Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-62.47.6.95-20130609205603/@comment-5106672-20131126214359

Utter solitude wrote: Since Sidney is free, his lamp may be basically useless. I don't find it too odd that there would be another similar/identical lamp. It wouldn't be if they didn't specificly say " the three Genies". I'm not a native speaker, but if I remember correctly, the determinate article preceding a numeral adjective specifies there are only said number of said thing.

Also, depending on how back in the timeline is the flashback, most likely at the time the book was written Sidney was still a Genie to begin with. And if there were many genies, there would be no point for Jafar to go above and beyond to retrive Cyrus, given it is undoubtedly a huge waste of time, energy and magic – and, however cocky he might be, I think he's aware there is a possibility of falure due to Alice and Cyrus' adamant determination to be together.