ABC’s Once Upon a Time season six episode five aired on October 23, 2016 and delved into the relationship between Princess Jasmine and Aladdin. The episode titled ‘Street Rats’ opened in the Capital of Agrabah with Aladdin (Deniz Akdeniz) stealing from citizens while Jafar (Oded Fehr) speaks about his hatred for thieves, turning three thieves into actual street rats. Aladdin looks through his new treasures when Princess Jasmine (Karen David) confronts him, looking to hire him for a job. Jafar is her father’s advisor and has been controlling his every movement, and she wants Aladdin to help her defeat Jafar. Aladdin points out Jafar has magic, but Jasmine puts the Golden Scarab of Agrabah in his pocket saying she’ll claim he stole it if he doesn’t go along with her. They need to find the Diamond in the Rough, the most powerful weapon in their world.
Meanwhile in Storybrooke, Emma (Jennifer Morrison) is chasing a bird through the forest followed closely by Archie (Raphael Sbarge) who tells her to stop following the bird. She’s convinced she needs to speak with the Oracle, however when they do follow the bird they find the Oracle is dead. Emma tackles Princess Jasmine/Shireen as she runs away from the body.
David (Josh Dallas) and Emma question Shireen and she’s keeping her story a secret because she’s afraid of Hyde. Once they tell her Hyde is dead, she confesses to being Princess Jasmine but says she didn’t kill the girl in the forest. That girl was her friend who was helping her find Aladdin. She doesn’t know where he is and calls him the Savior. That piques Emma and David’s interest.
Archie returns to his office to find the Evil Queen (Lana Parrilla) waiting to talk about Emma. He can’t talk about his patients but she knows the Oracle gave Emma visions of the future. Since the Oracle’s gone – and the Evil Queen admits to killing her – she needs Archie to tell her everything. She wants to team up with him, but when he says no, the Evil Queen transforms into an Archie clone and informs him she’ll ask Emma herself.
Zelena (Rebecca Mader) finds Archie gagged and tied up in her home and knows it was the work of the Evil Queen. Zelena thinks the Evil Queen had her reasons and puts the gag back in Archie’s mouth after he attempts to psychoanalyze her.
The fake Archie sees Emma on the street and says they need to talk about her visions. She tells him there’s another savior, Aladdin, who is okay so maybe the vision isn’t true.
Back in Agrabah, Princess Jasmine and Aladdin wander the desert looking for the Cave of Wonders. They finally find it and he warns her to be careful as they approach. Aladdin shouts, “Open sesame!” and that actually works.
Emma comes home to find Hook (Colin O’Donoghue), David, Snow (Ginnifer Goodwin), Regina, Henry (Jared Gilmore), and Jasmine depressed they couldn’t find Aladdin. Archie barges in and tells Emma he doesn’t want her to keep lying to her family. Hook tells Emma to talk about the visions and she admits to everyone she dies in them because all saviors die. But, now that she knows Aladdin is alive she thinks he can help her avoid her fate. As Emma spills her guts, Hook looks more and more upset. He’s angry she lied to him as Archie leaves, transforming back into the Evil Queen outside the door.
Regina figures out that she’s the figure under the hood who is going to kill Emma, but Emma says it’s a vision and not her subconscious at work. Regina heads out to track down Aladdin and tells Emma to meet her at her vault in an hour.
Flashback to the Cave of Wonders and Jasmine and Aladdin discover the Diamond in the Rough they’re looking for, but it’s booby trapped. Fortunately, Aladdin figures it out but then the Diamond falls apart in his hands. Aladdin uses magic to save them as columns start crumbling, unaware he was even able to do magic. Jasmine suspected he was capable of great magic and he is the weapon, the Diamond in the Rough. She tells him he’ll be the savior of Agrabah.
In Storybrooke, Jasmine’s depressed about Aladdin’s possible death and Henry tries to comfort her. She says being a savior is a death sentence and she’s the one who put him on that path. Henry says he also did that to his mom who was just living her life. He wonders if maybe Hyde was wrong about saviors having to die.
Snow tells Emma she should have shared what was going on, and Snow’s worried about what keeping secrets has done to her relationship with Hook. David interrupts Snow and Emma’s heart-to-heart to say Leroy can’t find Archie. Snow quickly figures out the Archie who was just at Emma’s was the Evil Queen in disguise.
