ALADDIN isn’t being sold on any one thing. The casting of Will Smith is designed to get certain demographics into the theatre, just like certain demographics were targeted by the nostalgia factor, the casting of Jafar, Aladdin and Jasmine, etc.
I think Ruffalo/Hulk and Smith/The Genie is a fair comparison in terms of approach here. The Hulk doesn’t look as much like Mark Ruffalo as this Genie looks like Will Smith in part because Mark Ruffalo isn’t a super huge draw. Will Smith is. When they hired him, The Genie was going to look like him. But there are some definite similarities in the approach.
I can’t see Will Smith going “Sure, I’ll play the Genie, oh, but can he look like a sort of cartoonish Robin Williams?” (I think you can argue that the original Genie looked a bit like a cartoon Robin Williams).
People seem to be really hung up on this looking weird. But The Genie is supposed to look weird.
He’s always looked weird. You can see Aladdin stepping back with a look of confusion on his face, because something weird is happening and something weird is moving toward him.
Legitimate question: What would have been better?