Maelstrom was a developmental lifetime ago, when it was rushed (honestly fairly impressively for Disney) in less than three years from them realizing the movie was a smash success.
Arrendelle at Hong Kong is a much better land than Tokyos. So there’s that at least. It’s a better ride in Tokyo, but honestly not as much as it should have been. Then there are some choice improvements for Hong Kong that helped FEA.
FEA gets way too much unnecessary flack in my opinion…
I mean yeah, it was ages ago, but it’s still true and they are opening the same ride next year still.
I also I totally disagree about the rest of your assessment. I mean I enjoy the aesthetic of FEA, if it has a real-world wait less than 15-20 minutes I do it, but it is a coin toss between it and Maelstrom in a vacuum if you ignore the arbitrary IP attached because despite it having modern tech and some improvements like a longer track and great queue, the storytelling as a whole is just so weak, and theme parks are a lot more permanent than just tossing something together. Though, given they are still cloning them a decade later, it appears that they actually think their product isn’t very flawed. There’s a reason Mermaid was never cloned again, and it’s not because The Little Mermaid isn’t an elite IP.
I think Pooh at Magic Kingdom is a very clever small-scale dark ride and well executed for what it is, but when you go on Pooh’s Hunny Hunt it’s like holy, what a difference. I don’t think FEA is well executed like TMAOWTP, despite it being smaller in scope and tech, and I don’t think “tech” is enough to lift up a ride’s inherent issues.
I definitely overthink rides, most people will just go on them or whatever, I really view attractions more like a designer, probably too much.
Frozen Journey is in a stratosphere of its own over FEA. The Elsa lift hill scene reminds me of Shanghai Pirates’ Flying Dutchman reveal, the turntables with Anna/Elsa literally makes you feel like the boat itself is a film camera, the ending finale and scenes just being so large and detailed, the pacing, scale, I mean the ice palace is nuts. It is a monumental achievement in themed design, not the best ride ever made, but absolutely a top tier ride in execution and scale, sort of like Radiator Springs Racers or Hagrid’s, maybe a tad bit lower but my point is the gap is huge, it’s not a marginal improvement in scale but totally brilliant execution.
The team that worked on it likely would’ve actually done Princess and the Frog right.
Frozen Journey would easily be the best ride at Magic Kingdom if it opened tomorrow, probably third at Disneyland after Indy and Rise (I guess Pirates too tho I hate the Red Head change). I wouldn’t even put Frozen: Ever After in the top 5 at EPCOT. Even if it was just executed better, just for its smaller scale than it needed alone holds it back.
I don’t really know how to quantify this into words, I hope I’m making sense.
It really feels like Tiana’s Bayou Adventure is FEA’s spiritual successor and that’s not a compliment at all, as they both suffer from the same “YAYAYAY HAPPY TIMES” for toddlers, terrible storytelling, very weak set dressing for large parts, and weak execution from what it could be. Now, Splash was more beloved than Maelstrom, but I really think they’re both rides that could’ve just been executed a lot better and a lot of the complaints would be irrelevant (tho Frozen itself obviously is too large of a franchise to shoehorn). I can’t imagine that Disneyland Park wouldn’t get a Frozen ride at some point, Star Wars Coaster, Tomorrowland redo all seem like the next steps for the park, but I guess we’ll see.
I think SDMT is a perfect example of a ride basically executed perfectly despite its scale being too small, I wish Frozen: Ever After felt like that, but it really doesn’t. Alas, it’s not going anywhere but I’m still going to call it out, and I don’t think the AA’s faces are the ride’s largest issue.
I do agree that HKDL’s land is terrific, small, but very well done in matching the park’s quaintness, but Fantasy Springs is so, so much larger and more extensive that it doesn’t really matter, it also improved on some aspects as well; I just like HKDL’s whimsical approach, but HKDL needed a killer ride like Pirates, and it basically got a flawed (again, not even well executed) Shanghai’s Peter Pan’s Flight ride in scale instead. I disagree with people that say it was enough for HKDL, it really isn’t especially not to clone a frustratingly poorly executed attraction. Even if they plopped down Toy Story Mania, and they should, the park doesn’t have an IJA, RSR, FoP, etc. which is what it is. I hope the Avengers/Spider-Man drop tower is Mission: Breakout good, but I am very hesitant to be truly hyped for it because Iron Man Experience is flat out bad, Web Slingers is fine but so much weaker than Toy Story Mania it will never make sense other than R&D trying to justify it.
Walt Disney Studios also needed a killer ride, which I guess they’re getting with Lion King, I mean it really does look spectacular, but it again makes zero sense cloning FEA yet again. Not only are they arbitrarily restricting themselves with a small layout, the execution has never been all that good.
It’s even more noticeable when you ride like Snow White’s Enchanted Wish or Alice in Wonderland at Disneyland, it’s like, those rides are even smaller scale but just so much better paced alongside its storytelling as well.
Idk, I guess I just long for an alternate timeline where MK or HWS gets Frozen: Journey and we get a killer Mary Poppins ride in the UK pavilion instead.
