I know it's been around for some time now, but I only just recently made it onto the Under the Sea-Journey of The Little Mermaid ride. Waits were often long and the one time we had a FP the ride itself broke down, so it took a while to finally make it on. Being part of the whole, big "new" Fantasyland, I expected it to be a pretty cool and sophisticated attraction with it being a newer ride and all.
Unfortunately I was pretty disappointed.
The clam-shell omnimover car idea is cute, but the cars themselves are WAY too close together. This makes it even worse when a lot of the ride has the cars at a slant angle where you view the insides of other cars and see so many other people. The large room filled with the characters is awful because for a time the cars face each other from opposite sides of the room, so your attention is drawn toward seeing the people (as well as being self-conscious about others seeing you). This design MASSIVELY takes away from the idea of being immersed into a ride and the fantasy world it presents.
With it being a newer ride I expected a little more in terms of advancement of the animatronics, but there were so many basic-looking things here with most things/animals just spinning or making the most simple of movements.
The actual concept of the visuals of the ride was good, and I liked going down (and below) at the beginning. I also thought a lot of the individual scenes had great potential, but they were not nearly as visually impressive as they could be (and again, the closeness of the cars and seeing so many riders in them distracted from this).
Overall, it was a good concept with the potential for great visuals and with so many characters it could have really pushed the envelope with animatronics.
But the cons far outweight the pros as it felt like it was all put together in a very rushed way, attention to details were almost non-existent, I saw animatronics that should have been moving that were not, and the animatronics that were there were very basic (except for perhaps Ursula, who was OK). Certain visuals COULD have been so much better, but looked like they were finished half-heartedly.
In should have been a fun ride and could have been a visual treat for the eyes and senses, but in my opinion it ended up feeling kind of cheap and dated-looking for such a newer attraction. And dated-looking isn't a bad thing when you have the charm and joy that comes with older Disney attractions, but this one seemed to miss the mark on so many levels.
All IMHO of course.
Other thoughts or opinions?
