If you haven’t watched Once Upon A Time in a while, you’re in good company — the show has become a complete narrative mess. And it’s about to get messier….ABC announced today they have cast the character of Jafar, who will appear in Season 6. Unfortunately, they seem to have forgotten they cast Jafar already.
Jafar was the big villain of Once Upon A Time In Wonderland, the spinoff ABC aired three years ago. Back then he was played by Lost’s Naveen Andrews. He schemed to “change the rules of magic” so that he could control love, kill people and alter time. He got to enjoy this power for a little bit, but then, paralleling his fate in the original Aladdin movie, was tricked into becoming a genie and wound up imprisoned in a lamp. Also, the show established Jafar was the Sultan’s illegitimate son. Aladdin never appeared.
I’m guessing we won’t need to remember any of this, because the producers announced Jafar today at SDCC like he was appearing for the very first time. This go-round Oded Fehr will be portraying him, and we WILL get Aladdin, played by Deniz Akdeniz. Also, the first scene between them has been revealed, and it’s definitely different….
You could make the case that Wonderland was its own separate story and continuity, but that doesn’t work. The characters from the Wonderland series actually visited Storybrooke in a couple of episodes. The previous Jafar has already been established as existing. Do they not remember, or do they not care?
In some ways, though, they should be thankful they get the chance at a do-over. That part about Jafar being the Sultan’s son should really remain buried. They also have a chance at rendering a better-looking Agrabah than this….
Once Upon A Time returns September 25 on ABC.
UPDATE August 13, 2016: The initial version of this article misidentified the new Jafar actor as “Oden” Fehr instead of “Oded” Fehr. The reason why Naveen Andrews, the actor from Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, will not be reprising his role as Jafar in Once Upon a Time is due to a scheduling conflict due to his role on the series Sense8, according to a report on tvline.com.
No, they did NOT forget they had already cast Jafar before in Once Upon a Time: Wonderland. The actor who played Jafar in Wonderland, Oded Fehr, is too busy with his commitment to the series Sense8 according to TV Line.
http://tvline.com/2016/07/23/once-upon-a-time-season-6-aladdin-jafar-cast-oden-fehr/
It's supposed to be the same Jafar.
Whoops, I meant NAVEEN ANDREWS, D'OH!