News Walt Disney World's Character meet locations to reopen along with more shows and entertainment

mm52200

mm52200

Well-Known Member
drizgirl said:
And how about putting Minnie back with Mickey for the remainder of the 50th? And making sure Cinderella is in the lobby of CRT. I hear she has been MIA a lot lately.
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If they can’t open a venue with two-three short height characters due to staffing what makes you think they can add back a similar height character in a multi room open to close venue?
All of this boils down to simply not having enough staffing at this moment in time and in conjunction with event season.
Once again Cinderella is most likely due to staffing. She’s not guaranteed at the restaurant still and if they can’t make it happen that day, then it doesn’t happen.
 
mattpeto

mattpeto

Well-Known Member
mm52200 said:
Pete’s was supposed to have already happened but due to staffing they haven’t been able to reopen it yet. Maybe in the winter
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Wow, it has to be rough. Figured Ariel at the Grotto would be back, she’s there 4x a week at MVMCP (and with Eric). Maybe Bon Voyage returns in early 2023 after parties wrap.

I assume these and Enchanted Tales with Belle returns in first half of 2023.
 
mm52200

mm52200

Well-Known Member
mattpeto said:
Wow, it has to be rough. Figured Ariel at the Grotto would be back, she’s there 4x a week at MVMCP (and with Eric). Maybe Bon Voyage returns in early 2023 after parties wrap.

I assume these and Enchanted Tales with Belle returns in first half of 2023.
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Once again though, one Ariel appearing a night four times a week is very different from the 8-10 a day it takes to operate the grotto.
 
mattpeto

mattpeto

Well-Known Member
mm52200 said:
Once again though, one Ariel appearing a night four times a week is very different from the 8-10 a day it takes to operate the grotto.
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Fair point. Still sending Ariel to Bon Voyage might be an easier objective.

Reference: the single meal at Artist Point.
 
GiveMeTheMusic

GiveMeTheMusic

Well-Known Member
wdrive said:
What’s so horrendous about it?
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WDW's focus on mass locations has removed visible characters from the parks, shielding them behind huge queues, and completely destroyed character variety. Everyone insists that WDW guests are somehow different from the guests at every other Disney resort worldwide and that they want to wait 60+ minutes to meet one character at a time, and don't have any interest in meeting anyone but the fab five or Cinderella, and that's just demonstrably false every single time an event occurs and people lose their minds over the chance to see literally anyone else.

A character department that still has a Merida meet-n-greet with a queue and no Mirabel meet-n-greet is a character department asleep at the wheel. New characters are often completely unseen, or they just appear in blink-and-you-miss-it cavalcades. And if they think the demand for Mirabel would be overwhelming, they can do what every other resort does and have lots of other characters available to help spread out demand.

Now it's a staffing issue, but it wasn't before and one day it won't be again. If they had all the staffing they could ask for now, they'd just be right back at their 2019 offerings, which were stale then and moreso now.

How is it acceptable that I can go to the supposed most popular theme park in the world right now, pay $154 to get in the gate, and not be able to find Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Donald, Pluto, Chip, Dale or Daisy? Why are there country bears in Frontierland when those performers could be in Pluto or Goofy? Why is Stitch doing "sightings" in Tomorrowland instead of that performer being in Minnie or Donald and doing sets? Staffing is a problem but this is nothing but incompetence. If they can't staff a Minnie meet at MK consistently, don't publish it and just send her out to do sets in Storybook Circus or something on the days you do have her. Characters aren't rocket science, and WDW's department has completely lost the plot.
 
OwlHouseKing97

OwlHouseKing97

Active Member
In the Parks
No
GiveMeTheMusic said:
WDW's focus on mass locations has removed visible characters from the parks, shielding them behind huge queues, and completely destroyed character variety. Everyone insists that WDW guests are somehow different from the guests at every other Disney resort worldwide and that they want to wait 60+ minutes to meet one character at a time, and don't have any interest in meeting anyone but the fab five or Cinderella, and that's just demonstrably false every single time an event occurs and people lose their minds over the chance to see literally anyone else.

A character department that still has a Merida meet-n-greet with a queue and no Mirabel meet-n-greet is a character department asleep at the wheel. New characters are often completely unseen, or they just appear in blink-and-you-miss-it cavalcades. And if they think the demand for Mirabel would be overwhelming, they can do what every other resort does and have lots of other characters available to help spread out demand.

Now it's a staffing issue, but it wasn't before and one day it won't be again. If they had all the staffing they could ask for now, they'd just be right back at their 2019 offerings, which were stale then and moreso now.

