After 18 years of waiting for the park to open late for everyone, maybe - just maybe - it would have been better to wait one more.
If marketing would allow it. Of course.
Yup, totally. Lets complain about DAK's hours being extended at the same time that we complain about hours being shortened elsewhere. Makes perfect sense, and makes this site a great source of opinion for Disney to read!
The reality is, Disney could've done absolutely nothing with AK other than Avatar, and there would be no criticism. They could've operated the park just like they had in the past. But instead, they decided to extend the hours AND add, yes add, unique nighttime entertainment. And so to complain about that is absolutely ridiculous. It is an addition. It makes the experience better. If people don't want to stay, they don't have to, but the ones who do stay will have a great time.
Sorry, I don't care what point you're trying to make. It would not have been better to wait one more year.
And "marketing" does not deserve any blame, only credit, for having a real promotion for once and improving the experience across all four parks. I think this year's summer promotion is far superior to Olaf in the Sun or whatever they did last summer.
Perhaps they should go back to all fluff and no stuff, which is probably exactly what they're planning for next summer.
Egg,
The problem we are having is that Disney was the one displaying all this great new technology. They had all the videos showing how great it was going to be. They had Imaginears touting what a great job they did. There were 4 videos on the Disney Parks Blogs showing how this was going to transform the park into an all day park. It was typical Disney over hype and typical under performance. It was going to be the best thing since sliced bread. Disney hyped this show up so much, now we are extremely disappointed with what the outcome became. They promised all these poor Guests that this was going to the Summer of Fun, and now this attraction won't be available until the Fall if were lucky.
This is a show put together in two months, and they wrote limited engagement everywhere. So if you expected the best thing since sliced bread, that's entirely your fault. They also made it pretty clear that this would be a dancing and instrumental show rather than a water show like WoC.
The imagineers may have touted what a great job they did, and I agree with them. For having put this together in two months, it is a pretty damn good show. To me, it's really not much worse (or fundementally different, for that matter) than Festival of the Lion King.
They did heavily advertise RoL a few months ago. But that show got delayed, and in place of it, they created a show that is nothing like RoL. The geat new technology isn't being used yet because it's just not part of TJB:AwM!!! Just as Indian dancing is not part of RoL!
So no, in the last two months, they did not promise guests that this would be a "summer of fun" only to delay it. Literally everything will open as promised. Except for RoL, and they decided to actually show something in place of that, rather than go with the typical and easier solution of saving money and leaving the theater empty. They could've shown nothing. Instead, they are showing something, and something that isn't complete crap.
I applaud that alone. I applaud Disney for their decision and the show they put together. And the rest of you guys can teach them to not even bother adding new entertainment in the coming years, or to simply show nothing when faced with an issue.