News New Haunted Mansion Grounds Expansion, Retail Shop Coming to Disneyland Resort in 2024

[DavidDL]

If the items don’t sick out and blend in then it’s not a huge deal especially if they are not a major showpiece. The issue is with the internet someone will be able to track down where they bought it and let the world know about it. Do they really want that kind of attention? Having people walk through a queue and point out to their friend “ok yeah that’s the piece Disney bought on RedBubble (or Blackforestdecor.com) I read about it on the internet.” That doesn’t really take me to another time and place. Not very transportive. It’s shattered the “illusion” or at least the suspension of disbelief.

You can’t really track down a brick.

I'm just saying, stuff like a pre-made veiled bust sitting on the corner of a shelf in one of Disney's many stores doesn't really bother me. But if for some reason someone who sees it decides they should bust out their phone or get on their computer once they are home and scour the online marketplace for where that knick-knack may have come from in an effort to verify it was hand-made by Disney, then two things:

One, I would probably argue that the phone itself is doing more to take them out of whatever time and place Disney is trying to establish than the pre-purchased item.

Two, they're probably just looking for a reason to complain.

But, I suppose it's not all bad. This kind of thinking was able to catch the AI generated piece they hung in the shop. Which I am thankful for. There's just a limit to how much I can care when it comes to stuff like that. I'm sure the torn up gauze cloth they hung inside the Nightmare shop outside Pirates probably came from a Party City or whatever because it looks just like what I buy every year for a Halloween party but it didn't make that shop any less enjoyable to me.

 

[mickEblu]

I'm just saying, stuff like a pre-made veiled bust sitting on the corner of a shelf in one of Disney's many stores doesn't really bother me. But if for some reason someone who sees it decides they should bust out their phone or get on their computer once they are home and scour the online marketplace for where that knick-knack may have come from in an effort to verify it was hand-made by Disney, then two things:

One, I would probably argue that the phone itself is doing more to take them out of whatever time and place Disney is trying to establish than the pre-purchased item.

Two, they're probably just looking for a reason to complain.

That person is irrelevant. When the info is out it’s out and it’s detrimental to what Disney is trying to accomplish at their parks/ attractions.

Also why do you keep using poor examples like bricks or gauze cloth? Clearly those aren’t issues for obvious reasons. That should be clear right? That a piece of gauze cloth or brick vinyl isn’t the same as a piece of art or statue?

 

[duncedoof]

Hot take: Yes, U.S. Haunted Mansion is a better show, better tone. But the 2019 update was an improvement to Phantom Manor. Tightening the screws and changing some of the creative decisions that never really worked. And the exterior grounds and facade are very grand.

7 days late! Absolutely the hell not!













And I could go on. It's actually insane how much artistry was lost with the update. The team in charge had absolutely no idea what they were doing. The storyline was simplified into dust, totally destroyed. By far, my least favorite ride refurb ever. I think most give it a pass because they didn't really consider what was there before.

 

[britain]

7 days late! Absolutely the hell not!













And I could go on. It's actually insane how much artistry was lost with the update. The team in charge had absolutely no idea what they were doing. The storyline was simplified into dust, totally destroyed. By far, my least favorite ride refurb ever. I think most give it a pass because they didn't really consider what was there before.

Ahem, no.


I first visited PM in 1993, and I can tell you it was a spectacular attraction, but there were always a few things that didn't click:

• What is this supposed to be? Is it a mirror? It doesn't look like a ghost in a mirror, it looks like a painting sporatically appearing behind a mirror.
  
  
  
  The straight-forward replacement (a painting) makes much more sense. And the new wall transition in that room is fantastic too.
  
  
• The stretching room: The previous version revealed a lot of disastrous things happening to Melanie. Are these things that actually happened, or is it your imagination? Mystery is one thing, bad storytelling is another. The new portraits with the suitors each meeting unfortunate ends is clearer, and with clarity comes greater comedy (something the original HM portraits have). Plus the tech behind the fading of Melanie from the portraits is terrific.
  
