HOLY THREAD EXPLOSION BATMAN!
This thread did not only explode, it's an Upper-Megaton-Range-H-Bomb-Thread-Explosion in the yield of Castle Bravo! 53 pages, 1045 comments in less than 24 hours, quite a lot of fuzz about what some commentators consider only a "mediocre", "boring" and "outdated" attraction, isn't it?
I tried to read through the entire thread but after 25 pages I surrendered so I apologize if I write about aspects which were already mentioned or discussed.
I am not happy with this decision because I always liked Maelstrom, I never missed it during a day at EPCOT (and I measure my stays in WDW not in days but in weeks normally so I am not in hurry and doing the parks commando style) and consider it a little gem of a dark ride. YES it is (or was in the near future) quite short, actually it's shortness is about the only flaw of this carefully and highly elaborate attraction. And it is, for years now, badly maintained (a common major flaw in WDW nowadays). Ever experienced the original segment in the North Sea? With the wind, the wave machine and the real electricity lightnings striking the oil rig? I never saw every special effect working in any of my stays in the 21. century so far. The missing effects (sometimes even the loudspeakers didn't work and the troll at the drop remained mute) add to the shortness of the ride and that leads to less attractiveness to the crowds. That's the problem and TDO solves it in the easiest way they can imagine (their imagination is today very near the level of imagination of some bean counting Wall Street bankers, which Walt always despised) by ripping out a classic but aging attraction and replacing it by a ride based on the most hyped movie in Disney history.
Yes Frozen has it's moments and some atmosphere but I consider it only a mediocre movie, with a lot of plotholes (Anna "lives" how long in her "Fortress of Solitude? One day? Or two? "Eternal Winter" lasting for what, three days?) an annoying percentage of music scenes, even for a musical cartoon (in the first third of the movie is more singing than talking) of mediocre quality (sorry folks , but Christophe Beck is no match whatsoever as a composer for Alan Menken, Jerry Goldsmith, the Sherman Brothers or Hans Zimmer) and I simply don't understand the enormous success of the movie at the box office. I understand also that Disney want's to cash in as much as possible, the last years it was the Pixar division that scored the mega blockbusters, not Disney animation. But they could do this easily by adding an attraction somewhere else, at a park where it fit's into the theming and topic of the park and land. But this is TDO, they only build something entirely new if they are on a sinking boat already, without WWoHP we would never had a New Fantasyland and Avatarland in this decade. TDO is so "undisney" like anything you could make up in your mind, in opposite to Walt, who always actually dared somenthing and expanded Disneyland to the max, they wait as long as possible, choose only the most mediocre and less risky plan and build it as much as possible at the expense of other attractions/lands.
They do it with Frozen replacing Maelstrom, the good decision would have been a major refurbishment for Maelstrom and a completely new built (E-Ticket?) for Frozen at MK (in Fantasyland) or DHS (Animation Courtyard?). Instead, because they are TDO and not Walt Disney, the take away the ONLY good ride in WS which is based on the country of the pavilion and replace it by a movie ride, based on a fictional country that is inspired by scandinavian culture and based on the book of a DANISH author (Andersen is not Norwegian). Thats the TDO way. And they insult an entire nation by reducing it to the background for a fictitious movie. Yes, I heard that Norway has stopped the sponsoring of the pavilion so TDO can do what they want, but it is the definite beginning of the end of the WS concept and the entry to Disneys Character Showcase.
Even if the Frozen ride is more than a simple new overlay and even if they expand the ride (which is essential for making the new ride long enough) Maelstrom was an epitomic signature ride in WS, the only good attraction in entire WS, the decision is wrong and a step into the wrong direction.
