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Journey of Water featuring Moana coming to Epcot
- Thread starter Rteetz
- Start date
Disney Analyst
Well-Known Member
I have no issue with space, resources, or effort being deployed for a walk through attraction. Disneyland Paris has many, and they are wonderful.
WondersOfLife
Blink, blink. Breathe, breathe. Day in, day out.
I'm glad you're into a completely empty pavilion across the way that drastically needed something put into it, and you're also into a proposed scrapped potential refresh or re-theme for imagination.... As well as the drastically much needed spaceship earth refurb being cancelled..
...all in favor of the multi million dollar water playground.
Mention the okay-ish projects and forget about all the things Epcot needed and was supposed to get.
Even Mary Poppins tea-cups would have been better utilized than this. And out of the way, too.
Ayla
Well-Known Member
Will it even be open at night?
flynnibus
Premium Member
And how many anchored park redesigns?
Or will the city park be what you think this attraction is supporting cast for?
The sad reality is we get this and guardians… and the rest is even more just walkthroughs and environmental
James Alucobond
Well-Known Member
I generally agree that they scrapped a lot of necessary, better things, but the bolded strikes me as somewhat inaccurate. They didn't stop work on everything else and redirect funds because they thought Journey of Water was more important; the simple fact is that they were already well underway on the spine and couldn't feasibly back out of it completely. Poppins, Spaceship Earth, and Imagination, on the other hand, never even got started and so were much more easily abandoned. PLAY! had some work done, but it's on the outskirts and was already essentially vacant for many years. I'm reasonably confident that if they hadn't started demolition or if JoW had been located elsewhere, it too would have been cut.
jaklgreen
Well-Known Member
That is my concern, are they going to limit how many people can walk through at any given time? The last thing that most people want is to have it so packed that it becomes a bottleneck with no one moving, and you are unable to actually interact with the attraction.
yensidtlaw1969
Well-Known Member
There's a lot of difference between Journey of Water and the DLP walkthroughs.
The DLP Walkthroughs are all sumptuous, high-quality, inexpensive . . . they contribute directly to the theme of their land, fulfill an aspirational moment relative to their theme, and only one of them opened as a standalone offering - Les Mysteres du Nautilus, which opened during the construction of their Space Mountain in anticipation of needing to be able to handle more crowds in that corner of the park in 11 months when Space would be complete. They're each tucked in corners that are not really large enough for alternate use, and sometimes hidden in plain sight offering an opportunity to explore spaces that the Stateside parks would mostly leave empty. None of these attractions were marketed heavily (though of course the landscape was different then without Social Media), and all of them were meant to address the pressing capacity concerns of the park. The financial failure of EuroDisneyland is usually painted with a brush that glosses over the details - they built far too much hotel space given most guests were either local or chose to stay offsite in the City, which put the overall resort in the red, but the Park itself did gangbusters from day one. They needed more places for guests to be, and fast, hence the greenlighting of additional walkthroughs that could open in the first 2 years of the park. The ones that opened with the park - the Castle Walkthrough, the Dragon's Lair, and Alice's Curious Labyrinth, the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse, and (arguably) Adventure Isle - were all solid if minor offerings that were complemented by a healthy menu of attractions throughout DLP. In the early days The Dragon's Lair in particular was cited as the #3 attraction in the whole park in terms of guest satisfaction, so it far outperformed expectations.
Meanwhile EPCOT's new walkthrough appears to be far too little too late on nearly every front, excepting expense and footprint -
EPCOT has been faltering thematically for years, with neither guests nor management seeming to know what the park should actually be, and Moana only contributes to that confusion. The park is short on meaningful attractions that draw guests in, and not making full use of the capacity it already offers, so adding "just anything" is not what's needed. While the rockwork and foliage appear nice on their own, they're stuck in a spot that offer few clues as to why they're there. They've added one of their most popular properties to the marquee despite the attraction making no real attempt to deliver a genuinely satisfying "Moana" experience. Despite this, the attraction has managed to cost many millions of dollars - far more than any of the DLP walkthroughs. Construction has taken many years on what amounts to an outdoor queue for a larger attraction that doesn't actually exist, and that process has been charted by Disney and fans alike, creating an outsized impression of the attraction's significance. The attraction seems to be pulling from a bag of tricks that its neighbor has already been offering for 40 years. Due to its placement, it physically is the literal centerpiece attraction of what was meant to be the parks revitalization plan, hardly any of which came to pass. That real estate could and should have been used on an attraction that helps state clearly what the new direction of the park is. Instead JoW merely suggests that EPCOT is a place you can find characters, but the logic of who and why remains pretty mysterious. On top of that, the people who are most likely to see through those mistakes and hiccups to evaluate the attraction on the level it was meant to be appraised (The Cast and their guests) are saying it still manages to underwhelm. The uninitiated guest that thinks this is a new "Moana Ride" is not going to be so kind.
