Disneyland's Rise Of The Resistance - Reviews, Criticism, Deep Thoughts

[mickEblu]

Yes, and it always will be. (Unless they PC it even more I guess)

Of course. It was but a silly question to stimulate some convo. Its still King after the butchering of the auction scene So I can’t imagine what they could do that’s worse.

 

[RobWDW1971]

After watching the videos multiple times, the only thing sliiiiightly bothering me is

Spoiler: That one part where...

the AT-AT's appear to be completely static. I kinda thought there'd be some big head movement or something. Oh well.

Nitpick as well - it’s odd that the two scenes that are the most disappointing to me are the two largest set pieces that we’ve seen the most of along the way.

The room full of stormtrooper mannequins just looks awkward and not at all convincing vs having less of them and having more realistic activity or focusing on the big screen.

And the AT-AT scene is just a huge static set piece. Again, you would think these huge uses of real estate would be the most compelling parts, but I felt they were the least intriguing.

Again, nitpicking as the ride looks great.

 

[mickEblu]

Nitpick as well - it’s odd that the two scenes that are the most disappointing to me are the two largest set pieces that we’ve seen the most of along the way.

The room full of stormtrooper mannequins just looks awkward and not at all convincing vs having less of them and having more realistic activity or focusing on the big screen.

And the AT-AT scene is just a huge static set piece. Again, you would think these huge uses of real estate would be the most compelling parts, but I felt they were the least intriguing.

Again, nitpicking as the ride looks great.

Nitpick away. That’s what we do here. It annoys me when people automatically categorize nuanced discussion as negative. The alternative is being the WDWMagic version of One Day at Disney.

 

[TP2000]

Just watched the "big" DHS opening ceremony. Here are my Deep Thoughts on that...

• No celebs. Just Chewbacca, Vi Moradi* Presented by Clairol ColorSilk, and a gaggle of kids from Tallahassee Junior College pretending to be fighter pilots and gritty townsfolk on stage. You can dress up a blonde twink as a fighter pilot and smear dirt on his face, but that doesn't mean the audience buys it.
• Drones. Okay, kind of cool, but also kind of pointless. They moved more like the Goodyear Blimp than an X-Wing Fighter. Were they supposed to do something more?
• Bob Chapek. He is still exactly like Bob Chapek, or the animatronic they use for Mr. Chapek. He read his script reasonably well and hit all his Power Words. Immersive is still firmly in his vocabulary, thank God. He still has a good grasp of how to pull off Executive Casual with the blazer, so thank you to Mrs. Chapek or whomever styles him.
• Does the ride work? At the end Mr. Chapek didn't tell the crowd "we invite you to experience Rise of the Resistance!". Instead he said "we invite you to live your own adventure throughout Star Wars Galaxy's Edge!" They didn't mention the ride was open. That's odd.

 

[George Lucas on a Bench]

The Stormtrooper room is awkward due to lack of movement from the obvious mannequins but my theory is that this was designed to be an Instagram area while you're waiting to go on the ride.

 

[Travel Junkie]

The Stormtrooper room is awkward due to lack of movement from the obvious mannequins but my theory is that this was designed to be an Instagram area while you're waiting to go on the ride.

Agreed. I think it would have been better if they had Stormtroopers on both sides of you like the below scene from ROTJ. Surrounded by static figures as if they were at attention staring at you would have been pretty cool.

 

[Jiggsawpuzzle35]

Is POTC still King of Disneyland?

Nope, that belongs to Alice in Wonderland.

 

[mickEblu]

Nope, that belongs to Alice in Wonderland.

King (or Queen in this case) of Fantasyland maybe.

 

[Figments Friend]

( Drinks another glass of Knott's concentrated bosenberry punch ....)

( Munches loudly on Chili Cheese flavored Fritos ...)



-

 

[George Lucas on a Bench]

The King? He's right here.

 

[Nirya]

The part of the ride that intrigued me the most is that opening scene when you pass by empty ride vehicles. That’s such a clever way to cycle in empty vehicles in a tight space. Everything else looked really good, and I’m excited that we (theoretically) get the version that has some kinks worked out.

 

[TP2000]

We are having a heck of a lot of fun over on the DHS forum talking about this dedication ceremony and official Media Event night.