Archie is babysitting at Zelena’s when the Evil Queen pops in. They leave Archie with the baby after the Evil Queen promises she can make everything better for Zelena. They head off to The Three Bears spa where they get manicures while being pampered. The Evil Queen tells Zelena everyone else just tolerates her but she actually chooses her. Zelena needs to embrace herself for her daughter to embrace her, too.
Regina’s mixing a spell in her vault when Emma arrives to help. Regina’s making a locator spell to find Aladdin and Emma needs to drink the potion to link like magics.
In the Cave of Wonders, Aladdin’s wondering why Jasmine didn’t tell him this savior thing earlier and she says it’s because he wouldn’t have believed her. He wants to be alone but before she goes, she gives him the hero’s scarab. She tells him she believes in him. After she leaves, Jafar appears and asks what it’s like to be the savior. Aladdin thinks if he beats Jafar, he’ll be able to live a happy ever after. Jafar doesn’t think so and uses his red bird to show Aladdin his unhappy future. He can alter that future if he uses special shears to sever the tie to his destiny. He’ll live a long, happy, prosperous life but he won’t be the savior anymore.
At the palace, Jafar tells Princess Jasmine her savior took the gold and ran. He locks Jasmine in an hour glass and in flies Aladdin on a magic carpet, breaking the hour glass and severing Jafar’s hold over Jasmine’s father, the King. Aladdin admits he almost took Jafar’s offer of wealth but didn’t because of Jasmine. He tries to give her back the scarab but she tells him to keep it so that he’ll always remember he has a friend in her.
In Storybrooke, Emma is leading Jasmine, Snow, Hook, Regina, and David to Aladdin. She leads them to crypts under the cemetery and Jasmine looks around. She finds the scarab and cries out, upset knowing that he’s in the crypt. Since Aladdin’s dead it appears Emma also must die. She wants to be alone and doesn’t even ask for Hook to stay. She has another vision and her hand shakes as Henry returns to comfort her. He apologizes and says it’s his fault for dragging her to Storybrooke in the first place. She tells him he didn’t force her to do anything. She has a family, she’s a mother, and she has real magic in her life. She wouldn’t change a thing about her life. She doesn’t want to think about her story’s ending and instead just wants to think about their journey together. Just then Aladdin appears and her hand shakes uncontrollably. He sympathizes, telling her the hand shaking is no fun.
Back in Agrabah, Aladdin turns down offers of riches and tells Jasmine he just wants to save people. He also wants Princess Jasmine to come with him as he heads out to fight Jafar. They almost kiss but she says she can’t because she has work to do in her kingdom. She tells him that when he defeats Jafar, he’ll know where to find her. As he walks away, a whirl of red magic envelopes him and he discovers Jafar has left the magical shears in his bag for a rainy day, the note says.
Back in Storybrooke, Aladdin says he used the shears and Agrabah fell. He went to the Enchanted Forest and has been in Storybrooke this whole time. He didn’t want to be found but then when he heard Emma and Henry, he knew he couldn’t keep the shears to himself. David says Aladdin must go to Jasmine, but since he’s just a street rat Aladdin can’t bear to see the look in her eyes. Aladdin says their story never even began because duty always got in the way.
Jasmine sits outside in a park and Aladdin walks up, saying, “Hello, Princess.” She thought he was dead and she’s overjoyed he’s alive. Now, she needs his help – the savior’s help – but she doesn’t know Aladdin is no longer a savior.
Zelena and the Evil Queen finally return from their spa day and Zelena’s decided to take the Evil Queen’s advice. She shows her baby daughter who she really is by changing Archie back into Jiminy Cricket, placing him in a cage above the baby’s crib.
Regina, Hook, David, Snow, Henry, and Emma discuss the shears, but Emma doesn’t want to use them. She thinks that it’s different for her because Aladdin didn’t have a family to protect him. She promises everyone, including Hook, no more secrets. She gives Hook the shears, not wanting them to be used as a weapon. He rows them out to sea and they kiss when he rows back to shore. He has to check in on his ship and then they’ll have dinner back at her place. After Emma walks away, Hook shows he’s still holding onto the scissors.
