave goods]. Their specific literary references have been lost, with the loss of all Etruscan literature, but the image of the mature, bearded Hercules suckling at [|Uni]/[|Juno]'s breast, engraved on a mirror back from [|Volterra], is distinctively Etruscan. This Hercle/Hercules — the Hercle of the interjection "Mehercle!" — remained a popular cult figure in the Roman legions.

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