  After/Before:
  
  
  
  
  
• The hall of changing paintings: Anyone who is claiming that Fitzgerald is just trying to remake the PM into more of a HM experience is conveniently ignoring this part.
  
  Before:
  
  
  
  
  
  After:
  
  
  
  
  And again, a great tech upgrade.
  
  
• Melanie first appearance: Originally the first one we see at the top of the stairs is smiling and welcoming us (and it was a really close look at a human-style animatronic and the light bulbs in the candles - didn't look great). So we're in this dark place with ominous music, and she's smiling at us. I don't get it ... I guess she has ill intent! But no, it's part of some "caught in a time loop of her wedding day" and she's at the start of the happy occasion but she'll get sadder -and older?- as the attraction proceeds?
  
  
  
  
  Of course, how foolish of me to not get that!
  
  The new version has us first see Melanie on the loading area staircase, NOT looking at us - she's sadly looking out the window, bouquet pointed down. The staging matches the story that we're being told. Not in a typical modern 2020's way of spitting lots of exposition at you (looking at you Rise of the Resistance). But also not in a disorienting and unsatisfying way like the original PM did. 2019 PM does it right (And great lighting too!)
  
  
  
  
  
  I've reached my limit on attachments. Part 2 to come!

 

[britain]

• Attic Mirror:
  I won't necessarily say this was a major change for the better. I get the homage to "All is Vanity" is lost now. But for any guest who didn't get that reference, they're probably thinking "Well that giant skull is not a very subtle effect." Also, this whole concept of Melanie getting older during the attraction pretty much hinges on her appearance here and you can't see her very well. I certainly don't blame anyone for not noticing that the animatronic's face has some more wrinkles now, and that there's some gray in her hair.
  
  After/Before
  
  
  
  
  
• The Phantom:
  
  Look, some stories work in some mediums better than others. Stories that spend a lot of time inside the main character's head tend to make better books than movies. (Harry Potter or Ender Wiggin have lots of great internal struggles that they keep under a collected surface... the movies can't capture that.)
  
  In my opinion, any theme park story that deals with the subject of artifice is going to fail. Jingle Cruise with junky decorations and plastic reindeer next to 'real' fiberglass animals doesn't cut it with me. Spaceship Earth's Greek math scene used to be Greek theatre, and it wasn't immediately evident that these masks aren't just cheaper animatronic faces. Fortunately they had an 'actor off-stage' holding his mask to help the audience get what was going on.
  
  WDI wanted to do some sort of Old West Meets Phantom of the Opera in 1992. They gave the Phantom a dark skull mask, and built up to a big reveal of his "true nature" as a hideous decomposing corpse. "Ooo! It's so edgy for a Disney ride! Ooo, it's got those Andrew Lloyd Weber vibes! I wonder when Weber is going to finish his Noah's Ark score for Eisner?"
  
  Well it didn't work. Nobody thought that this guy...
  
  
  
  
  
  ...was wearing a mask. They naturally thought that this is some skeleton phantom.
  
  And when they got to this guy...
  
  
  
  
  
  It's like... cool lookin zombie dude, but is this the same guy we saw before or some other citizen of town? And why do his clothes look like they've been through a shredder? Why does he look like this now but not earlier?
  
  Again, you can only go so far with the "We don't want to tell you the details, it's all a myyyyystery!" excuse for dots that just don't connect very well.
  
  Now the Phantom looks the same all the way through the attraction, but with the bonus benefit of lit eyes in the back of the sockets. This creates the impression that he's always looking right at you! (And I love the double-take he occasionally does at guests near the end of the ride).
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Finale
  
  I'll grant this as a step down, at least viscerally: Did skeleton Melanie make any sense if you weren't catching on that she was getting older? No. Did you get that she "saved" the guests from the Phantom? No. Was it cooler to look at than tombs of the suitors? Yeah it was.
  
