Eddie Sotto's take on the current state of the parks (Part II)

[Pixiedustmaker]

Hopefully these two videos can illustrate what I am trying to say about the added music in the battle scene. Perhaps they were trying to enhance the experience by adding the dramatic score? Perhaps Walt Disney intentionally left music out of this scene to make it feel more realistic...

I think Walt might have passed on before such a decision was made . . . but I think there is an obvious reason why there isn't a "score" in the battle scene: You're in the ocean! Only when you are in a village with Pirates who are singing, and yes, who are holding musical instruments, is it plausible that you would hear the "Yo Ho!" song.

The guy playing the banjo . . . a plausible source for music.

I immediately think of the film when I hear the music . . . OK, as I liked the films and the score, though it kinda sounds like "victory lap" for Disney, playing the music from a very popular franchise inspired by the ride you are on. Because the score is so dramatic, it kinda heightens the scene for me . . . but it isn't realistic as there ain't no orchestra on the Wicked Wench.

It's an interesting topic, IMHO, the 'plausible' sources of music/sound effects:

Plausibly non-artificial soundtracks:

1. Rufus snoring in his cave. With a bit of imagination the snoring loop is a bear.
2. Banjor/instrumental music around Frontierland. In that time period you could have something like that.
3. Small World song. Easy to believe it is the animatronic children singing.
4. Train announcement in the Main Street station.
5. Generator sounds in the Indy queue. You can believe they come from the generators.

Music Obviously Pre-recorded:

1. Indiana Jones theme song being played as you exit IJA. Ain't no orchestra down in that temple! Like Pirates, I recall the film. Good for me as I like the film.
2. Casey Jr. song on the train . . . there aren't guys singing a song on the train somewhere.
3. Space Mountain music. Why music in a space station before blast off? Or in the spaceship? If they wanted to re-do this area they could put in a more "realistic" Star Wars style spaceport, and have an alien playing a musical instrument, like street musicians in a subway. Star Tours in queue has music when the ad for Star Tours plays, plausible, in my mind.
4. Star Wars theme song as you board Star Tours.
5. Star Wars theme song on Star Tours.

Overall, I think that the obviously pre-recorded soundtracks can work, especially if they are beloved instrumentals that make you remember a dramatic film and add to the drama of a ride.

 

[Pixiedustmaker]

I fully get why they would want to make it more like the films, as going forward the audience more and more will associate the films with the ride.

I think the decision to not have a score in the background was likely for that reason.

Probably so given that the guests were asking, "Where's Jack Sparrow?" before the changes. Some people might forget that snippets of "Yo Ho! Yo Ho! A Pirates Life for Me!" were in the film.

 

[Cosmic Commando]

If we continue with the "Disneyland as a theatrical experience" metaphor with the posters of "coming attractions" under the train station, the big reveal of the castle, the lands as sets, etc. it really makes perfect sense why there would be background music during a big battle scene in Pirates, even if it doesn't come organically from the scene (I swear there is a name for that which escapes me!). Film scores are a huge part of the movies. How many big, dramatic scenes in movies are completely silent other than dialogue and sound effects? Not many.

 

[The Empress Lilly]

Hopefully these two videos can illustrate what I am trying to say about the added music in the battle scene. Perhaps they were trying to enhance the experience by adding the dramatic score? Perhaps Walt Disney intentionally left music out of this scene to make it feel more realistic...

Before: >>>

After: >>>

To be honest, I was enjoying the new effects and staging -- then I noticed the music and it took my mind to the movie. I'm not sure that is essentially a good thing.

Plussing is not adding!

A pizza does not improve by adding more ingredients, one more topping. No, you need to find a combination of toppings that work, one where all components reinforce one another and together create a unified taste. Don't add salami and pepperoni and artichocks and etc, the pizza will end up just a tasteless soup, without distinctive flavour of itw own.
Pirates, like the MK HM, is beginning to feel like what a pizza tastes like if you let four eight year olds pick as many toppings as they want.

 

[Eddie Sotto]

Plussing is not adding!

A pizza does not improve by adding more ingredients, one more topping. No, you need to find a combination of toppings that work, one where all components reinforce one another and together create a unified taste. Don't add salami and pepperoni and artichocks and etc, the pizza will end up just a tasteless soup, without distinctive flavour of itw own.
Pirates, like the MK HM, is beginning to feel like what a pizza tastes like if you let four eight year olds pick as many toppings as they want.

I'm sure I've said this before, so forgive my redundancy. Pirates like any "musical" has moments of story and dialog and moments where the players move the story by breaking out in song. the story arcs and changes. The music carries you through the show and is the thread. HM, IASW and POTC are musicals or at musically driven attractions. You leave whistling their themes. They make the show repeatable too. As in most musicals, there is quiet and a drop in the tempo of the action for emphasis. If nothing ever stopped or slowed down, or was loud all the time, then you would not notice anything. Like your Pizza analogy, the distinctive flavors would all run together. It is no longer satisfying. If everything is special, nothing is special.

