Anyone who has spent any time online with fan communities knows their theories about favorite movies and TV shows can get intense, complicated, and super-weird. But few of these suppositions actually get validated by the pop-culture creators themselves.
However, one of the tamer hypotheses about the true identity of the peddler in Aladdin has been confirmed by the film's director, Ron Clements, in an interview for E! he did with co-director John Musker. Clements explained, "I saw something that speculates that the peddler at the beginning of Aladdin is the Genie. That's true! That was the whole intention, originally. We even had that at the end of the movie, where he would reveal himself to be the Genie — and, of course, Robin did the voice of the peddler."
The peddler, if you don't remember, sets up all the film's important metaphors in the movie's opening scenes, right after the song "Arabian Nights." With the confirmation of this theory, we now know that the Genie, even after his freedom, wanted to keep the story of his bestie Al alive.
One bit of conjecture, though, was completely discredited, as Musker explained: "We never thought [the movie] was postapocalyptic, futuristic, or in some other time." Well, every fan theory can't be right.
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