Two words: the Genie.

Okay, we may need a few more words. How about "Robin Williams as the Genie"? If you've seen Aladdin, you probably know that the Genie is one of the most memorable characters from this movie—from any Disney movie, really. He's a big, blue, wisecracking, wish-granting, song-and-dance man who rips through impressions and jokes at the speed of light.

Well, okay, you say. Sure, he's funny, but what's the big deal?

Answer: the Genie pretty much single-handedly changed our idea of what animated movies could be.

See, before Aladdin, full-length cartoons mostly followed a formula—timeless stories told by professional voice actors. Pull lever, cash check. Classic Disney movies often featured the same voice actors doing all kinds of different characters. You might notice, for example, that Winnie the Pooh, the Cheshire Cat, and Kaa from The Jungle Book all sound a bit alike. That's because they're all done by the late, great Sterling Holloway. And that was all well and good. For then.

But the folks who worked on Aladdin had a different idea. Their movie called for a genie who was larger than life. He needed to defy time, space, and physics, so who better than the manic and brilliant Robin Williams to play him? The screenwriters wrote the part for him, and the artists created sample animations of his stand-up routines to convince him of what the Genie could look like on the big screen. Williams loved it, and a big blue star was born. Shazam.

Robin Williams also did something totally unheard of for an animated movie. He improvised. That's right: almost all of the dialogue that he did for the Genie came straight from him. He recorded almost 16 hours of material for the film, even though the writers and animators could only fit in a fraction of that. The Genie turning into Arnold Schwarzenegger? It's in. Doing a mean Jack Nicholson impression? A must-have moment.

At the time, this was a huge risk. It had literally never been done before. Robin Williams was a big-name star, and animated movies did not usually have big-name stars in them. They also didn't have characters morphing to do Ed Sullivan impressions and spewing out pop-culture references every two seconds. What if it was all a big fat flop? We're guessing the Aladdin folks had their air sickness bags ready on this wild magic carpet ride.

But it wasn't a flop. It was the opposite of a flop. It was the top-grossing movie of 1992, and it changed the way everyone made animated movies. Look at any of the biggest animated movies at the box office now: you can't get them made without fancy stars. (Sorry, professional voice actors.) And fast-paced jokes and pop culture references? Ask any of the Shrek, Madagascar, Kung Fu Panda, or Despicable Me movies if they think those are a bad idea.

Yup, the Genie ushered in a whole new world of animation. There's endless possibilities for A-list celebrities to line their pockets for a few hours of voiceover work. And screenwriters can now pack in the gags to add fun for both the adults and kids. That's real magic.

And to think—all it took was just one little ol' genie.