How is it acceptable that I can go to the supposed most popular theme park in the world right now, pay $154 to get in the gate, and not be able to find Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Donald, Pluto, Chip, Dale or Daisy? Why are there country bears in Frontierland when those performers could be in Pluto or Goofy? Why is Stitch doing "sightings" in Tomorrowland instead of that performer being in Minnie or Donald and doing sets? Staffing is a problem but this is nothing but incompetence. If they can't staff a Minnie meet at MK consistently, don't publish it and just send her out to do sets in Storybook Circus or something on the days you do have her. Characters aren't rocket science, and WDW's department has completely lost the plot.
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and also they have yet to retire characters from shows that ended/barely air on reruns anymore like Elena of Avalor and pretty much the DJR characters(except for Pluto, as he's timeless) too, as she's nowhere near as popular as Mirabel(they retired the title character from another Craig Gerber like Sofia the First from meets once her series ended, they couldn't do the same for EOA)
 
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mm52200

mm52200

Well-Known Member
GiveMeTheMusic said:
WDW's focus on mass locations has removed visible characters from the parks, shielding them behind huge queues, and completely destroyed character variety. Everyone insists that WDW guests are somehow different from the guests at every other Disney resort worldwide and that they want to wait 60+ minutes to meet one character at a time, and don't have any interest in meeting anyone but the fab five or Cinderella, and that's just demonstrably false every single time an event occurs and people lose their minds over the chance to see literally anyone else.

A character department that still has a Merida meet-n-greet with a queue and no Mirabel meet-n-greet is a character department asleep at the wheel. New characters are often completely unseen, or they just appear in blink-and-you-miss-it cavalcades. And if they think the demand for Mirabel would be overwhelming, they can do what every other resort does and have lots of other characters available to help spread out demand.

Now it's a staffing issue, but it wasn't before and one day it won't be again. If they had all the staffing they could ask for now, they'd just be right back at their 2019 offerings, which were stale then and moreso now.

How is it acceptable that I can go to the supposed most popular theme park in the world right now, pay $154 to get in the gate, and not be able to find Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Donald, Pluto, Chip, Dale or Daisy? Why are there country bears in Frontierland when those performers could be in Pluto or Goofy? Why is Stitch doing "sightings" in Tomorrowland instead of that performer being in Minnie or Donald and doing sets? Staffing is a problem but this is nothing but incompetence. If they can't staff a Minnie meet at MK consistently, don't publish it and just send her out to do sets in Storybook Circus or something on the days you do have her. Characters aren't rocket science, and WDW's department has completely lost the plot.
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Wait you just complained about the stale character variety but are also complaining about having different characters like the Country Bears and Stitch out instead of the VIPs which are out in every other park and multiple dining venues?
 
GiveMeTheMusic

GiveMeTheMusic

Well-Known Member
mm52200 said:
Wait you just complained about the stale character variety but are also complaining about having different characters like the Country Bears and Stitch out instead of the VIPs which are out in every other park and multiple dining venues?
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Goofy and Pluto are available in one park each today, Donald and Daisy in two. Dining venues are great, but they don't supplant main park availability - they're extremely difficult to book and of course come with their own hefty pricetags. They need to get a handle on VIPs before they put out zero-demand characters like Wendell and Shaker. In a fully staffed situation, WDW should definitely be able to have more variety but if things are truly this bad there, then they need to focus on the basics first.

Every other resort seems to manage having the VIPs out as well as a good variety of other characters, even now. I realize event season complicates things too, but that's a self-imposed problem. God didn't foist MVMCP on WDW, TDO did. The idea that regular guests paying out the nose are somehow not worthy of a regular character menu is insane, and it's their problem to figure out.
 
MisterPenguin

MisterPenguin

President of Animal Kingdom
Premium Member
WDW is still doing the distanced M&G with Pooh, Chip & Dale, Daisy, etc... either on a grass knoll or up on a balcony.

But yeah, they should be keeping up with what DCA does in Avengers Campus.

I did see both Elena and Mirabel in parades at MK, tho.
 
brb1006

brb1006

Well-Known Member
GiveMeTheMusic said:
WDW's focus on mass locations has removed visible characters from the parks, shielding them behind huge queues, and completely destroyed character variety. Everyone insists that WDW guests are somehow different from the guests at every other Disney resort worldwide and that they want to wait 60+ minutes to meet one character at a time, and don't have any interest in meeting anyone but the fab five or Cinderella, and that's just demonstrably false every single time an event occurs and people lose their minds over the chance to see literally anyone else.

A character department that still has a Merida meet-n-greet with a queue and no Mirabel meet-n-greet is a character department asleep at the wheel. New characters are often completely unseen, or they just appear in blink-and-you-miss-it cavalcades. And if they think the demand for Mirabel would be overwhelming, they can do what every other resort does and have lots of other characters available to help spread out demand.

Now it's a staffing issue, but it wasn't before and one day it won't be again. If they had all the staffing they could ask for now, they'd just be right back at their 2019 offerings, which were stale then and moreso now.

How is it acceptable that I can go to the supposed most popular theme park in the world right now, pay $154 to get in the gate, and not be able to find Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Donald, Pluto, Chip, Dale or Daisy? Why are there country bears in Frontierland when those performers could be in Pluto or Goofy? Why is Stitch doing "sightings" in Tomorrowland instead of that performer being in Minnie or Donald and doing sets? Staffing is a problem but this is nothing but incompetence. If they can't staff a Minnie meet at MK consistently, don't publish it and just send her out to do sets in Storybook Circus or something on the days you do have her. Characters aren't rocket science, and WDW's department has completely lost the plot.
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I remember when WDW used to have more variety of Disney Characters to meet during the early to mid 2000s compared to now.
 

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