A Spirited Perfect Ten

[AEfx]

And yet, they never touch on Disneyland at all, and Walt isn't mentioned once.

The CoP and Small World take place at the 64 World's Fair. And, it's arguable, it's based more off that than the Theme Park lands.

Yes, and the average person would know that, right?

You guys are missing the big picture here. Think outside the Disney fan bubble.

The film was marketed and sold as being associated with the theme park concept. The things you guys are arguing about are irrelevant to that fact because you would actually have to see the film to know that.

When people think IASW they think Disneyland/WDW - they do not think 64 World's Fair. Brad Baird has been on record saying how heavily influenced it was by WED and Disney Parks history.

The original title, 1952, was also Disney-based (the year WDI was founded) but they wanted to make it extra obvious that it was a theme park tie-in hence the name change.

Disney attractions may only be featured in a small portion, but they are there - and were in many of the promotional materials.

I'm not slagging on the film, but I do think the concept of "originality", as Variety said, is rather warped if one applies it to this movie.

It was a theme park based movie, guys - it may have had newly made up characters, some of it may be more esoteric (Baird's basing much of it on Walt's original EPCOT Utopian concept), but the film is called TOMORROWLAND...Disney rides are featured in it (however briefly)...there are many visual cues to tie them in...I mean, just the logo itself, for crying out loud.

You don't seem to be grasping the idea of "original" and "based on" in the same context.

Tomorrowland is based on a Walt Disney created idea, but the story/script/characters were all 100% original to the movie.

There's a very distinct difference. I'm sorry if you don't understand it.

Yes, I am the one misunderstanding here. LOL.

And Brad Baird disagrees with you, since he states how much it had to do with the original EPCOT concepts, but hey - whatever gets you through the night.

In any case, it bombed - Marvel and Star Wars are left to save the day.

 

[Funmeister]

You don't seem to be grasping the idea of "original" and "based on" in the same context.

Tomorrowland is based on a Walt Disney created idea, but the story/script/characters were all 100% original to the movie.

There's a very distinct difference. I'm sorry if you don't understand it.

The story/script/characters were all 100% "original" to the movie "based on" an existing concept.

 

[Next Big Thing]

The story/script/characters were all 100% "original" to the movie "based on" an existing concept.

Exactly. That's what i've been saying. I've stated it at least 2-3 times as a matter of fact.

 

[AEfx]

Exactly. That's what i've been saying. I've stated it at least 2-3 times as a matter of fact.

And yet you continue to miss the bigger picture...

 

[Funmeister]

Yes, and the average person would know that, right?

You guys are missing the big picture here. Think outside the Disney fan bubble.

The film was marketed and sold as being associated with the theme park concept. The things you guys are arguing about are irrelevant to that fact because you would actually have to see the film to know that.

When people think IASW they think Disneyland/WDW - they do not think 64 World's Fair. Brad Baird has been on record saying how heavily influenced it was by WED and Disney Parks history.

The original title, 1952, was also Disney-based (the year WDI was founded) but they wanted to make it extra obvious that it was a theme park tie-in hence the name change.

Disney attractions may only be featured in a small portion, but they are there - and were in many of the promotional materials.

I'm not slagging on the film, but I do think the concept of "originality", as Variety said, is rather warped if one applies it to this movie.

It was a theme park based movie, guys - it may have had newly made up characters, some of it may be more esoteric (Baird's basing much of it on Walt's original EPCOT Utopian concept), but the film is called TOMORROWLAND...Disney rides are featured in it (however briefly)...there are many visual cues to tie them in...I mean, just the logo itself, for crying out loud.



Yes, I am the one misunderstanding here. LOL.

And Brad Baird disagrees with you, since he states how much it had to do with the original EPCOT concepts, but hey - whatever gets you through the night.

In any case, it bombed - Marvel and Star Wars are left to save the day.

How many people were singing along to "There's A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" in your theater? lol Hell, if that doesn't say "Disney Theme Park Land/Attraction" I am not sure what does. lol

Remember this teaser picture? Walt Disney is all up in dat!

http://www.ew.com/article/2013/01/28/disneys-1952-is-tomorrowland

 

[Tigger1988]

How many people were singing along to "There's A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" in your theater?

