WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

Did I use an H3H3 reference in the subheading of this article? Absolutely.

Am I ashamed? Hell no, because I've got only one thing left to say to Disney, and Ethan Klein's catchphrase perfectly captures my reaction after seeing Disney's live action Aladdin: "It's time to STOP."

Sure, it's not terrible. It's not offensively bad or shockingly stupid. That, however, would have at least been more interesting than the film we did receive. Instead, we were, yet again, served up an aesthetically pleasing but ultimately shallow, tepid stab at what a corporation is marketing as empowerment. Like Beauty and the Beast (2017), Aladdin is beautiful and incredibly produced, yet again touting another big name Hollywood star, but somehow Disney still managed to bore and annoy me with what should have been an energetic live action fantasy musical and the revival of one of Disney's most beloved properties.

Ultimately, it's a bit of a mess, as well as a little bland and bordering on dumb, but that's not too much of a surprise at this point either. The real question is why, why, oh why, does this "genre" of film keep falling lower and lower and landing flatter and flatter when Disney, one of the most powerful media entities in the world, is providing full backing for these projects? What went wrong?

But before we get into this, I'd like to establish that I'm not going to give this movie a pass just because it's a "kids' movie." First of all, this movie is marketed to everyone, not just children. Disney pumps out these live action adaptations with the goal of a maximum body count. They want asses in seats, people. Anyone from toddlers to senior citizens are within their massive target audience, regardless of race, religion, or any other divisive identity. Disney is not reviving these safe, well known classics and perpetuating a policy of cringey corporate "wokeness" because they deeply care about inspiring and pleasing the public. They want to make as much money as possible, and the laziness in pumping out these cash grab films has gotten so transparent that it's intolerable to watch any longer.

Second of all, "kids' movies" should be held to just as high, if not higher, a standard as more mature films. Up is a "kids' movie" and it brought me to tears and raised my awareness about an important issue, the plight of the old in an aggressively industrial world, without having to warp history like Disney has done with Beauty and the Beast and now Aladdin. If you want to start making the "it's just a kids' movie" argument, take a peek at Pixar's golden years or, better yet, the labors of Studio Ghibli. We're paying for these films. They soak into our culture and are blasted into our faces. We have every right to demand that they be held to a higher standard.

That's my stance, and my analysis of Aladdin will be heavily colored by that perspective.

Super. Now that we've got that settled, let's pick apart this mess, just another adaptation in a long line of Disney's pretty, stupid remakes.

Let's start with the good:

Again, it's very pretty. Some of the songs are pretty entertaining, especially Will Smith's rendition of "Prince Ali," though the excellent set and choreography certainly has a lot to do with this. In fact, the choreography and stunt work of the entire movie was surprisingly good. Will Smith also proves to be a great choice as the genie, as his energy and charm carries much of the film as it lags along. Also, I've got a special place in my heart for Naomi Scott, though she doesn't offer any amazing performance as Princess Jasmine in this film. Yep. That's about all.

That was quick. Now let's get down to the bad:

The story, while basically copied and pasted from the cartoon, is somehow boring and tired despite coming from one of the most interesting narratives and settings among Disney's collection. The acting ranges from adequate to a little cringey, though I can hardly blame the actors considering what they had to work with: the writing bounces from being passable but uninspired to being outright dumb. The characters are summarily weak and feel watered down from their original iterations. Not watered down as in made more realistic by filtering some of their cartoonishness, but watered down as in their spirits and charm have been drained after Disney twisted Aladdin out of the wet rags of their old properties.

What is left are overly energetic, overly bright characters that, like the film as a whole, are pretty on the outside but lack an essential center. When they smile, laugh, and cry, everything feels artificial. I don't sympathize with Jasmine, whose arc has been expanded to include an assassinated mother and a burning desire to somehow become the sultan herself. These are fascinating developments in a character whose primary role in the original cartoon was admittedly, to be a love interest for Aladdin and to look sexy.

The genie is one of the few, if not the only character who retains some essential charisma and life thanks to the energy of Will Smith, but even the additions to his originally very blank arc, including the romance with Jasmine's handmaiden and his fathering of two children, are somehow bland and flat where they should be game changing and interesting. Perhaps that is one of the main issues: these new developments should be game changing, affecting the entire story and spinning the narrative in exciting new directions, but instead they feel like set pieces and forgettable details because the story ultimately continues on in the direction it was already going.

