Originally posted by Captain Cab
My thoughts exactly!
The problem is that Space Mountain doesn't really have a story behind it. The ride is simply a steel mini roller coaster themed (very well I might add) to be in the future that never was. Sure it's very popular, but how can you make a successful movie out of a ride that's not being driven by a story?
Right now Disney is skating on thin ice with this concept of making theme park rides into full length movies. Sure Pirates of the Caribbean was a huge hit, but the two previous films (Country Bears and Mission to Mars) bombed big time. Let's not forget about that direct-to-video failure of a movie, Tower of Terror. Haunted Mansion will be in the theaters soon, but the early reports don't look very promising. So let's see, out of those four movies (excluding HM) only three made it to the big screen, and only one was a success. That's only a 25% success rate. Not exactly a good ratio.
Getting back to Space Mountain, how can there be a movie when the ride has no story? You simply get into a rocket and race around the galaxy. No objective/mission, no bad guys, and not really much of a point except that it's a thrilling ride. Whoop-de-do.
If Disney were to make a coaster into a movie, a logical choice would be to base it on Big Thunder Mountain. With the concept of an old western town, a flash flood, an earthquake, and a runaway mine train Disney can make an excellent action movie that everybody who has ridden the ride can instantly recoginize and relate to. They can even call it Thunder Mountain (leave off the "Big") and people unfamiliar with Disney will want to see it without realizing that it's actually based on a very popular Disney ride. Also, Big Thunder Mountain is pretty consistant in all the Disney parks throughout the world. There are small differences, but the whole concempt, layout and theming are the same. Space Mountain varies a bit between TDL, DL, and WDW, and DLP is totally different from the other versions.
Also, instead of Space Mountain what about focusing on Splash Mountain? As we all know, the ride is based on "Song of the South", but due to political correctness the movie is basically banned here in the U.S. So how about making an updated version that follows the ride more? How about following the adventures of Brer Rabbit as he is constantly chased by Brer Fox and Brer Bear? Also, Splash Mountain is quite consistant between TDL, DL, and WDW, so everybody who has ridden the ride has pretty much experienced the same exact version.
Why focus on a ride without a story when there are plenty of other popular rides that can be made into excellent movies?
(Athough a SM movie could be interesting if done right.)