I recall a meeting on POTC 2 decades ago when the operations people came in and said there were areas that were "boring", like the cave before the ship battle. They wanted to see something added to what they called the "dead spots". I was ok with enhancing existing scenes and making them more exciting (i.e. real fire in cannons), but not adding show where the anticipation naturally builds, like that transition cavern. In the dark cavern you only hear a voice. You are wondering what you are getting yourself into and you strain to hear what is coming next in the empty darkness. The echoes of cannon fire become louder and real voices are out there in the mist. The answer comes when the cave reveals an epic panorama of a Pirate Ship attacking the Fort as the Pirates are alive for the first time and you are in their time period in real time, leaving their remains behind. Powerful stuff when properly orchestrated.

For the most part, Jack Sparrow is inserted into the existing scenes pretty carefully and guests love it. My regret is changing the messaging of the ride to "crime does pay" and "dead men do tell tales" justifying everything you see. It was one thing that drunken Pirates looted a city, sold women at auction (and for what), and then burned the place down, but at least they died trying or it all came to nothing. I think our last impression being Jack Sparrow free to endorse a life of crime is not a message I would ever support in a family ride. We had skeletons on the lift, dead, trying to drag their treasure out, but it caused them their demise. Like Pompeii. I liked that "call back" to the beginning of the show better, that's just me. If I had to see him at the end of the ride, it would have been funnier leaving him in a precarious situation where no one ended up with anything. Like the movies where the suitcase of cash they were chasing ends up blowing away in the wind.

Ironically Disney aggressively prosecutes media "Pirates," but endorses "piracy" and glorifies larceny in the media they produce. Maybe even "pirating" the rights to the script themselves? Ain't life strange?

I know most of you would say that it's not a big deal, but Walt always appealed to our better nature, and built on that.

 

[Omnispace]

Plussing is not adding!

A pizza does not improve by adding more ingredients, one more topping. No, you need to find a combination of toppings that work, one where all components reinforce one another and together create a unified taste. Don't add salami and pepperoni and artichocks and etc, the pizza will end up just a tasteless soup, without distinctive flavour of itw own.
Pirates, like the MK HM, is beginning to feel like what a pizza tastes like if you let four eight year olds pick as many toppings as they want.

I love that analogy!! Can we put Skittles on the pizza??!!

 

[Nemo14]

I think you can extend that analogy to a lot of what has been going on at WDW lately. Do we really need themed bathrooms?

 

[lazyboy97o]

If we continue with the "Disneyland as a theatrical experience" metaphor with the posters of "coming attractions" under the train station, the big reveal of the castle, the lands as sets, etc. it really makes perfect sense why there would be background music during a big battle scene in Pirates, even if it doesn't come organically from the scene (I swear there is a name for that which escapes me!). Film scores are a huge part of the movies. How many big, dramatic scenes in movies are completely silent other than dialogue
and sound effects? Not many.

Non-diegetic would be the word.

 

[unkadug]

Plussing is not adding!

A pizza does not improve by adding more ingredients, one more topping. No, you need to find a combination of toppings that work, one where all components reinforce one another and together create a unified taste. Don't add salami and pepperoni and artichocks and etc, the pizza will end up just a tasteless soup, without distinctive flavour of itw own.
Pirates, like the MK HM, is beginning to feel like what a pizza tastes like if you let four eight year olds pick as many toppings as they want.

Adding pineapple to a pepperoni pizza certainly improves it in my book.

 

[Omnispace]

I'm sure I've said this before, so forgive my redundancy. Pirates like any "musical" has moments of story and dialog and moments where the players move the story by breaking out in song. the story arcs and changes. The music carries you through the show and is the thread. HM, IASW and POTC are musicals or at musically driven attractions. You leave whistling their themes. They make the show repeatable too. As in most musicals, there is quiet and a drop in the tempo of the action for emphasis. If nothing ever stopped or slowed down, or was loud all the time, then you would not notice anything. Like your Pizza analogy, the distinctive flavors would all run together. It is no longer satisfying. If everything is special, nothing is special.

I recall a meeting on POTC 2 decades ago when the operations people came in and said there were areas that were "boring", like the cave before the ship battle. They wanted to see something added to what they called the "dead spots". I was ok with enhancing existing scenes and making them more exciting (i.e. real fire in cannons), but not adding show where the anticipation naturally builds, like that transition cavern. In the dark cavern you only hear a voice. You are wondering what you are getting yourself into and you strain to hear what is coming next in the empty darkness. The echoes of cannon fire become louder and real voices are out there in the mist. The answer comes when the cave reveals an epic panorama of a Pirate Ship attacking the Fort as the Pirates are alive for the first time and you are in their time period in real time, leaving their remains behind. Powerful stuff when properly orchestrated.

