I like the thoughts- but from my understanding, when a fifth gate is pitched- the cost of infrastructure, the ability to staff it, combined with the fact that a fifth gate will steal “guests” from the other four gates, it becomes a non starter. My thoughts would be to create a third domestic park (say in Missouri, or Texas) so as to capture more people. Develop some of these new concepts along with the old traditional rides- to make it a “must visit” Third Park for us all to dump our money in.
I think modern Disney would be more concerned about about cannibalizing their coastal resorts with a single-day location if they were really serous about building something else... and if they were going to build a theme park or big themed experience targeted primarily towards an older demographic, it seems more likely they'd try for something around Las Vegas (Like Universal is doing) than in either of those two places, to me.
Maybe with Bob C. gone things
might be reversing but this is the company that within the last twelve months, was pursuing sports betting revenue so it's not as crazy as it sounds.
Again, I'm talking 10-20 years down the road - like when we
might see a working Yeti in Everest
(okay, that was a joke, he, he - we're never going to see a working yeti) and Universal has opened or is working on their
fourth fifth gate and cupcakes aren't the killer marketing strategy they apparently still are, today.
(aso a joke, if themed cronuts didn't dethrone them, nothing will)
I mean, Universal has already managed to morph their Mardi Grass celebration into their own international food and booze celebration.
They're ripping/mooching off Disney but it's working and Disney likes to pretend they're in a wide blue ocean and that they aren't concerned with competition but remember how quickly and semi-half-a$$ed Hollywood Studios opened after Universal announced they were coming to town and how we got AK which managed to open a little ahead of IOA and how the last expansion for the MK was the alleged "Potter Swatter"?
Also, it's important to keep in mind when talking about how realistic or feasible something is, that we are having this discussion 113 pages into a thread that is still hotly debating a non-announcement that Disney made about what to all of our knowledge, they haven't green-lit, haven't designed, and aren't building, almost a year ago.
Anyway, my personal take is trying to put that in a single land would be a real waste of future potential. Fantasyland content has already spilled out to two of the other three parks because there isn't enough room for it and they're trying to "poach" some of that MK traffic in the other three parks to better load balance, already.
This is a broader category than that unless we just consider the need for cohesiveness to be sort of out the window the way current management at Disney has and we'll have a villains land and then, if that's popular, they'll just start putting villains attractions wherever.
If so, I guess it doesn't matter but this is just
my blue sky idea. I think having a whole Coco land and a whole Encanto land devoted to single IPs and then stuffing a land devoted to 100+ years of Disney villains behind them, knowing the space we are talking about for all three just seems... wonky unless villains land amounts to 1.5 attractions and a bunch of shops and a restaurant or two which is probably what each of the three "lands" would really end up being, anyway.
Personally, if they don't want to go with a fifth gate, I'd rather just have an e-ticket emphasizing the villain from one of their popular movies stuffed in there somewhere
(maybe they could kill two birds with one stone and make it Ernesto!) than see basically the same thing with a bunch of space wasted to add yet another spinner to go along with the Instagram and retail opportunities tacked on that they decide to call a "land" but I know that's probably what we'll get.
I expect the rock work will be world-class. :/
... And I know they're not going to do what
I want.
, especially when I try to use sarcasm or tongue-in-the-cheek speech.