  Before:
  
  
  
  After:
  
  
  
  
  
• The Mirrors: In the old version, why put the Phantom on top of every single doom buggy that goes by the mirrors? I can see that he's on the buggies next to mine, does he clone himself? And his head is on top - there's no "cool! I can see my hand through the ghost next to me" experience here.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The new version isn't as fun as original HM, but it's better than old PM. We've got some swirly ghostly light appearing and dissappearing in our buggies, and only in the last mirror (cutting down on the clone problem) do we see that Melanie is riding with us - and here's a nice twist - looking happy to see YOU, a potential new suitor!
  
  
  

There you have it. Casket closed. Now back to coverage of the HM gift shop.

 

[TP2000]

There you have it.

Bravo!

Casket closed.

So well done! I'm going to use that phrase sometime.

Now back to coverage of the HM gift shop.

Oh, darnit.

 

[Disney Analyst]

So do we think when Mansion reopens they'll finally remove the temporary Lightning Lane from Pirates?

 

[PiratesMansion]

7 days late! Absolutely the hell not!













And I could go on. It's actually insane how much artistry was lost with the update. The team in charge had absolutely no idea what they were doing. The storyline was simplified into dust, totally destroyed. By far, my least favorite ride refurb ever. I think most give it a pass because they didn't really consider what was there before.

Honestly, while I don't love every choice made in the refurb (particularly some of the musical changes), as I experienced it in 2015, Phantom Manor was something of an incoherent mess. It both was and wasn't a HM, but was also trying to tell this story with the bride, which, on paper, great! But I felt as though if I didn't already know bits of the backstory going in, it wouldn't have been entirely clear what was going on.

This was not helped by how low the lighting level was in 2015; judging by the fact that you can clearly see the the bride's facial expressions in several older photos and videos but you couldn't on the actual ride in 2015, it seems confirmed to me that they lowered lighting levels to that degree to hide how much the whole thing was in such poor shape then. It went well beyond atmospheric darkness and made it difficult to see much of the ride. I could see that there were bride animatronics; I could not see her face at all.

But based on my ride through (and POVs of the changes), making the story more straightforward can only be a benefit, and fixing some of the dodgy staging of the original ride helps too (i.e. in the stretching room, it was difficult to read that one person was hanging another, especially with the darker lighting). I subscribe to Foxx Nolte's description of the difference between HM and PM: she said, roughly, that on HM you ride again to find new details and come to a greater appreciation of a superb theme park attractions; on PM, you ride again to try and figure out what the heck you just saw. So anything that streamlines an overcomplicated story is only a benefit, in my view.

So do we think when Mansion reopens they'll finally remove the temporary Lightning Lane from Pirates?

I doubt it; TBA is open, Mansion's queue opened during HMH, and yet Pirates' LL remained over Christmas.

I hope (but doubt) they'll remove it; while it wasn't WDW slow, waiting in the Pirates queue and being accustomed to it moving at a certain pace, only for it to drag, wasn't fun.

 

[Disney Analyst]

Honestly, while I don't love every choice made in the refurb (particularly some of the musical changes), as I experienced it in 2015, Phantom Manor was something of an incoherent mess. It both was and wasn't a HM, but was also trying to tell this story with the bride, which, on paper, great! But I felt as though if I didn't already know bits of the backstory going in, it wouldn't have been entirely clear what was going on.

This was not helped by how low the lighting level was in 2015; judging by the fact that you can clearly see the the bride's facial expressions in several older photos and videos but you couldn't on the actual ride in 2015, it seems confirmed to me that they lowered lighting levels to that degree to hide how much the whole thing was in such poor shape then. It went well beyond atmospheric darkness and made it difficult to see much of the ride. I could see that there were bride animatronics; I could not see her face at all.

But based on my ride through (and POVs of the changes), making the story more straightforward can only be a benefit, and fixing some of the dodgy staging of the original ride helps too (i.e. in the stretching room, it was difficult to read that one person was hanging another, especially with the darker lighting). I subscribe to Foxx Nolte's description of the difference between HM and PM: she said, roughly, that on HM you ride again to find new details and come to a greater appreciation of a superb theme park attractions; on PM, you ride again to try and figure out what the heck you just saw. So anything that streamlines an overcomplicated story is only a benefit, in my view.


