Photos - Storybook Circus soft opening

[rioriz]

We're talking about Disney, not Universal. And besides, many people have brought up the big ugly showbuilding's at WWOHP. And Univeral's Dragon Challenge is a lightly themed, undisguised set of coasters, the likes of which we don't see at Disney. (Goofini non withstanding.)

But your answer is yes, it does ruin the illusion.

I understand we are talking about Disney and not Universal but since everyone seems to see Universal as the new standard then if its ok for Universal then it must be ok for WDW....

 

[mets7]

Well somebody had to rant. You okay buddy? Wanna talk about it?

Nobody here is complaining that you can see Dumbo from the Barnstormer. You can see Dumbo's VERY unmagical showbuilding clear as day from it. While, is inexcusable, in my opinion. This is not Six Flags, Disney should have hidden their show building. Therefore your teacups argument is invalid, as is your peoplemover argument.

And as crazy as we sound, nobody freaked out and went on a rant. I think the land looks great too. That showbuilding however, does not.

It's a building??? who cares if you can see a building?:shrug: I personally don't see the big deal about seeing a building. I guess I go to six flags to often and I need to raise my standards. When it is all said and done isn't it still an amusement park? Yes a much better and more visited one but in the end it is still an amusement park. I for one still enjoy every minute, no every second I am in WDW. The fact I can see a show building is not going to ruin my trip or the "magic."

 

[CndleontheWater]

So, about the new costumes? Do we know for sure that they won't be able to switch over to pants when the weather gets cooler?

Truthfully I don't really know anything about Disney costuming, but it would make sense to have "shorts" for the warmer months and then long pants for the cooler time periods.

I've been wracking my brain trying to think if any other ride has costumes that have shorts for the summer and pants for the winter, and I'm coming up blank. The Safari maybe? I guess I'm not that wired into the details of costuming.

 

[RandySavage]

I've said it before and I'll say it again - I've seen and heard upper management quash good quality projects and/or important show elements using the excuse that "they won't know the difference," and "just look at the comments on the blogs." If that isn't enough to get the point across I don't know what will wake people up. WDW is getting the quality that its audience is demanding.

Appreciate this inside perspective, as dismaying as it is.

Normal guests don't know any better. It's Disney's job to offer experiences beyond expectations and adventures the average guest would never dream of. My problem is with the fan community that should know better but instead praise Disney when they're just good enough to get a c- or d+. Their acceptance of this is one of the things that empowers Disney to continue manufacturing substandard product.

Again, I really appreciate your posts because you're a pro who works with WDI/Universal, a champion for quality and you're unafraid to speak your mind when you see lackluster work.

I'm with you 95% of the time (e.g. the ride portion of Barnstormer is actually a reduction in theme-ing from what was there).

But (there it is), dismissing the entire FLE as a below par, substandard effort based on the weaker individual attractions may be a "seeing-the-forest-for-the-trees" situation. While no single component of FLE may be an exciting, juicy home-run like Forbidden Journey (and the flagship Mermaid ride may have some significant execution blunders), the area as a whole could be a significant, high quality addition to MK in perpetuity.

I think those trees and rockwork you mention, if done correctly and create a wholistic environment that feels like entering a storybook forest, could be considered a major leap forward from the sterile, fiberglass-tented original ML Fantasyland that the WED legends created (including the ridiculously out-of-theme 20K, as cool as it looked).

I'm an environments guy... to me, placemaking is a 50-50 partner with attractions. As mentioned above, parts of Wizarding World (measuring stick in this thread) are brilliant environments (the village, the lead-up to Hogwarts), but then you've got visible showbuildings and a huge naked steel coaster.

I am loathe to defend mediocrity at WDW (God knows there has been plenty), but I don't believe I am in this case. If the heart of the FLE (Mermaid, B&B, Coaster) gets its environments right (too early to tell but signs are pointing that direction), even though its components (attractions) may be bunts and singles, the overall FLE mosaic could be a homer.

 

[Neverland]

Responding to a conversation about seven pages back, the two Dumbo spinners will be identical. They are moving the old one and giving it a facelift to match the new one. Eventually, one will be the fastpass Dumbo and one will be the standby Dumbo, so they are going to be the same. Like how Omega side of Space Mountain is pretty much the FP side, and Alpha is generally the standby side.

 

[Rob562]

You know, this whole discussion about the showbuilding on the back of the Dumbo tent gets me wondering....
Why didn't they just make the tent itself bigger to encompass the space that's within those green buildings? Yes, there's A/C equipment on top of those that has to be exposed to the air, but a cutout on the backside of the tent structure would be far less visible/obvious as the green building sticking out the back.

As for why it's an issue, the tent area is meant to look like an early-20th Century circus came to town and set up their tent. It's not many circuses that set up their tent stuck onto the side of a building...