None...

 

[PhotoDave219]

So moving away from the movie argument and back to Dynamic Pricing and the crowds at Disney.....

I did some number crunching and a Data Analysis based on the TouringPlans' historical crowd data from last year.

Short version? Yes, the Calendar Disney put out in their Survey is very very close to how life is and what days are peak/off-peak. Len's data reflects this.

Each Park drew a Peak level crowd for their respective park about 14% of the time and the resort as a whole drew a peak crowd 12% of the time overall.

Other major conclusion? DHS is a disaster. DHS isnt drawing people. DHS draws an off-peak crowd 34% of the time while the resort as a whole only draws an off-peak crowd 20% of the time. 14% more than than normal. DAK isn't far off as their crowd is off-peak 30% of the time. Epcot fanbois, bad news - your park isn't as bad off, or so says the data - as Epcot only draws an off-pear crowd 6% more than normal or only 26% of the year.

I can't imagine that management would let DHS continue down this road but nothing is slated or even rumored until 2020/21; at least DAK has something coming in 2017.

 

[Funmeister]

None...

Well I can say there were a few in mine. Where would they have heard that song before? Not Sirius/XM or America's Top 40.

 

[Next Big Thing]

And yet you continue to miss the bigger picture...

I'm not missing any bigger picture. The film was mediocre and is gonna lose a bunch of money and could possibly affect the companies willingness to go forward with original films in the future (Every original or "based on" that misses the mark scares them away more...). Missing anything?

 

[AEfx]

How many people were singing along to "There's A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" in your theater? lol Hell, if that doesn't say "Disney Theme Park Land/Attraction" I am not sure what does. lol

Remember this teaser picture? Walt Disney is all up in dat!

http://www.ew.com/article/2013/01/28/disneys-1952-is-tomorrowland

Precisely.

By the bar some folks are using, Haunted Mansion was an original concept.

Like I said, I think because Disney really doesn't have an original bone in it's body these days (I'm waiting for someone to call Maleficent original...) I honestly don't think folks understand the meaning of the word anymore.

It couldn't have more clearly been marketed and sold as a theme park movie - which, pretty likely - played into it's financial woes.

The film would have probably done better if it had been called 1952 and hadn't shown a single Disney theme park attraction in the promotional materials.

 

[englanddg]

None...

Same here. It was just me. And, even though I was just mouthing the lyrics, I got wierd looks (I went to a fork and screen, so I had waiters passing by).

 

[lazyboy97o]

So moving away from the movie argument and back to Dynamic Pricing and the crowds at Disney.....

I did some number crunching and a Data Analysis based on the TouringPlans' historical crowd data from last year.

Short version? Yes, the Calendar Disney put out in their Survey is very very close to how life is and what days are peak/off-peak. Len's data reflects this.

Each Park drew a Peak level crowd for their respective park about 14% of the time and the resort as a whole drew a peak crowd 12% of the time overall.

Other major conclusion? DHS is a disaster. DHS isnt drawing people. DHS draws an off-peak crowd 34% of the time while the resort as a whole only draws an off-peak crowd 20% of the time. 14% more than than normal. DAK isn't far off as their crowd is off-peak 30% of the time. Epcot fanbois, bad news - your park isn't as bad off, or so says the data - as Epcot only draws an off-pear crowd 6% more than normal or only 26% of the year.

I can't imagine that management would let DHS continue down this road but nothing is slated or even rumored until 2020/21; at least DAK has something coming in 2017.

Are we now supposed to be surprised that Disney knows which days would be best to target for trying to charge more?

 

[AEfx]

I'm not missing any bigger picture. The film was mediocre and is gonna lose a bunch of money and could possibly affect the companies willingness to go forward with original films in the future (Every original that misses the mark scares them away more...). Missing anything?

Yes, the meaning of the word original - but if you don't get it by now, not much more I can do.

It's Disney's idea of original, as in mining itself deeper and deeper of existing IP and broad concepts, but a futuristic theme park land called Tomorrowland, no matter what the characters do and say in the film, is simply not an original concept. And quite clearly it was not sold as one, either - it was sold as a souped-up future of the Tomorrowland we know today.

