Good point. Why don't they add Woody and Jessie to Big Thunder Mountain? That ride is BEGGING for a character overlay!! And it'd be Pixar to boot!
Is that a hint of sarcasm I detect?
You're taking it too far, even with the term "overlay". You make it sound like Small World will suddenly turn into a montage of disney movies.
There's a big difference between that and what is being
hinted at. Remember, it's only just imagineers messing around after all.
Would it be terrible if they put woody or such into BTMRR? Well, if they suddenly themed the ride after it, yeah, it would! It'd be horrible. They might as well make Space Mountain Buzz themed while they're at it.
But I'll give you an example: Suppose they DID put a character into Mountain.... say The Prospector from the second movie, and it just so happened that his shadow was cast against a cave wall very subtly... or you saw some sort of reference to him in the town scene (dunno if that has some sort of official term). Would it change the "experience" all that much?
Now you might say to yourself "Well, even a subtle thing could alter something
too much", and I can see what you mean. Imagine if you will if they sort of snuck in a Shere Khan somewhere in the bushes in Jungle Cruise. Subtle right? But hey, it's a cartoon figure in a "realistic" environment, and that means it pretty much "breaks" the experience. They could try to make him realistic.... but then he'd look like a normal tiger! So it doesn't work. Can't be done then.
With Small World your talking about a childish, cartoon environment, and as far as the characters, well they ARE cartoons and when morphed to fit whatever motif is being used they are still recognizable whilst keeping with the theme (look at those "cute" pins with mickey and pooh and donald. They look very hello-kitty ish... but you can still tell it's them).
Picture it. You're going through the polynesian section of IASW. Look at the hula girls.
Hula girl -> Hula girl - Hula girl -> Hey, that one sorta looks like Lilo. Look closer and somewhere in the background you spy a suspicious looking hawaiian "dog"... who's apparently blue. Small giggle. You point it out to your kids. They giggle.
The ride continues. The rest of it looks EXACTLY as it always has.
In the words of every single doctor everywhere: "There, now that wasn't so bad, now was it?"
Heck, I'm probably exaggerating. I bet it'll be even more subtle.
In fact, worse things have been done as far as "overlay". Correct me if I'm wrong (I'm not a disney park knowledge database) but Countdown to Extinction as it once was before was not
Dinosaur (the movie) themed, was it? Now that might not matter because it's not "defacing" some sort of classic ride, but I've actually been a bit upset I never got to ride the original version. We're talking about taking an original disney experience and pretty much making it the movie's ride, like that joke I said earlier about making Space Mountain Buzz-themed. "Buzz's Rocket Tour" or something.
PotC now houses a movie-related storyline... and THAT'S a big classic. In my personal opinion the changes did little to tarnish the original ride. I think it was a pretty clever yet not too intrusive way to tie them both together. But if you wanna talk about "overlays".... I don't even wanna know what sort of riots ensued around here about that.
Like I said before, it seems like such a big fuss over something so small that may or may not be done.
Call me when they add "Tim Burton's" to The Haunted Mansion and then I'll sign the petition, join the picket line, et cetera.