For the most part, Jack Sparrow is inserted into the existing scenes pretty carefully and guests love it. My regret is changing the messaging of the ride to "crime does pay" and "dead men do tell tales" justifying everything you see. It was one thing that drunken Pirates looted a city, sold women at auction (and for what), and then burned the place down, but at least they died trying or it all came to nothing. I think our last impression being Jack Sparrow free to endorse a life of crime is not a message I would ever support in a family ride. We had skeletons on the lift, dead, trying to drag their treasure out, but it caused them their demise. Like Pompeii. I liked that "call back" to the beginning of the show better, that's just me. If I had to see him at the end of the ride, it would have been funnier leaving him in a precarious situation where no one ended up with anything. Like the movies where the suitcase of cash they were chasing ends up blowing away in the wind.

Ironically Disney aggressively prosecutes media "Pirates," but endorses "piracy" and glorifies larceny in the media they produce. Maybe even "pirating" the rights to the script themselves? Ain't life strange?

I know most of you would say that it's not a big deal, but Walt always appealed to our better nature, and built on that.

I don't think anyone could have said this better...

 

[The Empress Lilly]

If nothing ever stopped or slowed down, or was loud all the time, then you would not notice anything.


I think our last impression being Jack Sparrow free to endorse a life of crime is not a message I would ever support in a family ride.


I know most of you would say that it's not a big deal, but Walt always appealed to our better nature, and built on that.

Well said!
It is the sign of true mastery to understand when not to use your art. The poor musician fills in every bar with notes, the good one employs silence. Good painters employ darkness. And as Coco Chanel said - in the process revealing the secret behind the natural elegance of French women - 'before you leave the house, look in the mirror, and take one thing off'.

I too think that Disney is about values. Which I don't mean in a conservative, family values or any other specific way. Just general, classic Disney values. Root for the good guys, crime doesn't pay, loyalty does, etc.
I think that is a big deal. There is something offensive indeed about seeing people plunder, pillage and worse and then have the experience end with them smugly sitting like a king on their pile of loot.

Sensitivities change over the years. Just as with Disney movies, the theme parks once portrayed Indians, 'exotic cultures', and the joy of rape in ways it wouldn't now be portrayed anymore. Sadly, chanhge is not just linear progress. Sensitivities can change in a direction one finds more offensive too. Nowadays, people love villains, the Dark Side of the Force, gangstas. If you find that a pity, well, the young 'uns would say you are getting old!

 

[HMF]

I'm kind of enjoying this continuing saga over the rights to the Pirates Movies. I thought it was settled and so did the company. Now the defendant claims he was misled into signing a release based on false information..According to the defendant, they essentially told him that this piece of art (below) was done by Marc Davis and that it was a missing scene from the ride where "Pirates turned into skeletons". Marc is quoted as describing a "Lost Island" idea where this happens. The defendant later learned in the 2009 "Art of WDW" book that the lost scene was by Colin Campbell, not Marc Davis' and was for a proposed Ben Gunns Cave for Discovery Island, not a "lost scene" from the POTC. He also claims that the Sorrel Pirate book changed the color of the art and cropped out the daylight so it looks more like a moonlit scene. Maybe not intentional, but that is a big color shift and the image does tell a bit of a different story. That is Ben Gunn on the beach, not a typical Pirate.
Article here.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/disney-sued-billions-pirates-caribbean-560640.

Case or no case....It's funny how what we would consider Disney trivia (Marc or Collin) has become the struggle for literally Billions! Did the ride have a supernatural "story" or not? Marc's comments have great import decades later. You can't write this stuff.

Here's the defendant's site. The actual claim is interesting reading http://disneylawsuit.com

I have to say there are too many suspicious actions on Disney's part in this case. I have to side with Royce the facts seem to be in his corner.

 

[HMF]

The POTC movie music feels a bit discordant with the ride in the caves. A bit too sedate? Preferred the original "scare me" music better but that could just be the nostalgia talking. What you say? I have to pay more attention to the battle scene next time to sense your concern.

Scare-Me still plays in the caves, the Dead Mans Cove and Hurricane Lagoon sections at the beginning of the grotto which originally had no music have had a new age-style version of Yo-Ho added to the soundtrack.

 

[HMF]

Hopefully these two videos can illustrate what I am trying to say about the added music in the battle scene. Perhaps they were trying to enhance the experience by adding the dramatic score? Perhaps Walt Disney intentionally left music out of this scene to make it feel more realistic...

