Conversely, Genie does not immediately know that Saleen is an Elemental.

In this scene there is also a lot of doing the right thing, as far as being a friend is concerned. He sees Aladdin with a woman who is hanging all over him and immediately goes “Dude, that’s not cool." 

And clearly, Aladdin’s pretty uncomfortable himself but he’s also not telling her to stop. I am starting to think there has to be some fear of being disliked that makes him hesitate to set boundaries as fast as he should. 

I actually can’t decide if this is him being uncomfortable or if he KNOWS she’s laying it on thick for attention because he already knows all these moves. 

The SECOND Saleen shows up, Iago encourages Aladdin to cheat on Jasmine.

This is damaging to my earlier remarks about him and Jasmine being such good friends. Mind you, this is almost forty episodes before that and their big bonding episode hasn’t happened yet. 

But seriously, Iago. 

Mind you, he seems to also be convinced Jasmine has already officially dumped him. 

Saleen is happy to confirm this. 

“Yes, I remember running into a girl with wet hair who was really really angry. She breaks up, btw. Are you doing anything Saturday?" 

Of course Aladdin wants to get back to Agrabah because he needs to speak to Jasmine, but Saleen needs an escort and I love this face he’s making: 

The thing is…I dunno, like with Sadira he doesn’t exactly tell her NOT to act too familiar. There’s something about the way he reacts at the end of this scene that makes me not feel surprised at all that Jasmine’s going to misinterpret this. 

I know you’re just being nice, but you need to work on your honesty issues when it comes to women, Aladdin. 

“What’s the deal with Princesses today?”

Are you…are you impersonating Seinfeld? 

“Why do girls have to be so complicated?" 

YEAH, WHY DO THEY EXPECT TO BE TREATED WITH RESPECT? WHAT DO THEY THINK THEY ARE, GUYS? 

Even the monkey agrees. Abu, the character who suffers the most from Aladdin’s poor decisions regarding women before they meet Jasmine, Because it usually ends in him not getting food. 

What the Hell are you doing, episode? 

Aladdin mopes because Jasmine stomped off on him.

One might think that she’s lost and that’s why he’s so down, but no. They live within walking distance of Agrabah. She could have just gone HOME. 

What’s more: 

“Sometimes I just don’t understand her.”

Wait wait wait wait. 

You don’t understand why she got mad and stormed off? After all the episodes I’ve covered so far where YOU’VE gotten super angry and defensive when people have laughed at YOU? 

No, you understand her just fine. You were just a jerk. 

It’s really hard to determine true motives for characters when their moods change so quickly. This is the downside of having only 20 minutes to tell a story.

As soon as Jasmine asserts that nothing can come between her and Aladdin, this seems reason enough for Saleen to decide this is a shot across the bow. I can’t tell if she just REALLY likes seducing and then murdering men, or if she doesn’t like being told she can’t do something. 

Introducing: Saleen, the Water Elemental. This was exciting back when the Little Mermaid was still a big deal, so as viewers we all EXPECTED her to be like Ariel.

image

So apparently all of this is right off the coast of Agrabah. Damn. Anyway: 

image

Saleen was expecting a sailor. I suspect she just likes killing men. We get hints that she does this often. She appears to be a siren in the typical sense: she lures men to their death and being alluring TO them is part of the fun for her. 

What I find interesting here is once she sees Jasmine for what she is, she gives her the ability to breathe under water. 

image

This struck me because initially, she is actually very friendly toward Jasmine, in a Mean Girls “we’re so totally sisters now” sort of way. She chats with her like she hasn’t had someone akin to her to talk to in ages, and she even has her hairdresser fix her up. 

It’s when Jasmine doesn’t seem willing to join her in the man-hating that she stops being so friendly. 

There’s problems with this, that goes with the whole “Other Women” issue. We’re being presented with a character that is at first friendly toward Jasmine, opening up the potential opportunity for female friends and camaraderie, but the Other Woman is like that. She’ll be nice to you at first just so she can go after (and in this case likely murder) your man. 

I am deeply troubled by the fact that this is the first real interaction Jasmine ever has with another woman in this show.