An original movie wouldn't have any existing ties like that. You know, it would be - original.

 

[FigmentJedi]

Yes, and the average person would know that, right?

You guys are missing the big picture here. Think outside the Disney fan bubble.

The film was marketed and sold as being associated with the theme park concept. The things you guys are arguing about are irrelevant to that fact because you would actually have to see the film to know that.

When people think IASW they think Disneyland/WDW - they do not think 64 World's Fair. Brad Baird has been on record saying how heavily influenced it was by WED and Disney Parks history.

The original title, 1952, was also Disney-based (the year WDI was founded) but they wanted to make it extra obvious that it was a theme park tie-in hence the name change.

Disney attractions may only be featured in a small portion, but they are there - and were in many of the promotional materials.

I'm not slagging on the film, but I do think the concept of "originality", as Variety said, is rather warped if one applies it to this movie.

It was a theme park based movie, guys - it may have had newly made up characters, some of it may be more esoteric (Baird's basing much of it on Walt's original EPCOT Utopian concept), but the film is called TOMORROWLAND...Disney rides are featured in it (however briefly)...there are many visual cues to tie them in...I mean, just the logo itself, for crying out loud.

Hell, the lore they made up for the movie actually manages to blend elements of both Tomorrowland dichotomies: The optimistic ever-changing "World on the Move" of Walt's day and the whole "Future as imagined by visionaries past" that's been around since the 90s. Plus Ultra's origin story at the Exposition Universelle with Jules Verne being a founding member even parallels an actual Tomorrowland attraction: Timekeeper.

 

[AEfx]

Same here. It was just me. And, even though I was just mouthing the lyrics, I got wierd looks (I went to a fork and screen, so I had waiters passing by).

"Fork and screen" - haha, I like that. Never heard them called that before. They are the only type I go to anymore - seats are so much more comfy and if I'm going to go out, might as well get something to eat at the same time.

 

[Next Big Thing]

Yes, the meaning of the word original - but if you don't get it by now, not much more I can do.

It's Disney's idea of original, as in mining itself deeper and deeper of existing IP and broad concepts, but a futuristic theme park land called Tomorrowland, no matter what the characters do and say in the film, is simply not an original concept. And quite clearly it was not sold as one, either - it was sold as a souped-up future of the Tomorrowland we know today.

An original movie wouldn't have any existing ties like that. You know, it would be - original.

I get it. I have from the start. My only point ever was to say that character/story/script is 100% original, meaning it is merely loosely based on. That was it. You have proven remarkably dense though.

Any sci-fi movie could have turned out this product for all intents and purposes (sans a few images here and there). That was my point. This was a very generic, run of the mill movie, Tomorrowland - the theme park land - had NEXT TO NO BEARING on this movie.

 

[PhotoDave219]

Spirited Weekend Media Musing:

I wonder if Disney has contracted with Frank Luntz (yes, the guy who W got to change 'global warming' to 'climate change' in media) to spin their desire/plan to radically change their pricing structure.

I see 'stories' planted in 'reputable' media talking about something that just 48 hours ago was simply a tale that some guy named Turkey Leg Jeff (or Fred or Ted) had brought to the attention of Robert Niles after getting a survey from Disney.

Oh wait, right from the horse's mouth on the Twitter:

Turkey Leg Jeff ‏@TurkeyLegJeff 5h5 hours ago

@hintofspy 5 journalists contacted me this week about the survey. I'd rather have heard from them when we were raising money for GKTWV & MS.

(all this for someone with 1,944 followers ... yet, all these reporters knew where to go and went so quickly. Again, if you're ignorant about how Disney operates, then they were just doing their jobs. If you live in the real world, then this is really bad news for your future travel plans.)

You don't get stories in real media that quickly unless Zenia Mucha and her flying monkeys are pulling the strings (much like when they get a story 'cleansed' from the Internet). I was just told that 'Disney surge pricing' is one of the top trending items on the Facebook right now.

