'Once Upon a Time' season 6 spoilers: Series exploring 'a whole new world' in upcoming season?
There is a long list of new faces gracing "Once Upon a Time" when it returns to the small screen for its sixth run this September.
At the beginning of the month, there were speculations that characters from the classic "Aladdin" would find their way to Storybrooke in the upcoming season. Now, just two months before "Once Upon a Time" season 6 launches, the actors who would breathe life to the roles of Aladdin, Princess Jasmine, and Jafar have been cast.
Playing street-rat-turned-prince Aladdin is "South Beach" alum Deniz Akdeniz while "Covert Affairs" star Oded Fehr would be playing the role of Jafar, Agrabah's Royal Vizier, Variety learned.
Fans would recall that in the spin-off "Once Upon a Time in Wonderland," it was Naveen Andrews ("Lost") who played Jafar. However, he was unavailable for the said role since he is currently working on Netflix's "Sense8."
On the other hand, Entertainment Weekly reported that "Galavant" actress Karen David has been tapped to play Princess Jasmine, Aladdin's love interest.
David, Akdeniz, and Fehr will be joining Giles Matthey, who was recently cast as Morpheus, and Craig Horner, who will play the Count of Monte Cristo, in "Once Upon a Time" season 6.
Meanwhile, the show's creator and executive producer Edward Kitsis revealed something to Deadline before heading to Ballroom 20 for the show's San Diego Comic-Con panel. He said the upcoming season is "not going to be 'Hyde comes to town, we fight with him for 10 episodes, and then in the winter finale he dies, we move on.' We kind of changed around what we're doing this year... going back to that Season 1 mentality, with small-town stories and smaller arcs. We're planning a 22-episode story, as opposed to just kind of breaking it up into two parts."
Kitsis also teased that as Hook (Colin O'Donoghue) and Emma's (Jennifer Morrison) relationship gets deeper, fans would learn about some of Hook's deep, dark secrets, even as he and Prince Charming (Josh Dallas) gets a fun arc in the upcoming season.
"Once Upon a Time" season 6 returns Sunday, Sept. 25 at 8 p.m. ET on ABC. Before that, check out the first sneak peek for the upcoming installment that was unveiled at the SDCC.