Hercules and the Arabian Night

Summary

As Hades goes through his usual job of bringing fresh souls in, Pain and Panic tell him that one of the souls is not cooperating. The dead Jafar approaches Hades, introduces himself and demands to be sent back. Hades is at first unconcerned, but they find a common ground: Jafar tried to overtake Agrabah, Hades is trying to overtake Mount Olympus and they both have been defeated by "upstart boys", but each villain thinks his nemesis is superior. They make a bet that they can defeat each other's respective hero. So Hades gives Jafar a new snake staff, which turns him into a mortal. He tells Jafar that so long as he holds the snake staff, he is all flesh and blood. Then, he orders Jafar to attack Hercules while he's training on Philoctetes's island.

At said island, Phil is trying to teach Herc not to "barrel through" and to "use his noodle" from time to time. Suddenly, Jafar pops up and creates a huge bull-like red beast, a griffin, and a minotaur to go after Hercules. With Phil tied up, Herc does his best to wrestle the beasts. Jafar laughs at how slow Herc is, until Herc picks up Phil's "statue head" house, bashes the beasts and proceeds to smash it on Jafar, who gets knocked all the way back to the Underworld. Hades decides to send Pain and Panic to Agrabah to take Aladdin out. When the minions arrive in the Arabian city, they first mistake Abu for Aladdin, but the real Al, along with his wife Princess Jasmine, arrive on Carpet. After a scuffle, Pain and Panic are about to finish Aladdin off, but Aladdin convinces them to look into his lamp (by telling them not to look into it). Genie's hand punches them all the way back to Greece and down into the Underworld (this is Genie's only appearance in this episode).

Hades admits that Aladdin is tough, but wants to concentrate on beating Hercules first. Then Jafar offers an idea: what if Herc and Al had a misunderstanding between them and get into a fight? Hades likes the idea and puts the plan into motion. The first part is kidnapping Abu from Agrabah and Icarus from Prometheus Academy (both using bananas as bait). When Herc can't find Icarus, an old man (Jafar in disguise) fools Herc by telling him that a "young rogue named Aladdin" kidnapped him. Herc gets angry and runs off to find Al. Later, in Agrabah, Al and Jasmine can't find Abu, and Pain and Panic disguise themselves as Herc and tell him that Herc kidnapped Abu.

When Herc, Phil and Pegasus arrive in Agrabah, Al, Jasmine and Carpet give them a not-so-warm welcome. Herc and Al start the fight, Herc barreling in and Al sidestepping each blow. Al gets Herc to chase him through the alleyways of Agrabah to an old abandoned building. He then gets Herc to punch enough holes in the walls to bring most of the house down on top of Herc. When Herc holds it up, Al demands Herc to tell him where he hid Abu. Herc responds by wanting to know where Aladdin took Icarus. This leads Al to realize there has been a mistake. Before they can work it out, though, the building collapses on both of them.

While Jafar and Hades believe the heroes have been destroyed, Herc gets himself and Aladdin out of the rubble. They piece together that it was a setup and that Hades and Jafar are holding Icarus and Abu in the Underworld. Aladdin wants to charge in to rescue them, but Hercules thinks of another way. While Hades tells Jafar of his plans for Olympian domination (and offers Jafar the 'Lord of the Dead' title while doing this), Pain and Panic yell that Herc and Aladdin are coming their way.

Jafar is sent to stop them. He blasts Aladdin in an ice block and creates a giant scorpion to take on the slow Hercules. But there's one problem: the man in the ice is Hercules, disguised as Aladdin, and the one fighting the scorpion is Aladdin disguised as Herc. Shocked, Jafar is unable to stop Aladdin from nabbing the snake staff and tossing it to Herc, who snaps it in half. This effect turns Jafar back into a soul and pull him down into the River Styx for good. Icarus and Abu meanwhile have escaped and begin punching Hades, until he threatens to make them "permanent residents".

Herc and Al congratulate each other before Al takes Jasmine, Abu and Carpet back to Agrabah. Aladdin tells Herc that he'll make a great hero someday. Icarus, having bonded with Abu, asks Hercules if they can get a monkey.

Background

This was the first and so far only animated crossover between Hercules and Aladdin. The episode is part of the series Hercules featuring characters from the Aladdin made-for-TV animated series.

Cast

Chronology

An unusual aspect of this episode is that it indicates that Aladdin and Hercules existed around the same time, though one would logically conclude that they lived at least a millennium apart (Hercules being from ancient Greece, while Aladdin is from the era of the Islamic empires, probably of Abbasid Caliphate). On the other hand, some of Aladdin's enemies, such as Mechanicles, Queen Hippsodeth and Dominus Tusk, could easily be the same vintage as Hercules. Also during the "A Whole New World" part, Aladdin and Jasmine can been seen riding through what could be Greece. Another thing to note is that in The Return of Jafar, Genie states that he raced with Hercules.

Princess Jasmine mentions that she and Aladdin are married, indicating this episode takes place after the events of Aladdin and the King of Thieves, which would explain Iago's absence in this episode and also explain why Aladdin has the same outfit on which he wore in Aladdin and the King of Thieves, this is additionally backed up by the fact that Aladdin appears physically older than his last appearance. This is a bit strange, though, since the episode seems to indicate that Jafar died recently, though there was an entire movie, and indeed a TV series, between his death in The Return of Jafar and this episode. It is possible that time passed differently in the underworld and that Jafar had to go through a waiting line before meeting up with Hades, as it is mentioned in many ancient texts (such as Virgil's Aeneid) that souls have to wait a long time to cross the river.