I find this take utterly baffling. The entire point of Monsters, the IPs hook, is putting extraordinary creatures in an utterly familiar, banal workaday world. The franchise’s setting is uninteresting ON PURPOSE. An attraction that emphasizes the setting over the characters - like, say, a coaster with few show scenes - is uniquely unsuited to the property. In fact, it’s not an exaggeration to say there are few properties that are more of a mismatch for a thrill coaster - one that springs to mind, of course, is Muppets. Both IPs need a ride type that emphasizes the characters and the gags that spring from their personalities - say a show or a dark ride. The Tokyo dark ride is a great showcase for the essential qualities of Monsters.
The fan obsession with the Door Coaster is a perfect example of people not understanding what works in a film and what works in a theme park attraction. Viewers watch the film’s door sequence, which uses editing, camerawork, and music to create kinetic excitement, and assume it’s perfect for a ride - but those properties don’t translate. Take another spectacular action sequence that seems perfect for a ride - the troop carrier escape from the reactor after the first encounter with xenomorphs in Aliens. It’s one of the most exhilarating sequences in all of film and seems ideally suited for an immersive ride. Actually translating it into a ride, however, would create an attraction set in empty industrial hallways, where the points of interest are almost entirely behind guests, and the ride vehicle dramatically restricts riders vision.
Perhaps an even more vital point is that the door sequence is so exciting because it functions as the climax of the characters’ emotional arcs - it worked because we had spent over an hour coming to care about these characters and there relationship. The early Pixar films excelled at these late-film action sequences that worked because they served as the climax of the films themes and the characters development. Think of the moving truck chase in Toy Story or the luggage room sequence in Toy Story 2. Both action sequences are masterpieces, and both would make awful rides. The emotional and thematic elements that make them work won’t translate. Movie viewers are generally very bad at understanding HOW a movie is making them feel things and attribute their excitement at these sequences only to the kinetic elements, which are of strictly secondary importance - hence the foolish obsession with building a door coaster.