Apparently the ride broke down this afternoon and it won't be running for the rest of the night. And now we know why once the dedication ceremony hosted by Bob Chapek was over he did not invite everyone to ride Rise of the Resistance, and he instead invited everyone to go shopping "live your own adventure!" in Star Wars Land in general.

The ride is closed for the night, and never actually opened for the media event and dedication ceremony. Oops!

I wonder how that happened?!?

 

[choco choco]

Nitpick away. That’s what we do here. It annoys me when people automatically categorize nuanced discussion as negative. The alternative is being the WDWMagic version of One Day at Disney.

Ok, here I go.

I think this is a terrific ride. If you know my posting history of recent Disney works, you'll realize this is high praise. Frankly, I didn't know Scott Trowbridge had this in him, judging by what I thought of his previous work.

Many scenes have clever little design touches in there. I like the big AT-T room hiding two Finn animatronics that are only visible to one ride vehicle at a time. Staging is superb here, his overall positioning, movements and dialogue contribute to the show, and then you move upward and your perspective changes to reveal an entirely different situation (from safety to danger) while still in the same scene. Bravo.

The staging of the Hux/Kylo bridge scene is also genius. That little pit is a part of the famous movie set, but it had never occurred to me to use it as a location to place the rider, who can then look up at the villains in the same way an underling worker would. Gives a sense of dread. Meanwhile the windows out to space can and is used as a nice bit of background visual pizazz.

The vehicle pause before Frogger-ing between the guns, as if admiring the whole dance between the mechanical wizardry in the foreground and the vastness of space into distance, is a nice touch.

Scenes flow into one another in contrasts - now in tight quarters, next opening to an enormous scale; a scene where you look straight, a scene where you look up; a scene where you focus close, a scene where you focus far. The pace of the ride is great, despite there not necessarily being a sense of escalation. The ride just seems to focus on scenes of great intimacy, and that is crucial. Intimacy is probably the single most important adjective in evaluating any addition's fit with the rest of Disneyland. Much of Galaxy's Edge misses it, such that the scale doesn't feel like it fits the park at all, but on this ride things seem snug enough to feel just right.

 

[choco choco]

Ok, here I go.

I think this is a terrific ride. If you know my posting history of recent Disney works, you'll realize this is high praise. Frankly, I didn't know Scott Trowbridge had this in him, judging by what I thought of his previous work.

Many scenes have clever little design touches in there. I like the big AT-T room hiding two Finn animatronics that are only visible to one ride vehicle at a time. Staging is superb here, his overall positioning, movements and dialogue contribute to the show, and then you move upward and your perspective changes to reveal an entirely different situation (from safety to danger) while still in the same scene. Bravo.

The staging of the Hux/Kylo bridge scene is also genius. That little pit is a part of the famous movie set, but it had never occurred to me to use it as a location to place the rider, who can then look up at the villains in the same way an underling worker would. Gives a sense of dread. Meanwhile the windows out to space can and is used as a nice bit of background visual pizazz.

The vehicle pause before Frogger-ing between the guns, as if admiring the whole dance between the mechanical wizardry in the foreground and the vastness of space into distance, is a nice touch.

Scenes flow into one another in contrasts - now in tight quarters, next opening to an enormous scale; a scene where you look straight, a scene where you look up; a scene where you focus close, a scene where you focus far. The pace of the ride is great, despite there not necessarily being a sense of escalation. The ride just seems to focus on scenes of great intimacy, and that is crucial. Intimacy is probably the single most important adjective in evaluating any addition's fit with the rest of Disneyland. Much of Galaxy's Edge misses it, such that the scale doesn't feel like it fits the park at all, but on this ride things seem snug enough to feel just right.

Only a couple constructive critiques. I think most of the Beck's dialogue should be cut. It's not necessary to give us granular instructions, the music (and John Williams score is attributable to 85% of Star Wars success) will do most of the heavy lifting. I would change the probe droid scene to feature the probe droid spotting us, shooting a laser that hits our vehicle droid while Beck is mid-sentence and cuts him off. That's it, the idea is conveyed that from then on we're on our own.

I think the guns should recharge slowly. There's already a visual indicator, so if they started it earlier and had this sound whirring where you could hear it slowly gaining power while you travel, it could increase the fear that it will explode while you are passing in front of it. Which would be nice.

