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Original Scale of Pirates?
- Thread starter wdwfan94
- Start date
ABigBrassBand
Well-Known Member
In Martin's tribute it says something about this...I believe it was to be a direct copy of the DLR version, but the fact that they had no basement and had to bring the ride to a lower level allowed them to cut some of the track out of the ride. Maybe the large queue also had something to do with it?
Testtrack321
Well-Known Member
The only information I read was about an interview with Marc Davis that stated Pirates was considered for Tom Sawyer's Island for a time... until they realized how hard it would be to hide the show building.
Pirates was so quickly added to WDW that I'm surprised we got as much as we got.
GymLeaderPhil
Well-Known Member
I wish we had Anaheim's length, but sadly the last few months that I have frequented our version leads me to believe it would be in such a horrible further state of disrepair. All non-essential audio animatronics have multiple inoperable movements - most notably mouth related if not the entire figure. Very bad show.
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
The bayou and the caves were originally considered to be necessary consequences of the Disneyland environment, not wonderful mood-setting showpieces. In Florida, all of the mood-setting was to be done by the queue. Every proposed extra that I have seen is always related to the queue and not the actual ride itself.
Sam Eagle 1776
Member
that makes sense, it does kinda resemble the DL version. yes i have heard that it was supposed to be bigger. the original is what a solid 3-4 minutes longer?
ABigBrassBand
Well-Known Member
Yes, but I think the OP is referring to the attraction after it was re-named...?
TP2000
Well-Known Member
Disneyland's original and epic Pirates of the Caribbean is about 15 and a half minutes long, give or take a few seconds. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mUQFnpQqs0&feature=related
WDW's version of Pirates is about half as long as that, clocking in at 7 and a half minutes long. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzPus1Iuga0&feature=related
There is about 8 minutes of ride length missing from the WDW version, compared to the much longer Disneyland original.
But, as has been mentioned earlier in this thread, it's not so much the missing ride length at WDW as it is the noticeably inferior maintenance and showmanship standards between the two versions. When I visit WDW, and then invariably hit Disneyland within a few days of my return, it's the big E Tickets like Pirates where the difference in maintenance between WDW and Disneyland is the most striking.
ABigBrassBand
Well-Known Member
Well they had to push it out so quick it was almost prepared to be half-assed, so I don't think that they would take pride in that :shrug:
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
Testtrack321
Well-Known Member
What he said. Totally agree.
It was never renamed. WRE was a totally new, different, and unique ride; only similarities is the method of conveyance. Pirates was demanded by the GP, it was rushed in, WRE was put on hold, and then budget and fuel crisis hit.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
Wow, what an interesting read. Thanks so much for linking it for us!
Although while reading it, I was left with the thought that this author was over-thinking this way too much. It's just a pirate ride at a theme park. But then I got to his final two sentences, and they summed up the difference between WDW and Disneyland perfectly when he concluded with...
"I think well above any missing figures or scenes or drops or restaurants, the most damning thing you can say about the Florida Pirate Ride is that WED has plucked the heart out of their mystery, made it somehow more like lesser rides. The 1973 version of the ride may have some admirable qualities, but it lacks the 1967 version's aspect of seeming to be like a dream - something that maybe you totally imagined. The literal minded 1973 ride lacks this quality and is innumerably poorer without it."
Add in noticeably poorer maintenance standards at WDW, and 8 minutes of missing ride length, and it's easy to see why the Disneyland version of Pirates is far superior. :lol:
AEfx
Well-Known Member
It's an Internet myth that the Disneyland version is some epic masterpiece compared to ours.
When I first experienced it last year (and I rode it at least 20 times in a week) I was expecting some "OMG! WOW!" moments, but I didn't have them.
First, our ride is grander in scale. Like most Disneyland rides, their Pirates is much more "intimate" - everything is a bit smaller, closer together. You notice it a lot on rides like POTC and HM because you are much closer to the AA's and set pieces in many instances. Sometimes that's cool, but in the case of Pirates, it just feels kind of cramped to be honest; it's more like you are in a ride building than actually out on the open seas, as you can feel in the WDW ride, specifically at the ship/fort section after the drop. (In the HM - which is close to identical to ours in many respects inside, it actually reduced the illusion - specifically in the Graveyard and the Hitchhiking Ghosts portion).
