aliceismad
Well-Known Member
That's valid. I know a lot of people hate on TSL and have some good points, but I enjoyed that small area and my kid absolutely loved it. Slinky is short but great fun.
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California Adventure or Hollywood Studios?
- Thread starter MK-fan
- Start date
Stevek
Well-Known Member
And it's an incredibly beautiful park.
cheezbat
Well-Known Member
DCA still to this day. DHS needs about 5 more rides and a better park layout to get it past DCA. The dead ends of the ‘animation courtyard’ and Sunset Boulevard really screwed up the flow of DHS....and 9 rides is just not enough for a park. Needs a water ride...maybe an E ticket, and maybe 3 smaller rides.
The Empress Lilly
Well-Known Member
At their peak, DHS.
DCA has its moments, and has a great attraction line-up.
But the classic DHS front part was one of the most embracing, stylish, gorgeous areas of any theme park, anywhere. Glamorous and melancholic, like an extention of ToT.
And the attraction line-up of DHS has always been underrated. In most iterations, roughly 3, like DCA, it has had a fair number of fabulous headliners.
DCA has its moments, and has a great attraction line-up.
But the classic DHS front part was one of the most embracing, stylish, gorgeous areas of any theme park, anywhere. Glamorous and melancholic, like an extention of ToT.
And the attraction line-up of DHS has always been underrated. In most iterations, roughly 3, like DCA, it has had a fair number of fabulous headliners.
Little Green Men
Well-Known Member
Have you been since SWL opened? It’s like a new park, just like DCA was in 2012
StarWarsGirl
Well-Known Member
- In the Parks
- No
I think your info is a bit outdated. TSM Pre-Covid ran around 30 minutes whenever I was here. Now it's usually 15 or less. It's gone from being the ride you fight to get on to being the ride you go on when everything else is crowded.
StarWarsGirl
Well-Known Member
- In the Parks
- No
I personally love DHS. I love Sunset Boulevard and the lead up to TofT as you walk up. TofT is my favorite attraction. I haven't been to DCA since Guardians took over, but even so, DHS's Tower was always better. Add the Star Wars attractions (which I still think GE does not fit in DL) and I love spending time at DHS.
I love DCA too. My biggest problem with DCA is the amount of attractions that can be found at my local amusement park. I can do swings and such at my local park where I paid $180 for a season pass (less for my renewal this year). DCA is way more expensive. I prefer the more unique dark rides that DL houses. I also hate the overlays that plague the attractions (Guardians, now Incredicoaster). Again, I've just seen the YouTube videos, but I think it's particularly shameful that they took an excellent rollercoaster and put cheap-looking characters on it. DL and its overlays....ugh. Hopefully Avengers Campus will be equal to GE/Carsland.
Ranking of the American parks:
1. Disneyland
2. MK
3. DCA/DHS (tie)
5. AK
6. Epcot
I love DCA too. My biggest problem with DCA is the amount of attractions that can be found at my local amusement park. I can do swings and such at my local park where I paid $180 for a season pass (less for my renewal this year). DCA is way more expensive. I prefer the more unique dark rides that DL houses. I also hate the overlays that plague the attractions (Guardians, now Incredicoaster). Again, I've just seen the YouTube videos, but I think it's particularly shameful that they took an excellent rollercoaster and put cheap-looking characters on it. DL and its overlays....ugh. Hopefully Avengers Campus will be equal to GE/Carsland.
Ranking of the American parks:
1. Disneyland
2. MK
3. DCA/DHS (tie)
5. AK
6. Epcot
Speaking of overlays. I would have preferred they kept the Villains show. I certainly drank the cost of that experience and they gave me parting drinks to boot. Not to mention it was one of the only extra ticket events that was worth it. The show, the scheduled appointments with the characters, even the food wasn't too bad.
el_super
Well-Known Member
My last trip to DHS, I skipped Star Wars, since I had seen it all at Disneyland. I will fully admit a Disneyland bias here, but it's extremely difficult coming from California and respecting the inclusion of Star Wars in Hollywood Studios.
So when I look at Hollywood Studios from the perspective of what is different/unique about the park: it really starts to fall apart. Tower of Terror had much better placemaking at DHS, but the ride itself was not as great as the DCA version and desperately in need of reimagining. Sound, video and lighting equipment all needs to be upgraded and something has to be done with the hokey 5th Dimension room. The original Tower of Terror has a great setting and story, but feels like a lumbering clunky mess of an attraction.
Great Movie Ride was the soul of the park and it's gone now, so there's that. And the Mickey ride is going to end up at Disneyland anyway. Meh.
Toy Story Land? Midway Mania? Launch Bay? Meh.
Avengers Campus will be fun, but Carsland it is not.
The thing about DCA that elevates it beyond the half day park I still see DHS as, is that change in philosophy between DCA and DL that complement each other really well. I think the disconnect here is that for Disneyland, DCA is really taking the place of Epcot as the second gate/more grown up/educational experience.
I think that Guardians is a better attraction than Tower of Terror.
I think Incredicoaster is an alright attraction, probably on par with Rock n Roller Coaster. It definitely was better as Screamin, but the coaster is pretty much the same.
