What if Agrabah isn’t ancient at all—but what’s left after us? The fan theory goes like this: the Genie says he’s been in the lamp for 10,000 years, yet he cracks jokes about Elvis, celebrities, and modern slang. He even quips that Aladdin’s outfit is “so 3rd century.” If he hasn’t been out in 10,000 years, that pushes the story to year ≥ 10,300. Now rewatch the backgrounds: broken stone and metal, odd ruins that feel more like salvage than palaces. The carpet behaves like advanced tech—and the lamp reads like a containment device, not a chalice for magic.In this episode we run a Debate:Futurist argues Aladdin is a post-apocalyptic tale where the “Genie” is an ancient AI/energy system and Agrabah is a rebuilt city living among artifacts.Classicist counters that the jokes are meta-humor, the timeline is fairy-tale elastic, and the visuals are stylized tradition—not proof.No verdicts—just clues, images, and the question we can’t shake: if the carpet is a machine and the lamp is a prison, what exactly did Aladdin set free?

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.

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