Will Smith as the Genie in a Disney live-action version of Aladdin as promised, he is indeed blue and does (for better or worse) resemble the original character design as performed by Will Smith as opposed to the late Robin Williams. Walt Disney dropped a 60-second TV spot during tonight’s Grammy awards. So, it’s a little odd that this second look at the movie features no onscreen singing and essentially no onscreen dialogue.
Marwan Kenzari’s Jafar has two unfortunately bland expository lines and Will Smith gets a brief intro, but otherwise, there’s actually very little content. Considering that this is a 60-second TV spot, there’s just not much here. We all assumed, falsely it would turn out, that Aladdin would be the big Super Bowl reveal last weekend, but going with the Grammys makes just as much sense. But the Toy Story 4 TV spot was just that, a context-free single sequence. And even the Avengers: Endgame TV spot was incredibly sparse. Even if you argue that Disney is understandably being coy with the fourth Avengers flick, the Mouse House has, in general, been quite close-to-the-vest with their big summer 2019 projects. To be fair, that could just be the freedom of not having to give away the store.
They are still selling the idea of a live-action Aladdin as opposed to what makes this specific Aladdin worth seeing. Considering that Guy Ritchie’s big-budget adaptation of the 1992 blockbuster toon is the biggest question mark on the summer release calendar, combined with the seemingly cursed Memorial Day weekend slot, it is worth noting that the marketing is almost hiding its contents, with random shots of mass gatherings and desert vistas substituting for actual substance. This isn’t a cheap remake of Child’s Play that plays coy in the first 60-second teaser four months before its June 21 release date. This is a big-budget Disney spectacular that’s still hiding in the shadows.
Twenty-seven years after the animated “Aladdin” became a classic; Disney dropped the new trailer during the Grammys on Sunday night. In addition to Smith’s Genie, who towers over Mena Massoud’s Aladdin in his bulked-up blue form, we get looks at the villainous Jafar (playing by Marwen Kenzari), Naomi Scott’s Princess Jasmine, and the sprawling city of Agrabah.
-Forbes