I get more nostalgic for Soarin over California than anything at DHS. I guess Smugglers Run is the closest I can compare it to.
Radiator Springs Racers may be a better ride than Rise of the Resistance for some, but just on IP, I'd prefer the Star Wars one.
Grizzly River Run is still a gem of an attraction, even if I never want to go on it.
Monsters and Mermaid are both decent dark rides, and I don't think there's any direct comparison to DHS.
And then yeah, there's some of the lesser carnival fare at DCA that may lack in quality, but make up for it in quantity over DHS.
DCA also has a lot of other little things that round up to a full day experience: The Food and Wine/Festival of the Holidays, Coco/Viva Navidad, The Bread Tour, Animation Academy and Red Car Trolley.
The one thing DHS has that I can't forgive DCA for removing is the Muppets.
PiratesMansion
Well-Known Member
Yes. Hence why the very first line of my post was that I hadn't been back since the new additions.
truecoat
Well-Known Member
I see a lot of people complain about the Muppets but no one was going in the theater. If they did, they would have kept the attraction. The blame falls on the customer not Disney. 3-D shows were a nice little show but none of them survived. It's Tough to be a Bug, Capt EO, Honey I Shrunk the Audience etc etc.
The only reason Bug, Muppets and Mickey's Philharmagic survive in Florida is the woeful lack of attractions in all parks. Philharmagic was something new at DCA and no one cared.
PiratesMansion
Well-Known Member
It's partly a California thing. There just isn't the same interest in those shows out there, though I imagine placing it in a theater where you were approaching it from behind if you were coming from the main entrance didn't help Muppets. And there's always been some weird irrational hatred towards Muppets particularly on the DLR side of this forum that I've never understood.
I still appreciate Muppets, PhilharMagic, and (to a lesser extent) ITTBAB, and seek them out when they're around. If EO was still around I'd still be watching that one too.
But I'd be remiss to not point out that PhilharMagic still draws appreciative crowds in Tokyo and Hong Kong too, although I suppose you could argue that they all share the common draw of being a place to get out of the sun and into the air conditioning in all of those places that can get quite humid in the summer. Can't speak for Paris, but then they, like DCA, didn't get the proper version.
Mac Tonight
Well-Known Member
Maybe shows also fare better in FL because it gives guests something to do for a period of time to escape the stifling humidity, particularly during the summer???
I remember doing PhilharMagic once and left feeling very "meh" about it. Do miss the Muppets though.
If they're not going Marvel-ize that backlot area, then they really need to bring the Muppets back to replace Monsters with a brand new dark ride.
I remember doing PhilharMagic once and left feeling very "meh" about it. Do miss the Muppets though.
If they're not going Marvel-ize that backlot area, then they really need to bring the Muppets back to replace Monsters with a brand new dark ride.
el_super
Well-Known Member
Oh yeah I agree. I just really liked the Muppet show, and still do. It is, for me, the only real must-do thing in DHS.
That, and it's also a repeatability issue. APs going 10 times a year will tire of something more quickly than a tourist going to WDW once every 2 years.
PiratesMansion
Well-Known Member
Exactly. It's rarely actively unpleasant to be outside at DLR in the same way it is at WDW (bad, humid), HKDL (WORSE), or (so I've heard) at SDL or TDR in the heat of summer. Repeatability for a local audience plays a role too, though it's worth noting that Tokyo, which also has massive local crowds, doesn't have nearly the same issues with attracting audiences to stagnant shows that DLR does, and PhilharMagic, the Country Bears, etc. will fill theaters. Maybe it's weather, maybe it's cultural, maybe a bit of both, but it's an interesting contrast.
I will say this for PhilharMagic: part of it depends on how much you care about the films of the Disney Rennaisance. I grew up with those movies and so for me it works well. If those films don't strike a chord with you and/or you're tired of them being so often used in the parks I can imagine it doesn't work as well. I think the other aspects might be blamed on WDW's maintenance-heading to Asia in 2019 after doing the show on three seperate trips to FL, what struck me was that there were seemingly WAY more effects at HKDL and TDL than I remembered in FL (the Asia parks likewise had fewer chairs that had clearly seen better days), and I can only assume that the lack of TLC endemic to WDW is to blame.
Club Vilian would be so popular out here, until they turned it into a Star Wars shop, I would have said to put it in where Rain Forest Cafe was, now maybe use one or more of the theaters from the old AMC theater and make it a permanent feature. Obviously this has to wait until indoor dining can resume at this point, but it could even be adapted into handling socially distanced interactions.
But yes, this is one that was completely worth the money.
PhilharMagic doesn't belong in the old Muppets Theater, it needs the large screens it gets in FL. Country Bears was still filling seats, the issue it had at DL was it had two theaters, where WDW only had one to fill, but I think if Disney had released the numbers, both probably had similar daily visitor counts.
October82
Well-Known Member
Which is part of why the direction DCA is going in make so little sense to me. I don't think "Jack-Jack on a stick" appeals to many adults. DCA around 2012 was starting to hit the right balance between family audiences and more mature experiences but has largely thrown that away since then.