MK Tiana's Bayou Adventure - latest details and construction progress

[Virtual Toad]

I agree with you normally, but honestly at this point this is a huge release of frustration.

It isn't aimed at everyone criticizing the attraction because not everyone has been this way and there are things worth criticizing.

But ever since this got underway, there have been a segment of people on this forum, on Twitter, on Reddit, and beyond who seemingly made it their life's mission to make this whole process as absolutely miserable for everyone as humanly possible. They were unhappy so they worked long and hard to make sure everyone else was unhappy too.

Every step of the way, it was picking apart one thing or another to the point that it was inevitable that they were going to hate the final product, even if it was the greatest attraction Disney had ever done. Every time someone said they liked something, they were forced to justify it because some found it so unimaginable that someone could like it that they simply couldn't just let people be happy and had to demand the reasons why they could possibly enjoy what they were seeing.

It has never been popular to be excited for this ride, just as it won't be popular in Disney fan spaces for anyone to enjoy it. It's all been one giant echo chamber of hating it while everyone who doesn't had to sit there and defend it. And that's just so....insane for a theme park ride. It's a ride. A ride. And it's been treated like some gigantic sin that represents the moral decay of everything to do with the parks.

To everyone who's not felt super excited along the way but tried their best to engage in good faith with it and found themselves still disappointed in it, that is so, so, so valid. I've felt the same way in regards to some attractions. This frustration is not at all aimed at them.

It's at the people who've spent the last year being completely, unashamedly negative about every little thing and can't even spare one even semi-positive remark because apparently that'd just be too much. I hope when some time has passed from opening, those people can look back on their behavior through all this and realize just how ridiculous it all has been and hopefully never devote that much time and energy to being this way over a theme park ride again.

Sorry for the essay, sorry if this is aggressive, I don't mean for it to be. This is just the culmination of so much annoyance and frustration that has absolutely ruined this whole process, my first time really getting to follow a ride's development from beginning to end, something that ought to've been joyous and exciting for a Disney nerd to get to do. Thank God I'm still looking forward to riding the ride, but lord I'm almost to the point of joining these people in wishing it didn't exist if only it means all this insane immature noise stops.

What is with the uptick in bashing people for the way they express negative opinions?

 

[Homemade Imagineering]

Where are the spoonbills or other critters?? Filling out scenes with more minor animated critters would have done wonders, makes me wonder if this was a plan of theirs and was completely cut

 

[TalkToEthan]

This ride needed to be a home run.

And ended up reaching first base on an error

 

[TheMaxRebo]

I think it's really important to highlight that Splash Mountain was the highest rated ride at the resort on guest surveys.

I'm sure we could go through and dissect Splash and find things to make it better - especially since it's 30 years old - but something about it clicked with guests and it was beloved.

Disney closing their highest rated ride for a retheme is unprecedented, and is in large part why this retheme has been under so much scrutiny.

This ride needed to be a home run.

Whether we like or not Disney had their reasons for closing it - *something* was going to be done. I think this is far from the worst that could have happened and the ride system is still in place, which I think was the most brilliant part of the ride

Guess just trying to focus on the positive aspects - of which I think there are a number of

 

[Animaniac93-98]

The more I think about it, the more strange it is that they are really setting up this ride to be about food but, once you drift by that first outdoor garden section, it has nothing to do with food. All the signage for the queue, the water tower, the delivery truck, etc., etc. all suggest you're about to take a ride set in a food co-op. Then, you get on the ride and it's about gathering animals in the bayou to play in the band at a party in New Orleans!

I didn't catch anything in the video, but do they acknowledge the Salt Dome conceit either?

Seems a lot of stuff talked about the ride previously, ultimately meant very little.

 

[TheMaxRebo]

Can someone explain this “shrinking part” for me. So the story is to find musicians for the party and they find all these critters to be part of the band and Tiana wants you to find more so she has Mama Odie shrink you to go into some log thing and find two frogs (all I saw) and then apparently that was enough so she makes you big again and has you go down a waterfall to get their quicker. Am I missing anything?

I think that is the gist of it (obviously frogs being a big part of the movie) - I do think, at least based on the video, this segment could have been better/more impact ful

 

[Incomudro]

I think it's really important to highlight that Splash Mountain was the highest rated ride at the resort on guest surveys.