The final scene with Kylo Ren also needs a bit of rethinking. It's not bad, conception-wise, but I think a little bit more theatric effects - no matter how unrealistic - might help it a bit. Make Ren also close the windows, start to darken the lights, really increase the sense he's isolating you from all hope. With a bigger budget you might go bigger. For instance, what if he moves in this scene. Forward facing we see him cut of our route into the next room, then he walks in between the two vehicles with his hands out, and as he does so his force powers force the vehicle to turn and face and follow him. Unbelievably powerful moment. Technically complicated but possible (put the animatronic on a moving vehicle) and use theatrics (smoke machine, dim lighting directionalized) to sell the illusion.

I’m not a fan of over-elaborate preshows and their endless enclosed rooms and hallways and forced exposition, so I don’t have much to say about that. I’m old school in that I think using the park environment as the scene setter is the best and most effective queue.


For those wondering, yes, you can critique the show aspects of rides through videos. I'm not commenting on movement or the environment's immersiveness, only the ideas, conception and execution of story scenes and the way they transition between each other. These absolutely come through in modern videos. It's the same way you can get a feeling for old Disneyland in aged, grainy photos.

 

[Rich T]

Corridors: The Ride

 

[TheRealBobIger]

We are having a heck of a lot of fun over on the DHS forum talking about this dedication ceremony and official Media Event night.

Apparently the ride broke down this afternoon and it won't be running for the rest of the night. And now we know why the dedication ceremony hosted by Bob Chapek was over he did not invite everyone to ride Rise of the Resistance, and he instead invited everyone to go shopping "live your own adventure!" in Star Wars Land in general.

The ride is closed for the night, and never actually opened for the media event and dedication ceremony. Oops!

I wonder how that happened?!?

Just to catch you all up this is what we are talking about currently
• How the ride is closed for the rest of the night
• Other trackless rides in TWDC
• And our new CEO of TWDC blond hair Timothy

 

[TheRealBobIger]

Not Rise of the Resistance related but this happened a couple hours ago at the media event.

If only this happened more often...

 

[mickEblu]

Ok, here I go.

I think this is a terrific ride. If you know my posting history of recent Disney works, you'll realize this is high praise. Frankly, I didn't know Scott Trowbridge had this in him, judging by what I thought of his previous work.

Many scenes have clever little design touches in there. I like the big AT-T room hiding two Finn animatronics that are only visible to one ride vehicle at a time. Staging is superb here, his overall positioning, movements and dialogue contribute to the show, and then you move upward and your perspective changes to reveal an entirely different situation (from safety to danger) while still in the same scene. Bravo.

The staging of the Hux/Kylo bridge scene is also genius. That little pit is a part of the famous movie set, but it had never occurred to me to use it as a location to place the rider, who can then look up at the villains in the same way an underling worker would. Gives a sense of dread. Meanwhile the windows out to space can and is used as a nice bit of background visual pizazz.

The vehicle pause before Frogger-ing between the guns, as if admiring the whole dance between the mechanical wizardry in the foreground and the vastness of space into distance, is a nice touch.

Scenes flow into one another in contrasts - now in tight quarters, next opening to an enormous scale; a scene where you look straight, a scene where you look up; a scene where you focus close, a scene where you focus far. The pace of the ride is great, despite there not necessarily being a sense of escalation. The ride just seems to focus on scenes of great intimacy, and that is crucial. Intimacy is probably the single most important adjective in evaluating any addition's fit with the rest of Disneyland. Much of Galaxy's Edge misses it, such that the scale doesn't feel like it fits the park at all, but on this ride things seem snug enough to feel just right.

I stopped reading when I got to the spoilers. Il come back and finish reading the post in late January.

 

[BrianLo]

Is that manager photoshopped? I've been staring at the photo and still can't decide.

Maybe that's a credit to how good the CM costuming is to blend with the land colour palate that a guy in a button down might as well look like he is wearing fluorescent pink.

 

[George Lucas on a Bench]

In terms of CMs getting into the part, this ride is also 1000% better suited to it than the rest of the land. They have better costumes, you have heroes and villains, adventure and peril. It all seems very Star Warsy. Compare to the other banal half of the land where CMs have to say bright suns or whatever, hand out cards and tell us how, uh, Hondo needs our help to be engineers. It's not quite Steven Spielberg in E.T. telling us he needs our help, is it?

In ROTR, it's like "Come on, let's board this spaceship!" or "This way, prisoners! Interrogation awaits!" or "We're breaking you out of here! To the vehicle! How many?" Very exciting!