As to Luntz, I bring him up because 'surge' is the term Disney is leaking to the media to use to describe what is likely to be their largest price increase in history (and if people like myself and my buddy @flynnibus didn't like dynamic pricing when it suddenly meant surcharges to dining during holiday/peak seasons, just wait ...) ... A surge is something that needs to be dealt with because it can harm you. Think of all those flood waters SURGING in Texas. Disney is saving us all by dealing with this SURGE in Guests by helping to save us all (no, not by adding capacity -- they're doing that in Shanghai -- or adding attractions or even extending hours in all parks that don't have MAGIC in their names). Nope. Disney will raise prices yet again and convince you that they are protecting you. They are making your visits to WDW and DL even better.

Why add capacity? Why add new reasons to visit EPCOT, Disney-MGM and DAK here and DCA out west to take pressure off that SURGE in castle park attendance when you can simply raise prices to feed the corporate profiteering that is now part and parcel of The Walt Disney Company and 98% of other major American companies?

No longer will you be hearing about price hikes at Disney Parks or prices increasing, nope. You'll be hearing about 'surge pricing' ... that's what comes out of pricey focus groups. Just ask my friend, Frank. (In truth, the man can't stand me in the real world ... we once were working in the same conference room for two hours plus and he couldn't even look at me.)

I reached out to numerous people who might know about what Disney is doing. Only one responded cryptically with ''Changes are coming. Big changes.''

Something to think about as we celebrate another Harry Potter Weekend on ABC Family!

PS: Would someone on the Twitter reach out to Mr. Turkey Leg Jeff and ask him the names and organizations/affiliations of the five reporters who reached out to him this week?

Well, I got curious about their calendar and crowd data. So I crunched some numbers.

Two big conclusions: First, Disney's calendar in that survey is pretty right on as to what is an off-peak, average and peak crowds. They're close. (Personally, it es me off but the data supports the calendar. I think its reprehensible by Disney to raise prices like this and not actually offer the guests anything new for it.)

Second, and much much much more troublesome, DHS doesn't draw a crowd and the numbers support that. They had a dead park 34% of the time last year.

 

[WDW1974]

I agree with a theory others have mentioned: I think they put the survey out WANTING the plan to be spread publicly. I think that was their whole point all along. Do we really think, at this point, they truly care what the guest thinks anymore, at least on the level to value our input on something like this(side note: there is a difference between input and reaction)? I have not seen evidence of this in their decision making recently.

Also, I am far from a computer code writer, but wouldn't it be easy to make those survey pages difficult to Copy and Paste? There was no resistance.

As I understand it, servers can tell what other sites you visit. I visit this one every single day.

I know this sounds black-helicopter-ish, but it is just a thought.

I just put this up on the thread regarding Disney's surveying for decisions already made regarding future pricing modeling. But here it is again ...

I commented on this a bit ago on the Spirited Perfect Ten thread and I'll likely copy this over.

But you are absolutely correct. Disney wants this out in the public to prepare them for what is coming. I am wondering if we're going to see some of this enacted before summer (yes, like in the next few weeks) as the media campaign to plant this and spin it as something good for Guests (only Disney could screw people and convince them that it was for their own good ... only Disney!) has moved along at warp speed.

They don't care about us. They don't care about our input. They care about corporate profiteering. They already likely have posts for the Disney Parks Blog penned by Thomas.Smith@disney.com or Jennifer.J.Fickley@disney.com or maybe even Robert.Chapek@disney.com already touting their 'revolutionary' new ticketing plan (about as revolutionary as RFID tracking bands and keyless door locks!) ready to go.

Oh, as far as the black-helicopter-ish stuff ... save that for say ... I dunno ... an exclusive home community that isn't all that it appears. Most of Disney's surveys are very easy to copy if you have just a bit of tech savvy.

 

[FigmentJedi]

Tomorrowland - the theme park land - had NEXT TO NO BEARING on this movie.

Oh of course not, there isn't any random animated characters in it.

 

[englanddg]

"Fork and screen" - haha, I like that. Never heard them called that before. They are the only type I go to anymore - seats are so much more comfy and if I'm going to go out, might as well get something to eat at the same time.

I think that's what AMC calls their version of it.

Anyhow, it describes it to people not familiar with the concept better than "Studio Movie Grill", which is the name of the place I really go. We have some AMC one's here, but the food is better at SMG, imho.

https://www.studiomoviegrill.com/Default.aspx