Second, most of the ride length difference is attributed to the beginning where you float through the bayou (with lovely views of people in shorts and T-shirts eating in the restaurant - my how well that goes with the theming, LOL) and a very large extension of the caves where there is nothing but empty caverns. Cool, yes, but no "show". It's simply to get you out of the park and to the show building.
While the build-up is a little fun and necessary due to the inexplicable facade (I still don't get the relevance - apparently New Orleans was known for Pirates? I think of Pirates on the high seas, not in the French Quarter, LOL), it really doesn't add much to the ride. Our show building and queue is far, far more appropriate - imagine, going on a Pirate adventure by going through a Pirate bunker and then into the underground caves. Not some fancy looking 1800's pristine white building.
Most of the show scenes, except being smaller, are the same, with the exception of they have a treasure room near the beginning of the ride instead of at the end. It's a neat little thing (though kind of hokey - while the one skeleton driving the beat up ship before the drop in the MK version is neat, when you have skeletons drinking beer and stuff it's kind of silly to be honest).
That's really the biggest difference. The rest of the additional ride time is taken up by the Bayou (which is neat, but seeing the people eating in the restaurant kind of ruins it), extra-long empty caverns, the small treasure room at the beginning, and at the end you get paraded around a little wheel where you awkwardly are returned to the "big fancy white building" and go through part of the queue looking at the people in line before you are dumped back into the dark Bayou to unload at the same place you load to begin with (I found this rather strange feeling, everyone just stares at you in the queue because you are so close - LOL or maybe that was just because I'm funny looking LOL).
To be honest, it feels like a "Directors Cut" of a movie - which often has a few extra bits that are neat, a few extra bits that slow everything down but don't really add anything to the story/experience. In ours, people say it's "abrupt" how you enter into the action so quickly, whereas I find it more exhilarating and action-like.
All that said, it is not a bad ride. At all. It's amazing, just like ours. But my whole life I've been told that it's some amazing step-up from the WDW version, and it's really not. It's slightly different, but we have a far more appropriate queue that does not require the Bayou theme, ours feels more "epic" in scope (it may be shorter, but it's grander), and to be honest by the 6th or 7th ride I just got bored in the seeminly endless, empty caves that make up most of the additional ride time.
That's just my take on it, though. Others feel differently. But comparing it bit by bit, scene by scene, I don't think either one is overall "better", except for our queue which makes a lot more sense and sets the mood far better, IMO (we don't need a slow introduction, because we get that while walking through the queue).
When I first experienced it last year (and I rode it at least 20 times in a week) I was expecting some "OMG! WOW!" moments, but I didn't have them.
First, our ride is grander in scale. Like most Disneyland rides, their Pirates is much more "intimate" - everything is a bit smaller, closer together. You notice it a lot on rides like POTC and HM because you are much closer to the AA's and set pieces in many instances. Sometimes that's cool, but in the case of Pirates, it just feels kind of cramped to be honest; it's more like you are in a ride building than actually out on the open seas, as you can feel in the WDW ride, specifically at the ship/fort section after the drop. (In the HM - which is close to identical to ours in many respects inside, it actually reduced the illusion - specifically in the Graveyard and the Hitchhiking Ghosts portion).
Second, most of the ride length difference is attributed to the beginning where you float through the bayou (with lovely views of people in shorts and T-shirts eating in the restaurant - my how well that goes with the theming, LOL) and a very large extension of the caves where there is nothing but empty caverns. Cool, yes, but no "show". It's simply to get you out of the park and to the show building.
While the build-up is a little fun and necessary due to the inexplicable facade (I still don't get the relevance - apparently New Orleans was known for Pirates? I think of Pirates on the high seas, not in the French Quarter, LOL), it really doesn't add much to the ride. Our show building and queue is far, far more appropriate - imagine, going on a Pirate adventure by going through a Pirate bunker and then into the underground caves. Not some fancy looking 1800's pristine white building.
Most of the show scenes, except being smaller, are the same, with the exception of they have a treasure room near the beginning of the ride instead of at the end. It's a neat little thing (though kind of hokey - while the one skeleton driving the beat up ship before the drop in the MK version is neat, when you have skeletons drinking beer and stuff it's kind of silly to be honest).