I'm sure we could go through and dissect Splash and find things to make it better - especially since it's 30 years old - but something about it clicked with guests and it was beloved.

Disney closing their highest rated ride for a retheme is unprecedented, and is in large part why this retheme has been under so much scrutiny.

This ride needed to be a home run.

Imagine today's tech, lighting etc., augmenting an updated Splash?

 

[Ice Gator]

Where are the spoonbills or other critters?? Filling out scenes with more minor animated critters would have done wonders, makes me wonder if this was a plan of theirs and was completely cut

Oh yeah? Those birds that sing alongside Mama Odi in the movie are entirely absent unless I missed them.

 

[TheRealSkull]

Imagine today's tech, lighting etc., augmenting an updated Splash?

Imagine the 5th gate is an entire park is dedicated to retired attractions. Then your dream could come true.

 

[SuddenStorm]

Imagine today's tech, lighting etc., augmenting an updated Splash?

I had that hope for years, and it would have been amazing. Especially with tasteful projection mapping added to the Splash sets.

 

[mf1972]

i wasn’t going to watch the video, but after seeing the article here on mixed reviews, i decided to watch it. i like the animatronics & visually, its not bad looking. otherwise, thats it. huge miss by not having facilier anywhere in the ride, which is a shame.
it’s no splash mountain, but i’ll still give it a try & judge for myself. otherwise it comes off as navi river journey with songs.

 

[The Leader of the Club]

I didn't catch anything in the video, but do they acknowledge the Salt Dome conceit either?

Seems a lot of stuff talked about the ride previously, ultimately meant very little.

Looking solely at the attraction, almost nothing they revealed mattered at all.
The Salt Dome, the employee-owned Co-op, the backstories for the critters, the New Orleans culture, etc. were all nonexistent in the actual attraction.

If Disney spent half as much time thinking about the story of the actual attraction instead of its backstory, we would have been much better off.

 

[davis_unoxx]

“Everybody’s got a laughing place”

 

[JohnD]

I just finished the video. Alas, I can’t deny that I’m disappointed. Unlike some here, I don’t think the ride looks empty—I find the interiors sufficiently lush and interesting—but the lack of any narrative tension or excitement is very much to the detriment of the experience. I also really dislike the screens.

I don’t think it’s a bad attraction in itself, and I’m reasonably confident it will be more enjoyable in person, but the final product isn’t strong enough to stop me from missing Splash.

After watching, I find the interiors as sufficiently lush and interesting as NRJ. Lots of empty space until AAs (NRJ - 1 AA) show up.

 

[brb1006]

Just seen a couple online reactions from Japanese Disney fans reacting to the POV footage for this ride. Let's just say they weren't impressed at all.

 

[Squishy]

What they did to the drop build up should be criminal

 

[tanc]

Forgot the specific posts, since they were in Japanese but you have to do a bit of digging on Twitter/X (which is impossible for those that don't use the site) and other social media sites to find them.

Idk as someone who can read Japanese and follows Japanese Disney twitter accounts, I've seen positive and negative reception in Japan.

If you're genuinely curious you can just search this: https://x.com/search?q=スプラッシュマウンテン&src=recent_search_click&f=live

 

[KDM31091]

I agree that it gives me a similar feeling as when I get off of Navi River Journey. It's not a bad attraction. It's visually stunning. But it feels like it's missing something. There's no conflict and no real story. It's just very visually appealing. Tiana feels like the same thing. No real story, no conflict, no excitement.

I also feel like the backstory and characters hyped up by Disney beforehand barely play any role in the attraction.

 

[zipadee999]

I had that hope for years, and it would have been amazing. Especially with tasteful projection mapping added to the Splash sets.

Or at least they could’ve replaced the blue walls for the sky with screen backdrops to add some more depth. It was still just about perfect as was though

 

[mightynine]

I do wonder if TBA will be as dark as it seems on this video. Watching a second time on my TV, felt like everytime the camera encountered a brighter show scene, the surrounding scenery would get darker, like it had an auto adjust for brightness activated.

But man, that script is rough the second time around.

Louis - “Tiana found a band that can play!”
seconds later
Tiana - “They can play!”