Hopefully on my next DL trip, whenever it will be, F! will be back and running in full force. I rarely make the trip out west, but will be anticipating it until then!
About a year later, turns out that I happened to be in the LA area for the weekend, thus making an impromptu Disneyland visit, and I finally got to see the Fantasmic! here.
Seeing the show for the 1st time, despite it being the 2.0 (or 2.5 at this point) version of the show was great.
However, the viewing experience was probably the lowest part of it. I staked out my spot behind some ropes near Tiana's Palace ~30 mins before. Having to stand for the entire duration was rough, especially after a full day of rides and park hopping. Then about a couple mins before the show started, some people decided to stand in front of me. A CM told them to move, which they did by taking the rope in front of me and putting it in front of them. So now my view was partially blocked. Then throughout the show, CMs would regularly shout at guests to keep moving since it was a moving walkway, no fault to them.
As for the show itself, the intro was fantastic. Those spotlights and the anticipation of Tuxedo Mickey appearing was great. The moving fountains, mickey hand pyro and everything was
*chef's kiss*.
The lion king and jungle book segment segment was fine. Pink elephant followed by Genie was meh. Really did
not like seeing Sorcerer Mickey this early into the show.
The transitions to Peter Pan and the princess segment was really rough. It seriously needs to be tweaked. Peter Pan segment itself was fine, but wished it was quicker since it kinda drags imo. The WDW action hero segment with all different small segments for each hero makes the pacing go quicker and more engaging.
Aladdin/Jasmine doing a dance was okay, but hope they get their magic carpet back. The covered versions of the princess segment was eh, which was a common complaint with 2.0.
Onto the villians – bring back the Evil Queen! The current fight with "Malificient" was nice with all the extra pyro, but the dragon was missed..
Then here comes the weird part, there was no Mark Twain in the finale. The lighting and everything indicated a B-mode stage finale should've occurred, but there were no characters on the stage. My best guess is the characters were on the boat but the Mark Twain didn't budge for whatever technical reason.
I also found a closer spot with a better view by this point after people started leaving after the princess segment. Got the 2-mins of nothing on video as this is such a rare fail to see live.
Then onto the Sorcerer Mickey finale. That should've been the
first time we saw Mickey on top the cabin,
not during the magic mirror scene earlier as it ruins the surprise.
Besides that, the sync'd pyro was so good. I do think the spotlight choreography needs work as it was reduced with 2.5. The lasers could also be improved and better utlized, similar to the east coast version. Also noticed the green flares were missing and looks to have been turned off for quite a while now.
Overall, the show is probably a 6.5/10 for me.
I'm glad I finally got the chance to see the original in person after all these years, but it does have a lot of faults and overall mehs. The highs of the show imo are what was there originally and they built off for the newer version of the show. But the various changes/replacements made just doesn't match everything else.
The viewing experience however really dampers the experience for the regular guests.