I doubt it; TBA is open, Mansion's queue opened during HMH, and yet Pirates' LL remained over Christmas.

I hope (but doubt) they'll remove it; while it wasn't WDW slow, waiting in the Pirates queue and being accustomed to it moving at a certain pace, only for it to drag, wasn't fun.

It's still labelled as temporary on the app.

My theory, they weren't sure when the full queue for HM would open, so they planned to keep Pirates on LL through the holidays, and will now keep it until HM comes back, then it's safe to remove.

 

[PiratesMansion]

It's still labelled as temporary on the app.

My theory, they weren't sure when the full queue for HM would open, so they planned to keep Pirates on LL through the holidays, and will now keep it until HM comes back, then it's safe to remove.

I sure hope so, but my fear is that they found out that the world didn't end with Pirates on LL and will opt to keep it as is.

 

[Disney Analyst]

I sure hope so, but my fear is that they found out that the world didn't end with Pirates on LL and will opt to keep it as is.

It's definitely not ideal for Ops. The queue is a mess when full into New Orleans.

 

[britain]

Bravo!



So well done! I'm going to use that phrase sometime.



Oh, darnit.

Praise from Caesar! Thanks!

 

[mickEblu]

• Attic Mirror:
  I won't necessarily say this was a major change for the better. I get the homage to "All is Vanity" is lost now. But for any guest who didn't get that reference, they're probably thinking "Well that giant skull is not a very subtle effect." Also, this whole concept of Melanie getting older during the attraction pretty much hinges on her appearance here and you can't see her very well. I certainly don't blame anyone for not noticing that the animatronic's face has some more wrinkles now, and that there's some gray in her hair.
  
  After/Before
  View attachment 836066
  
  
• The Phantom:
  
  Look, some stories work in some mediums better than others. Stories that spend a lot of time inside the main character's head tend to make better books than movies. (Harry Potter or Ender Wiggin have lots of great internal struggles that they keep under a collected surface... the movies can't capture that.)
  
  In my opinion, any theme park story that deals with the subject of artifice is going to fail. Jingle Cruise with junky decorations and plastic reindeer next to 'real' fiberglass animals doesn't cut it with me. Spaceship Earth's Greek math scene used to be Greek theatre, and it wasn't immediately evident that these masks aren't just cheaper animatronic faces. Fortunately they had an 'actor off-stage' holding his mask to help the audience get what was going on.
  
  WDI wanted to do some sort of Old West Meets Phantom of the Opera in 1992. They gave the Phantom a dark skull mask, and built up to a big reveal of his "true nature" as a hideous decomposing corpse. "Ooo! It's so edgy for a Disney ride! Ooo, it's got those Andrew Lloyd Weber vibes! I wonder when Weber is going to finish his Noah's Ark score for Eisner?"
  
  Well it didn't work. Nobody thought that this guy...
  
  View attachment 836061
  
  ...was wearing a mask. They naturally thought that this is some skeleton phantom.
  
  And when they got to this guy...
  
  View attachment 836063
  
  It's like... cool lookin zombie dude, but is this the same guy we saw before or some other citizen of town? And why do his clothes look like they've been through a shredder? Why does he look like this now but not earlier?
  
  Again, you can only go so far with the "We don't want to tell you the details, it's all a myyyyystery!" excuse for dots that just don't connect very well.
  
  Now the Phantom looks the same all the way through the attraction, but with the bonus benefit of lit eyes in the back of the sockets. This creates the impression that he's always looking right at you! (And I love the double-take he occasionally does at guests near the end of the ride).
  
  View attachment 836065
  
  
• Finale
  
  I'll grant this as a step down, at least viscerally: Did skeleton Melanie make any sense if you weren't catching on that she was getting older? No. Did you get that she "saved" the guests from the Phantom? No. Was it cooler to look at than tombs of the suitors? Yeah it was.
  
