Deep Dive Disney: Wes Looks at Hercules & The Arabian Night

Welcome back my friends to special bonus edition of Deep Dive Disney. Given how immensely popular Disney’s animated movies can be, especially in the 90’s, it comes as no surprise that many have spawned animated TV shows. Some gave us the continuing adventures of our heroes, like Aladdin. Others served as a prequel to its corresponding movie, like The Little Mermaid. Some would place our characters in new and exciting settings, like Buzz Lightyear of Star Command. Some would even place the film’s characters in nonsensical settings that don’t in any way connect to the original film, like TaleSpin. And then some, like The Lion Guard, are… just weird. The show in question today is the Hercules Animated Series which ran for two seasons from 1998 to 1999. Here’s the basic premise. Set during young Herc’s training with Phil, the show sees Zeus decree that in addition to his hero training, his son must receive a proper education and therefore attend high school. Naturally, Herc engages in high school hijinks, meets several characters from Greek Myth including his best friends, Icarus and Cassandra, foils Hades’ wicked schemes and usually fights the monster of the week. It doesn’t line up perfectly with the movie since Hades is a recurring villain while in the film Hades had assumed Hercules was dead all that time but Hades is an awesome character and James Woods came back to reprise his role so I’m not exactly complaining and still would like to consider the series to be canon. The show itself wasn’t anything groundbreaking but it still had a few good moments including an episode where Hercules inspires a young Alexander the Great, an episode where the series continues the Superman allegory and sees Herc team up with a Batman-like vigilante to fight a Minotaur and an especially fun episode where Hercules briefly dates Medusa. Hell, despite it taking place while Hercules was a teenager, they even manage to bring back Susan Egan to reprise the role of Megara for a couple episodes. One where Herc and Meg meet as teenagers and have their memories wiped at the end of the episode in order to restore continuity and one clip show episode where a now married Hercules and Megara look at Herc's old high school yearbook. Getting to the point, if people remember this show for any reason, it’s most likely due to the episode we’ll be discussing today, and if you read that title or saw that slapdash poster that took me ten minutes in photoshop to make, then you can probably see why because this episode is an Aladdin crossover. That’s right, Disney did something really awesome and gave us a story in which two of its most iconic protagonists fight side by side against their respective foes, making it a very unique and interesting piece of Disney media indeed. There have been several easter eggs and fan theories over the years that suggest certain Disney movies having a shared universe but to my knowledge, this is one of the few times, if not the only time, we’ve ever gotten a straight up crossover. Sure, the timelines of the two films coinciding is historically impossible, even the Disney Wiki admits that, but who cares? We’re not here worry about historical accuracy, we’re here to watch Hercules and Aladdin kick ass. Since we’re dealing with a half hour episode as opposed to a feature length film, this article will be in the format of my old Gargoyles articles as opposed to our usual format. That in mind, let’s take a look at Hercules & The Arabian Night

We open in the Underworld where Hades is naturally irritated that Hercules is constantly foiling his schemes and nothing he tries seems to work. Hades is soon interrupted by Pain and Panic who are having issues with a new arrival in the underworld. Whoever this stiff is, Pain and Panic seem even more scared of him than they do of Hades himself. Hades goes to investigate and, of course, it’s none other than Jafar. I never actually saw this episode first run, but I can only imagine how mind blowing it must have been for all those nine-year-olds watching the show to see Jafar show up in a Hercules cartoon. I know that my jaw would have dropped as soon as I realized what was happening. Anywho, Jafar demands to speak to the man in charge, insisting that there’s been a mistake but Hades just dismisses him. Jafar is persistent however and soon catches wind of Hades’ plot to overthrow Olympus, something that reminds him of his own attempt to seize control of Agrabah only to be foiled by an impudent street rat. This convinces Hades that he and Jafar may have more in common than he realized and the two sit down and swap stories of their attempts to conquer their respective foes. As they talk, Jafar assumes that after facing someone as clever as Aladdin, a musclebound ox like Hercules would be a cakewalk. Hades challenges Jafar to put his money where his mouth is and enchants his snake staff with the ability to grant him life as long as he’s holding it. Jafar lets loose an evil laugh, something that both annoys and confuses Hades, and heads back to the mortal plane.

We finally join Hercules who’s in the middle of a training session. While Herc manages to destroy most of the obstacles in Phil’s training course without a suffering so much as a scratch, one catches him off guard and knocks him silly, Phil admonishing Hercules for relying too much on brute strength and not enough on smarts and strategy. The training session is interrupted when the fake monsters from Phil’s obstacle course suddenly become real ones and attack. It’s here where Jafar makes his grand entrance. Jafar and his monsters battle Hercules and the evil sorcerer gets a few good hits in but ultimately, Wonder Boy’s strength is too much for Jafar and he ends up back in the underworld at the feet of an unsurprised Hades. Jafar claims that he wasn’t prepared to face someone with that kind of strength since he’s used to facing a foe who relies on his wits and ingenuity. Upon learning that Aladdin is a mere mortal, Hades thinks that Jafar is simply out of his league against a demigod like Herc. To prove his point, Hades sends Pain and Panic to go kill Aladdin for him. Now, I understand that Hades doesn’t see Aladdin as a serious threat but you mean to tell me that the best he’s got are two imps who couldn’t even take down a helpless baby? Setting yourself up for failure there H-Man.