One of the most egregious examples of this has to be the "twist" towards the end of the film, where Jasmine's father relents his earlier efforts to silence and control his daughter and pronounces her sultan. This is both historically and thematically earth-shattering. This is unprecedented. This is madness. This not only affects Jasmine's entire character arc, as it vests her with a political intelligence and responsibility never before bestowed on a princess, much less her character, but it also affects the entire world in which Aladdin is set. Everything will change.

Or at least, it should have. The elevation of Jasmine should have been all of those things. It should have changed everything. It should have caused uproar and shock across Agrabah, it should have shifted Aladdin's role from a diamond in the rough destined for ultimate greatness to a secondary player in the story of Agrabah's long standing political feud between the established power and new forces threatening that establishment, Jasmine included. Furthermore, this should have caused the writers to create a stronger, more politically cunning, and even wily politician character when writing Jasmine's character for the film.

Of course, as this is Disney and they prefer to change history for the sake of being "woke" rather than actually detailing the past struggles of minority groups and oppressed classes, we get none of these things. Jasmine is made sultan by her father and faces no additional opposition. She runs to Aladdin and kisses him, announcing the news, and then the film ends with a dance number and a song. That's it.

Yet again, Disney does more harm than good through its flawed versions of inclusion and political correctness by erasing historical struggles and, in this case, the true plights faced by women throughout history. Instead, likely in the interest of inspiring girls to reach for the stars, preaching that anything is possible for us now, they bend the rules of the universe in order to create a skewed worldview wherein you can get anything you want if you just believe.

This issue is made even more glaringly obvious by the fact that not only Jasmine but also Aladdin himself is sucked into this scenario of reality bending to your desires. While the cartoon does a decent enough job of establishing something resembling chemistry between Aladdin and Jasmine and making Aladdin a thoroughly likable and honorable character, the film puts very little effort into their romance and fails to charm us with its watered down Aladdin. To a point, I can buy the narrative that spectacular things will happen to good people, that the universe will miraculously reward its best children, but only if those characters have thoroughly earned this special treatment. And between a bland cast of main characters, an Aladdin that hardly seems to live up to the mystical "diamond in the rough" title, and a Jasmine that is not nearly as clever and discerning as she would need to be to convince her father to overthrow the established order, I see no reason why such spectacular rewards should be bestowed on such unspectacular people. Their petulance and mild discontent with the world is not enough to satisfy my expectations for true character development, no matter how pretty they make look when they pout.

That is not to say that I think only amazing or incredible people, such as superheroes, fabled princes, or cursed beauties should be given the opportunity to experience something spectacular. Far from it. If you take a closer look at my recommendations to check out Pixar and Studio Ghibli for incredible "kids' films," most of their heroes are truly ordinary and even petulant protagonists who fail far more than they succeed. Rather, the spectacle, the wonder and appreciation and awe from the audience, arises from who they are able to become from their struggles. That's what a character arc is.

For example, in Spirited Away (one of my favorites films) the protagonist unwittingly enters the Spirit World as a spoiled and petulant little girl and exits as a wise and enlightened young woman who, while still physically ordinary and with no special political or social advantages, now possesses a spirit and heart equal to that of any nobleman. In a very general sense, this mirrors the character arc, or what should have been the character arc, of Aladdin very well, as he begins as a good-hearted but dishonest and discontent thief who stumbles into the spectacular and exits these trials as a nobler and wiser man.

Instead, in Aladdin the main characters do not undergo any significant internal change. The writers take the genie's advice to "just be yourself" to a detrimental new level by removing the element of character development from the story, further emphasizing the flatness and shallowness of this pretty, silly tale.

I could stand this at first, when Disney at least made an effort to shield the transparency of its flawed attempts at storytelling and creating messages of empowerment, but these movies just keep coming and I can't stand the sight of these lazy techniques being repeated over and over again by a brand that employs some of the most talented writers in the world.

Though I may continue my deconstruction of Aladdin in a future article, I feel that at this point I've stated the most important things on my mind after woefully watching the film in theaters: while the aesthetic has been upgraded and Disney has waited hand and foot on this film in terms of its production value, the media giant has yet again missed the mark in terms of character development, storytelling, tone, and the exploration of the story's most important themes.

While it's a very pretty thing that will likely do fine at the box office, Aladdin ultimately lacks the soul of a good film.