  Before:
  View attachment 836067
  After:
  View attachment 836068
  
  
• The Mirrors: In the old version, why put the Phantom on top of every single doom buggy that goes by the mirrors? I can see that he's on the buggies next to mine, does he clone himself? And his head is on top - there's no "cool! I can see my hand through the ghost next to me" experience here.
  
  View attachment 836069View attachment 836070
  
  The new version isn't as fun as original HM, but it's better than old PM. We've got some swirly ghostly light appearing and dissappearing in our buggies, and only in the last mirror (cutting down on the clone problem) do we see that Melanie is riding with us - and here's a nice twist - looking happy to see YOU, a potential new suitor!
  
  View attachment 836071

There you have it. Casket closed. Now back to coverage of the HM gift shop.

I don’t have a dog in this fight but this conversation prompted me to watch a video online and man is that phantom cheesy. He reminds me of something you might see on a seaside pier dark ride or Halloween lawn decoration that activates and laughs when you walk by it. That older “zombie” version looked way cooler.

 

[mickEblu]

So do we think when Mansion reopens they'll finally remove the temporary Lightning Lane from Pirates?

You would think but then it’s kind of hard for me to believe that they re extending the POTC queue and also removing POTC from LL. Granted Disney has never confirmed the POTC queue expansion but it seems to add up.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

This was not helped by how low the lighting level was in 2015; judging by the fact that you can clearly see the the bride's facial expressions in several older photos and videos but you couldn't on the actual ride in 2015, it seems confirmed to me that they lowered lighting levels to that degree to hide how much the whole thing was in such poor shape then. It went well beyond atmospheric darkness and made it difficult to see much of the ride. I could see that there were bride animatronics; I could not see her face at all.

It was very dark in 2017, especially in the Corridor of Doors.

I have mixed feelings about what was done in 2018/19. Some changes I like, some I absolutely do not.

But what OG Phantom Manor did have was the kind of conceptual ambition that the Disney of today never would try.

Whether or not it worked for everyone, it's the kind of risk they don't take anymore. It's what made Euro Disney so special.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

I'm glad I first got to see Disneyland Paris when I first did.

The place was literally falling apart in places, but the authorial intent was still intact.

Since Disney took over 100%, the park is in better shape, but they've tried to "fix" it by making the Jules Verne Space Mountain Star Wars, adding the movie characters to Pirates, Pixar to Storybookland and so on. Or just lousy decisions like no more squid for the Nautilus. Some rides like Small World and Big Thunder were tastefully restored, but it's increasingly begin redone to fit the modern Disney image.

We love to talk about the good old days of Tower of Terror, Indiana Jones, Star Tours and so on, but Euro Disneyland was an entire Magic Kingdom built from scratch to those standards and with a budget to match. That's what makes it amazing and why it being ignored by the company and the fans for so long was unfortunate. Now people want to discover it for themselves, but like all Disney, it's not quite what it used to be.

But at least for now my complaints about the park are mostly minor, fixable and its exterior remains largely as it was.

 

[PiratesMansion]

It's definitely not ideal for Ops. The queue is a mess when full into New Orleans.

Agreed, but I don't think ops gets to overrule the LL machine.

 

[VicariousCorpse]

I don’t have a dog in this fight but this conversation prompted me to watch a video online and man is that phantom cheesy. He reminds me of something you might see on a seaside pier dark ride or Halloween lawn decoration that activates and laughs when you walk by it. That older “zombie” version looked way cooler.

The way he flaps his jaw is the same as those cheap talking skulls you can get for Halloween.

 

[chadwpalm]

So with the new HM shop open and I assume the Port Royal shop is still open, are they now both selling the exact same merch?

 

[britain]

The way he flaps his jaw is the same as those cheap talking skulls you can get for Halloween.

True, but the zombie version also had a flappy jaw. And prominent ears for some reason…?