Anywho, Pain & Panic arrive in Agrabah. After the two assume their human disguises and humorously remark on this exciting new invention known as “pants,” the two spot what they assume is Aladdin and assume the form of a two headed dragon. However, because Pain and Panic are idiots, they’ve actually mistaken Abu for Aladdin but fortunately for them, the real Aladdin isn’t far behind. With the help of Jasmine and Carpet, Aladdin takes down the dragon using his agility. However, Pain and Panic aren’t done yet as they transform into a pair of snakes and constrict Aladdin. Thinking quickly, Aladdin tricks the two imps into looking inside the lamp and they end punched all the way back to the underworld by The Genie’s fist for their trouble. By the way, that’s all we see of Genie in this crossover. Would have been nice to see more, but having Aladdin rely on The Genie would have undermined the intended contrast between Hercules and himself.

Back in the Underworld Hades admits that Jafar was right and continues to go about his day. Jafar insists that Hades must seek revenge, but Hades says that he’ll get it once he rules the entire cosmos. One must their priorities in line after all. However, it’s here were Jafar gets a brilliant idea. If he and Hades can’t conquer their respective foes, maybe they can get them to destroy each other. After Hades is once again weirded out by Jafar’s compulsive need to laugh maniacally, the two put their plan into motion. Phase one: lure Abu into a trap with a trail of bananas and lure Icarus into a trap with… also a trail of bananas. Yeah, let’s just say when the Icarus of Hercules the Animated Series flew too close to the son it kind of fried his brain so the kid is a few bananas short of a bunch as a result. Phase Two: frame their respective foes for the kidnapping. Pain and Panic take on the form of Hercules to antagonize Aladdin and Jafar tells Hercules of Aladdin using his old man disguise. And hey, it actually makes sense for him to be using it this time, so that’s cool.

Later, on the streets of Agrabah, Hercules and Aladdin finally meet and come to blows. The ensuing fight is actually really fun. Aladdin figures out right away that Herc is way too strong for him to fight head on and leads him away on the magic carpet. Hercules follows on Pegasus but Aladdin maneuvers him into a trap, once again showing that Hercules is relying more on brute force than on strategy. Aladdin lures Herc into an abandoned building and taunts him to get him good and mad, even referring to him as “Jerkules” leading to an amusing bit where Herc says everyone thinks they’re being clever by calling him that but it’s not actually that funny. In his frustration, Herc inadvertently causes the roof to fall on top of him while Aladdin narrowly escapes. Before the building collapses completely, Hercules mentions Icarus which tips Aladdin off to the fact that they’ve both been duped. The building crumbles, but Herc uses his strength to save them both from being crushed. Now that they know that they’re not enemies, Hercules and Aladdin try to figure out who set them up and kidnapped their friends. Hercules suggests that it might be that Jafar guy who attacked him earlier and when Aladdin and Jasmine confirm that Jafar is supposed to be dead, it doesn’t take long for everyone to figure out that Hades is involved as well. The two heroes agree to team up and head to the underworld to save their friends, Hercules having an idea that may give them an advantage.

Down in the underworld, Hades and Jafar believe that they’ve won and are already plotting to take over Olympus together, Hades even offering Jafar dominion over the underworld once he’s dethroned Zeus. However, the plotting is interrupted when Hercules and Aladdin storm the gates, Jafar heading out to deal with them himself. Jafar seems pretty powerful, but Aladdin and Hercules changed clothes before heading into the underworld in order to confuse Jafar and throw him off balance. Hercules is easily able to power through the traps designed for Aladdin and Aladdin’s agility and cleverness help him overcome the spells meant for Hercules. While Jafar is distracted, Aladdin gets ahold of the snake staff and passes it to Hercules who promptly snaps it in half. With his staff destroyed, Jafar reverts back to a dead soul and is sucked into the River Styx while Hades, who’s had just about enough of this crap, just gives up and lets our heroes leave with their friends. And so our episode ends with Aladdin telling Hercules that he’s going to be a great hero someday before the two part ways.

Final Thoughts:

This crossover is awesome. It gave us pretty much everything we could ever have wanted from a Hercules and Aladdin crossover. We saw Herc and Aladdin fight each other and join forces against their respective enemies. Hades and Jafar are also great together. Jafar’s more over the top cliché villainy clashes nicely with Hades' dry wit and nonchalant demeanor. Together, they get a lot of laughs and work well off one another. The arc where Herc has to learn the value of strategy over brute force is also nice and has a great payoff in the end. While obviously this was released after the film, it’s always been my head canon that the way Hercules defeats the Cyclops without his strength was something he picked up from his encounter with Aladdin. Something especially interesting about this episode is how it could almost me seen as a torch pass of sorts. A throwaway line from Jasmine confirms that she and Aladdin are married at this point, meaning that this is taking place after the events of Aladdin and The King of Thieves. Since we know that the show is set while Hercules is still in training, that means that by the time they meet here, Aladdin’s story has already ended while Herc’s is just beginning. I might be reading too much into this, but I can’t help but notice that the first film Disney released after King of Thieves, the film that served as the finale to the Aladdin saga was Hercules. It’s hard not to see this as Aladdin, the old guard, passing the torch to a newer character in Hercules. Hell, this even gives us a more epic finale for Aladdin as he fights and defeats Jafar one last time before flying off into the sunset. All in all, this is an amazing crossover that shows gives us a great meeting of two iconic Disney heroes. Next time, we see the rise of another iconic Disney hero as Deep Dive Disney looks at Mulan.