If anything, the shell of a second tent could be built and added onto the green building to surround it. That'd look good enough, like the circus needed to conjoin two tents to enclose the space it needed.

-Rob

 

[Mickey_777]

Well somebody Nobody here is complaining that you can see Dumbo from the Barnstormer. You can see Dumbo's VERY unmagical showbuilding clear as day from it. While, is inexcusable, in my opinion. This is not Six Flags, Disney should have hidden their show building. Therefore your teacups argument is invalid, as is your peoplemover argument.

It's Storybook Circus. You're supposed to feel like you're at a circus and traditional circus' have multiple tents. Dumbo's building is made to look like another circus tent and that IMO adds to the theme of Storybood Circus. The new barnstormer is an outdoor coaster at the circus so if you blocked it from being able to see Dumbo then you'd have to obstruct views from the other two tents. At that point you might as well just put barnstormer in a box or get rid of it cause it no longer fits in in with the land.

 

[Pioneer Hall]

It's Storybook Circus. You're supposed to feel like you're at a circus and traditional circus' have multiple tents. Dumbo's building is made to look like another circus tent and that IMO adds to the theme of Storybood Circus. The new barnstormer is an outdoor coaster at the circus so if you blocked it from being able to see Dumbo then you'd have to obstruct views from the other two tents. At that point you might as well just put barnstormer in a box or get rid of it cause it no longer fits in in with the land.

I don't think it is a problem with it looking like a tent. The tent seems to end in the front and then it just shows the big building that the queue is going to be housed in. I think people are disappointed that the illusion isn't completely followed through as Disney is usually famous for doing. Hopefully this is something that will still be done and is only not finished as we are still in soft opening phases.

 

[Bolna]

I've said it before and I'll say it again - I've seen and heard upper management quash good quality projects and/or important show elements using the excuse that "they won't know the difference," and "just look at the comments on the blogs." If that isn't enough to get the point across I don't know what will wake people up. WDW is getting the quality that its audience is demanding. Normal guests don't know any better. It's Disney's job to offer experiences beyond expectations and adventures the average guest would never dream of. My problem is with the fan community that should know better but instead praise Disney when they're just good enough to get a c- or d+. Their acceptance of this is one of the things that empowers Disney to continue manufacturing substandard product.

First, I want to say that I very much appreciate your perspective on things and always find your posts very interesting to read.

But the sentence above which I bolded is the one thing which I think so many people forget that this is what made Disney's parks to what they are now.

I don't expect Disney to meet my expectations, but to exceed them. I want to see and experience something which I could not dream of wanting because I lack the creativity to do so. But I can very well appreciate the result of other people's creativity.

As for the FLE: having been to DLP several times I know that Disney can build a very pretty Fantasyland - and the Magic Kingdom's one so far never even met my expectations in this regard. So it was high time that they did something about that area of the park to bring it up to par with what they have elsewhere.

And while I don't want to come to any conclusions before I haven't seen the new MK Dumbo in person (and in the finished version), I do have very strong doubts that it will be able to compete with DLP's Dumbo... I am really not sure whether putting it at the fringe of the park and enclosing it with queue buildings did that much to add to its atmosphere.

 

[Mickey_777]

I don't think it is a problem with it looking like a tent. The tent seems to end in the front and then it just shows the big building that the queue is going to be housed in. I think people are disappointed that the illusion isn't completely followed through as Disney is usually famous for doing. Hopefully this is something that will still be done and is only not finished as we are still in soft opening phases.

I'll have to go back and look. I haven't seen that other side you speak of.

 

[danlb_2000]

I'll have to go back and look. I haven't seen that other side you speak of.

This is what people have a problem with:

 

[CrescentLake]

It's a building??? who cares if you can see a building?:shrug: I personally don't see the big deal about seeing a building. I guess I go to six flags to often and I need to raise my standards. When it is all said and done isn't it still an amusement park? Yes a much better and more visited one but in the end it is still an amusement park. I for one still enjoy every minute, no every second I am in WDW. The fact I can see a show building is not going to ruin my trip or the "magic."

Yes, it is a building. (Was that really a question?) I care, and frankly, a lot of people on this forum care. I'm not trying to be a doom and gloom-er, in fact, you'll come to know that I'm quite the opposite. I don't know why you're jumping down my throat, again I said that I liked the land but you can CLEARLY see Dumbo's show building from all around, and that is not okay. By your logic, Disney shouldn't even bother theaming the outside of attractions, lets just keep them in warehouses, its only just a building!

Is this going to impact my enjoyment of WDW? No, thats ridiculous. But I am going to notice it. Disney may be an amusment park, but its held to a higher standard, and showing a gross, grey-green show building with ac vents and the like is not good show. And, as a true Disney fan, you understand how vital "good show" is.