Before: >>>

After: >>>

To be honest, I was enjoying the new effects and staging -- then I noticed the music and it took my mind to the movie. I'm not sure that is essentially a good thing.

I actually tried an experiment a few years back by playing the original Captain's dialogue with "The Medallion Calls" underscoring it and it sounded pretty epic. Far more epic than it being used to underscore Barbossa seeing how many times he can repeat Captain Jack Sparrow's name as it is now.

 

[HMF]

I'm sure I've said this before, so forgive my redundancy. Pirates like any "musical" has moments of story and dialog and moments where the players move the story by breaking out in song. the story arcs and changes. The music carries you through the show and is the thread. HM, IASW and POTC are musicals or at musically driven attractions. You leave whistling their themes. They make the show repeatable too. As in most musicals, there is quiet and a drop in the tempo of the action for emphasis. If nothing ever stopped or slowed down, or was loud all the time, then you would not notice anything. Like your Pizza analogy, the distinctive flavors would all run together. It is no longer satisfying. If everything is special, nothing is special.

I recall a meeting on POTC 2 decades ago when the operations people came in and said there were areas that were "boring", like the cave before the ship battle. They wanted to see something added to what they called the "dead spots". I was ok with enhancing existing scenes and making them more exciting (i.e. real fire in cannons), but not adding show where the anticipation naturally builds, like that transition cavern. In the dark cavern you only hear a voice. You are wondering what you are getting yourself into and you strain to hear what is coming next in the empty darkness. The echoes of cannon fire become louder and real voices are out there in the mist. The answer comes when the cave reveals an epic panorama of a Pirate Ship attacking the Fort as the Pirates are alive for the first time and you are in their time period in real time, leaving their remains behind. Powerful stuff when properly orchestrated.

For the most part, Jack Sparrow is inserted into the existing scenes pretty carefully and guests love it. My regret is changing the messaging of the ride to "crime does pay" and "dead men do tell tales" justifying everything you see. It was one thing that drunken Pirates looted a city, sold women at auction (and for what), and then burned the place down, but at least they died trying or it all came to nothing. I think our last impression being Jack Sparrow free to endorse a life of crime is not a message I would ever support in a family ride. We had skeletons on the lift, dead, trying to drag their treasure out, but it caused them their demise. Like Pompeii. I liked that "call back" to the beginning of the show better, that's just me. If I had to see him at the end of the ride, it would have been funnier leaving him in a precarious situation where no one ended up with anything. Like the movies where the suitcase of cash they were chasing ends up blowing away in the wind.

Ironically Disney aggressively prosecutes media "Pirates," but endorses "piracy" and glorifies larceny in the media they produce. Maybe even "pirating" the rights to the script themselves? Ain't life strange?

I know most of you would say that it's not a big deal, but Walt always appealed to our better nature, and built on that.

When Jack actually says in his final scene "To piracy and it's many shiny rewards" I felt was literally a reversal of the message it had replaced. It really hurts the morality tale aspect of the attraction.

 

[Eddie Sotto]

I have to say there are too many suspicious actions on Disney's part in this case. I have to side with Royce the facts seem to be in his corner.

Agree. I think his case is so much stronger now that this whole "bait and switch" thing with the Artwork is out there. I'd like to know if they actually submitted that painting as evidence in official record for his release. Books have typos, but a legal argument has to be completely correct. If there was nothing to his claim, then why did they have to resort to using Art clearly marked from another job? Where there wasn't smoke, maybe there is now? It certainly raises eyebrows, where before Royce was perhaps seen as a shakedown artist.

 

[Eddie Sotto]

Nowadays, people love villains, the Dark Side of the Force, gangstas. If you find that a pity, well, the young 'uns would say you are getting old!

Maybe. Or another sign of the times were all living in?

 

[Eddie Sotto]

Scare-Me still plays in the caves, the Dead Mans Cove and Hurricane Lagoon sections at the beginning of the grotto which originally had no music have had a new age-style version of Yo-Ho added to the soundtrack.

True, but I miss it as the first thing you hear after the second set of falls.It keeps momentum going.

 

[Cosmic Commando]

I actually tried an experiment a few years back by playing the original Captain's dialogue with "The Medallion Calls" underscoring it and it sounded pretty epic. Far more epic than it being used to underscore Barbossa seeing how many times he can repeat Captain Jack Sparrow's name as it is now.

I don't mind him saying Jack Sparrow a million times; I mind him (and everyone else) saying CAPTAIN Jack Sparrow a million times! It was a running joke in the movies that nobody called him "Captain"...

 

[neoshinok]

Here's the defendant's site. The actual claim is interesting reading http://disneylawsuit.com

This is unreal. I hope this guy gets paid.