That's really the biggest difference. The rest of the additional ride time is taken up by the Bayou (which is neat, but seeing the people eating in the restaurant kind of ruins it), extra-long empty caverns, the small treasure room at the beginning, and at the end you get paraded around a little wheel where you awkwardly are returned to the "big fancy white building" and go through part of the queue looking at the people in line before you are dumped back into the dark Bayou to unload at the same place you load to begin with (I found this rather strange feeling, everyone just stares at you in the queue because you are so close - LOL or maybe that was just because I'm funny looking LOL).
To be honest, it feels like a "Directors Cut" of a movie - which often has a few extra bits that are neat, a few extra bits that slow everything down but don't really add anything to the story/experience. In ours, people say it's "abrupt" how you enter into the action so quickly, whereas I find it more exhilarating and action-like.
All that said, it is not a bad ride. At all. It's amazing, just like ours. But my whole life I've been told that it's some amazing step-up from the WDW version, and it's really not. It's slightly different, but we have a far more appropriate queue that does not require the Bayou theme, ours feels more "epic" in scope (it may be shorter, but it's grander), and to be honest by the 6th or 7th ride I just got bored in the seeminly endless, empty caves that make up most of the additional ride time.
That's just my take on it, though. Others feel differently. But comparing it bit by bit, scene by scene, I don't think either one is overall "better", except for our queue which makes a lot more sense and sets the mood far better, IMO (we don't need a slow introduction, because we get that while walking through the queue).
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
The restaurant is obviously something that was considered a mistake to remove, as it was put back into the Tokyo Disneyland (a near replica of the Disneyland original) and Disneyland Paris (an amazing re-imagining that I prefer over the US versions) attractions.
AEfx
Well-Known Member
And eating there is awesome!
It made me wish we had something similar at WDW.
But from the attraction ride vehicle, it's just too open and lit-up and the only way you can avoid seeing tourists in T-shirts is to turn your head completely 90 degrees left and keep it there for the entire time you are in the Bayou.
It doesn't surprise me that they replicated that elsewhere - you can easily drop $100 on a relatively simple meal there for a couple, but you pay it because you get to sit in the ride. It's a cash cow, and I willingly paid it and would pay it again.
BUT...it does nothing for the attraction itself, it just takes away from it. It's not there in the other parks as an enhancement to the ride, it's there because it's a super-popular restaurant with probably the best theming in all of Disney-dom where they can charge super-premium prices for the experience of the location. It's a financial decision, not to enhance the ride itself.
Wilt Dasney
Well-Known Member
This makes sense to me. As interesting as the opening segments of the DL ride are, I couldn't help but feel they seemed "tacked on" and inconsequential from a narrative standpoint.
(It's possible that feeling comes from decades of knowing only the Florida version, and thus feeling the story was "complete" without the DL opening scenes — but really, that's just full disclosure. I still think I'm right about the DL Pirates. :lol
Testtrack321
Well-Known Member
I made the same mistake you just did. The fantastic writer is actual female and is incredibly smart with her analysis of design. Not to nag you with it, but credit due where credit is due.
Wilt Dasney
Well-Known Member
I will stand up for the DL ride on this count. It's one of those things that I never noticed was "missing" until I experienced it (and honestly the ride works perfectly fine without it), but to me, there's something a little extra special about setting sail from New Orleans to find the Pirates than from the already "exoticized" Adventureland.While the build-up is a little fun and necessary due to the inexplicable facade (I still don't get the relevance - apparently New Orleans was known for Pirates? I think of Pirates on the high seas, not in the French Quarter, LOL), it really doesn't add much to the ride. Our show building and queue is far, far more appropriate - imagine, going on a Pirate adventure by going through a Pirate bunker and then into the underground caves. Not some fancy looking 1800's pristine white building.
It's not a long way from the Louisiana coast to the Caribbean, so it makes perfect sense that you could start out from civilization, take a wrong turn on the water, and suddenly find yourself facing the bloodthirsty crew (whereas in AdvLand you're already past civilization, so you expect these kinds of adventures to pop up anyway).
I absolutely love the fact that PotC and HM are both located in NO Square at DL — and both of them are narratively justified!