 

[Tom]

This is what people have a problem with:

I have mixed feelings, as usual.

On one hand, you can liken this to Test Track, where you see lots of ugly backstage during the loop. But the idea is that you're going fast and most people are looking ahead or have their eyes closed. Same goes for Barnstormer.

At the same time, as soon as that fence comes down, everyone on the Speedway will be looking right at it. And it's ugly.

If I'm thinking correctly, this is the first un-themed portion of a show building guests can see from inside the Magic Kingdom. So, doing this sort of makes them look lazy, in this park.

The whole concept of the MK was to take you away to another world. That's why you don't see air conditioners, fluorescent lights, unthemed building walls, street vehicles, or CM's in the wrong section of the park. Now they have a giant green building smack dab in the middle of the park, and it's just wrong.

I just hope horticulture hasn't gotten in there to plant their trees, but I think that's wishful thinking.

 

[The Empress Lilly]

I don't expect Disney to meet my expectations, but to exceed them. I want to see and experience something which I could not dream of wanting because I lack the creativity to do so. But I can very well appreciate the result of other people's creativity.

This. :sohappy:

You express it very well. Including the inherent modesty of a lot of WDW criticism.

I know that I can not think up the MK, or EPCOT. That's why I don't engage in armnchair engineering. And that's why I am critical of many creative decisions WDW has made in the recent past. Because I know that I myself could've designed them.
I get the feeling that in today's 'everybody's a winner' culture it is considered a sign of creative succes by WDW if it conforms to what the guest could've thought up himself, if it delivers what the guest expected, whereas I would dismiss it as a failure for precisely that reason.

 

[The Empress Lilly]

This is what people have a problem with:

A glorified playground. Sixflags standards.

Circusland ought to be immediately torn down and its designers fired. This is below Disney quality standards. From what is there: a bare coaster frame (which had no place in the MK to begin with), to the half-tent that magicallty transforms in a big green permanent structure, to what is not there: a truly engrossing, enveloping placemaking theme.

 

[nolatron]

One thing I can't help thinking when seeing the building in some of these photos are what exactly are the plans for inside there. It's a pretty large building dedicated just queue space. What's going to be interactive about it? Carnival games? Puppet Shows? A Bearded Lady? Miles of back and forth queue space?

 

[danlb_2000]

I have mixed feelings, as usual.

On one hand, you can liken this to Test Track, where you see lots of ugly backstage during the loop. But the idea is that you're going fast and most people are looking ahead or have their eyes closed. Same goes for Barnstormer.

This was also my first thought, and in the on ride video you can see that it's not to noticeable where the picture was taken since you are going pretty fast, but later in the ride you go slower right towards the building so I don't know how it could be missed.

Test Track doesn't bother me because you are going very fast, and there really isn't much of a themed world to be taken out of. Does the Dumbo building totally ruin the experience? No. But it's a shame to see them put so much effort into good theaming and leave things like this.

 

[Bolna]

This. :sohappy:

You express it very well. Including the inherent modesty of a lot of WDW criticism.

I know that I can not think up the MK, or EPCOT. That's why I don't engage in armnchair engineering. And that's why I am critical of many creative decisions WDW has made in the recent past. Because I know that I myself could've designed them.
I get the feeling that in today's 'everybody's a winner' culture it is considered a sign of creative succes by WDW if it conforms to what the guest could've thought up himself, if it delivers what the guest expected, whereas I would dismiss it as a failure for precisely that reason.

Yes. And it was actually one of whylightbulb's posts on the recent It's a Small World thread (about adding interactive elements) that really made this obvious to me once again. Most people really disliked the idea of interactive elements (as did I), but then he came in and said that it could be good if done well and explained it. And it sounded really great - I would have never come up with that!

And I think if things are done very well creatively and exceed our expectations and dreams, they are not only fantastic experiences when you first see them, but they can keep up their appeal. That's why the Haunted Mansion is still a very popular attraction today. And if it lacks we feel like the parks have become stale.

 

[ToTBellHop]

The whole building was designed inappropriately. You can see the green show building from the Speedway, Barnstormer, many places in the park, and even, most egregious of all, from the Dumbo ride itself! Watch the on-ride video here--http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8no17Ffe4k4&feature=related

Whatever happened to caring about sight lines?

 

[Pioneer Hall]

The whole building was designed inappropriately. You can see the green show building from the Speedway, Barnstormer, many places in the park, and even, most egregious of all, from the Dumbo ride itself! Watch the on-ride video here--http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8no17Ffe4k4&feature=related

Whatever happened to caring about sight lines?

I am still hoping that it isn't done yet, and that we will see improvements up until the actual opening. It's possible that with Thunder Mountain closed they just wanted a couple of attractions open to help with the Spring Break crowds and that they are still putting things together in the opened area.