We all know that Blockbuster went out of business in 2014, because digital streaming became more popular. In fact, laptops without CD players entered the market during the mid 2010s.

I watched Aladdin on a third-party website until the site went. Then I went to Amazon to purchase a digital version… only for it to be unavailable because the seller would not let them sell it.

I thought then, Okay, maybe they’re having technical issues. I can’t remember what year this happened. It might have been 2016.

A digital version of Aladdin was also unavailable on YouTube. 

The only way to stream it online was through third-party websites and watch it for free–if you were lucky. The sites and availability came and went. And I think that was uncommon knowledge.

Aside from that, the movie was only available on DVD and Blu Ray, a.k.a. outdated, old-school technology. So unless someone had a disc player in their computer or knew about the hack where you could stream it through third-party websites if they were lucky… they couldn’t watch Aladdin at all… for years. And I feel sorry for those people.

Yet, they could watch movies that did more poorly than Aladdin, such as Hercules (which got only decent reviews), Pocahontas (which received mixed reviews and criticism for how Native Americans were portrayed), and Teacher’s Pet (which is practically forgotten due to its big flop).

Here are some of the reasons why it was inexcusable for Aladdin not to be available to buy digitally until August 2019.

1: It has the most popular Disney song, “A Whole New World.”

That song has ranked as the top Billboard hot-100 for years…19 years… until the song from Encanto, “We Don’t Talk About Bruno.” That’s a long time for a song to be on the top Billboard hot-100 for years.

The song also won an award right after its release.

2: The film contains the only official Disney princess who does not have the lead role.

It’s obvious that I am talking about Jasmine. She is clearly not a damsels-in-distress. She demands that the guards let go of Aladdin. She also warns Jafar that will be removed from the palace once she is queen. 

She can also make it through the village without too much trouble–until she gives a little boy a piece of fruit. But she is blamed for stealing, maybe because she is much older. Then Aladdin stops the seller from chopping off her hand and claims that she is his sister (I actually think the two look like siblings, even though they’re obviously not).

The two escape to Aladdin’s apartment, and discuss the pros and cons of living in a palace.

I could go on, but I’m going to stop there.

3: It is one of the most popular Disney movies after The Lion King.

But when the live-action remake came out, it received mixed reviews. Someone had thought that Disney would want to see how the live-action remake would turn out. Yet, that was only a guess.

4: It became a Broadway show, and it is doing well.

Only a handful of Disney films become Broadway shows. And they are only those that were super successful and popular.

According to my research, New York City is the only city in the US that has a theater district where each show has is own designated theater. Other cities, including major ones, like LA, will have one or two theaters where shows play temporarily, and then another will play after.

I also have a theory as to why its animated version wasn’t available to purchase digitally, and why Disney wouldn’t let Amazon or YouTube to have it until August 2019.

Theory

In the mid-2010s, the Walt Disney company was going to make it available to stream it on sites, like YouTube and Amazon. But then a bunch of technical problems interfered, thus the CEO wouldn’t let it be available to stream, along with its sequels, be available to purchase digitally.

And that annoyed the employees, so they fought for Aladdin to be available to stream on Amazon and YouTube. They might have even lost money because people returned the DVDs and Blu Ray discs, and that it was unfair that they couldn’t stream it, but they could with films that didn’t do nearly as well.

But projects, such as Coco and Moana slowed the fight for Aladdin to be available to stream.

In 2019, the CEO finally agreed to let the film be available to buy digitally.

Conclusion

Did this bother you as well? Please let me know in the comments if you’d like.