I'm sure I'll be able to enjoy Journey of Water for what it is, but the DLP Walkthroughs are like the sprinkles on an already fabulous cake. Journey of Water . . . has not been set up to be that.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
I think we all had rather high hopes for Bob Iger's Sidekick Tightpants when he took over the Parks division.
The ladies swooned because he was cute and had a Cool SoCal Dad wardrobe, and the rest of us were just thankful that he got the job over that charmless and snobby Michael Colglazier who was shown the door.
But that was three years ago now. Has anything in the Parks division actually improved, other than the ability for StorybookLand Canal Boat hosts to show off their strip mall tats and long greasy hair in order to suppress wage growth for entry level CM's? Because I can't think of anything. But I can think of a lot of stuff that showed up in the Parks the last three years that never should have; Harmonious, Kite Tails, two unfortunately placed roller coasters for WDW, StorybookLand Canal Boat hosts with strip mall tats and long greasy hair, and also whatever the heck this Moana pre-show without a show thing is, etc.
Sidekick Tightpants needs to start producing some hits. He can't just keep bringing his runner's build in slimfit jeans after a visit to the BleachBright teeth whitening kiosk at the mall and expect us to accept crap. He needs to start doing something that's actually good.
Centauri Space Station
Well-Known Member
Of those listed WOL is the only loss as it would finally utilize the pavilion but even that was a misguided idea that wouldnt be great.
montyz81
Well-Known Member
I would have even preferred the table over this.
SaucyBoy
Well-Known Member
- In the Parks
- No
It's cute and will be a distraction for the children (and adults) who have no concept of what a quality Disney edutainment experience should be like. Thanks for the rule breaking Tik Tok for showing us the experience so I don't have to waste my time next spring.
aladdin2007
Well-Known Member
I stated it was not a mess like that visually.
another harmonious on their hands except its not a visual mess....like another poster said this is perfect for a moania queue/attraction at AK. A blunder for epcot.
the parks division needs to clean house badly. Disney keeps touting this like it's some big new attraction, and that's a big problem or going to be for them.
bmr1591
Well-Known Member
I saw the CMs lined up to go in the other night when this video was taken. My wife and I almost got in line because they had no wristbands, no scanning of MagicBands, nothing to stop anyone from getting in line and checking it out.
trainplane3
Well-Known Member
I'm confused why this wasn't on the plot between Seas and Land? It'd be something decent to fill that space. This should've been a dark-ride instead. It would've fit and actually handle crowds. This is not something that should be in the center of the park.
I wasn't expecting much but I'm still disappointed. Still curious enough to see it in person though.
I wasn't expecting much but I'm still disappointed. Still curious enough to see it in person though.
James Alucobond
Well-Known Member
Because it was supposed to fill a gap when the Festival Center was a thing. No other reason, I imagine.
WondersOfLife
Blink, blink. Breathe, breathe. Day in, day out.
God I wish.
jaklgreen
Well-Known Member
I was thinking the same thing, that it seems so out of place in that location. I guess it would depend on what else they put in that area. We will see when it is done. I will be there in a month arriving on the day that it is predicted to open so hopefully I will be able to see it in person. I am fine with walk through attractions. One of my favorite things to do is sit in the aviary in the Maharajah Jungle Trek because I like the peace. Not sure this will be at all peaceful, but maybe later in the evening it will be.
WorldExplorer
Well-Known Member
Edit: I've been corrected on the rules.
Anyway, the main thing I got from the video is that I wish this was in Studios or MK with a Sorcerer's Apprentice theme. It would still be poorly planned, crowd-wise, but at least it wouldn't be sitting in the center of Epcot and it would be cooler to pretend to be a wizard.
I don't think I'll go when it opens.
Anyway, the main thing I got from the video is that I wish this was in Studios or MK with a Sorcerer's Apprentice theme. It would still be poorly planned, crowd-wise, but at least it wouldn't be sitting in the center of Epcot and it would be cooler to pretend to be a wizard.
I don't think I'll go when it opens.
Last edited:
James Alucobond
Well-Known Member
It was stated by other previewers that they were encouraged to take photos and video but that they were explicitly told not to release them until a certain date.