Spirited News, Observations & Thoughts Tres

[WDW1974]

Apparently the seats in Radio City Music Hall had to be replaced due to little children wetting themselves when Snow White first debuted.

Snow White still scares me, to this day.

And that's OK. I was scared when I saw Bambi (in a theater) and it was probably the first time I really thought of death and loss as concepts. That's why those films were so important ... they were art, but they weren't made to talk down to children. Today's Disney is all about that. ... I'm honestly shocked that Iger hasn't had Sleeping Beauty edited to take out the reference to h-e-double hockey sticks.

When I went to the MK for the first time I was seven and I was fine with attractions like Mansion and Pirates (that sorta awed me and scared me a bit at the same time when they burned the village). But Snow White in its original form (which you can see in Tokyo and Paris and partially in Anaheim) scared me to the point I didn't want to ride a second time.

These films weren't watered down. That's one reason I enjoy Pixar's films as they largely follow a template of not aiming at kids.

BTW, anyone else old enough here to actually have seen Disney animated films as slide shows with a sound tape when they were in elementary school? (someone say you were to make me feel less ancient!)

 

[englanddg]

Of course, they could operate it and maybe put a little MAGIC into it.
God forbid...

Considering the strong market video games have now, I don't see why it would be so difficult to lease out space in DQ to developers to push their upcoming tech/projects. If they turned it more into a teen thing (pushing ME and 10+ games in sections) I think that would be a smart move. Still leave enough for smaller kids, but lets face it, families with smaller kids aren't making time out for DQ on a general basis. However, it would be a great place for a family of 4 to dump a surly teenager while they went to Magic Kingdom for a few hours!

The last I was there in 2011 I was disappointed. It was dirty, the games poorly maintained, etc...but then again, I used to run arcades, so I have a different eye.

We are gonna give it a shot this year I think, if we have a rainy afternoon. Hopefully it's improved, but I doubt it.

 

[WDW1974]

The Gearhead society and Lifestyler central were both holding meetings on the beach tonight. Maybe 5% of the people on the beach were actually staying at the Polynesian?

Because putting up video of pyro on Lifestyler sites has been proven to cause exactly 1.7 families to book MAGICal WDW vacations. But I'm sure they're all Tweeting their stuff. I'll read it later ... and then shower quickly!!!

 

[articos]

Well, I assumed they'd succeed because Disney couldn't have that building empty again. They've been looking to shutter DQ for a decade now. They can't largely because they can't fill that space.

But, seriously, what do you think it would do to plans for whatever the name of the moment is for Disney Mall if Splitsville goes belly up?

If Splitsville is unable to sustain 2 floors, I suspect they'll either give back one of the floors and resell it separately, or they'll pull out completely and Disney will again subdivide the space. I said to friends when Splitsville took over the building I thought it was too much space for that type of use in that location and probably would be dead most of the time or wouldn't last.

 

[WDW1974]

No he's not. I know Merida. She's wonderful

Mrs. Lee is Merida's double ... but she certainly is no princess and I doubt she'd like to be referred to as a queen because she associated queens with Disney fanbois! Perhaps Goddess ...

 

[the.dreamfinder]

Mrs. Lee is Merida's double ... but she certainly is no princess and I doubt she'd like to be referred to as a queen because she associated queens with Disney fanbois! Perhaps Goddess ...

I thought Lee would be into Blondes.

 

[crispy]

I thought Monsters University was good, not great, but then again, Monsters, Inc., is one of my favorite Pixar movies so I had high expectations. My girls loved every minute of it. We are planning to see Despicable Me 2 this weekend so it will be interesting to compare both sequels to the originals. I really loved the first Despicable Me which surprised me. It had enough edge for adults and enough silliness for kids. Plus, the Minions are about the cutest things ever.

As far as Splitsville, I visited there in February. It was an extremely crowded weekend (Princess Half weekend), and we were able to walk in and get a table immediately at Splitsville when every other place had a long wait. The food was okay, but really overpriced even by Disney standards. My sandwich and fries was around $15. Service was not that great especially since it wasn't really busy. If my visit was any indication, I can see why they may be having issues.

 

[WDW1974]

Happy 4th of July to all you Americans! Just finished up my final day at TDR, never did manage to see firework as it was cancelled all four nights due to weather (mostly wind). Probably would not go over so well missing fireworks on the 4th in the Swamps!

True, but I've never heard of fans being ushered backstage because TDR/OLC management can't staff enough people to control crowds during pyro shows and busy times. Nothing MAGICal about Phil Holmes parking space unless he's actually there and you can throw Frappucino's at it.

Tons of random thoughts about the resort now that I have some time to unwind.

-I just found out that Sindbad in its current state was NOT the original attraction. Just watched a video on youtube. It's completely jarring, all the elements are there but the tone and message is a complete 180 degree turn. Having only experienced the current version, which I will state again I simply love, it seems like some weird awful nightmare. Too bad they can't flip a switch during Halloween time so that all of Sindbad's friends suddenly want to kill him on your second ride through. The only thing "better" about it is the pacing is definitely faster so the animatronics are that much more lively and impressive. This is definitely an instance where Disney-fying something really worked out for the best. I guess even DisneySea was subject to some miss-fires and growing pains.

Yep. It was much darker and more true to the original tales. No cute 'wittle kitty sidekick and he had facial hair (apparently, they also find it scary!) ... But I never saw the original and the current one is easily in my Top 5 TDR attractions.

-DisneySea honestly just gets more impressive the longer you are in it. Probably something to do with getting my camera back and slowing down from attraction-to-attraction bouncing. Usually with time flaws appear in parks, but with time in DisneySea you really just keep discovering more and more beauty. Certainly Disney (especially TDO) deserves some of the distain it earns - but seriously no one touches Disney when they are firing at 100%. I really love Universal and everything they are doing, but they still are not at Disney levels. HOWEVER, Disney has been firing at about 20% in the swamps for nearly two decades. So even though Universal only reaches that 80-90% mark at their best, it's still 4-4.5X better.

I agree with the underlying point, but UNI has surpassed Disney level work for years now. Most of what you see at TDS was designed in the mid-late 90s by people whose reward for creating the park was being shown the door in Glendale.

-I liked Mythica, Mermaid and Magic Theater. They are all quite fresh by WDW standards, but I am glad they actually keep on top of things and are willing to constantly update/replace. I don't know why people get upset when they want to replace things instead of letting them stagnate.

Well, WDW fans mostly don't remember when the parks got new fresh product regularly. And many hate much of what has been replaced over the last 10-15 years, so you can't completely blame them. They're afraid that if an attraction goes it will be replaced by nicely themed toilets.

-Really happy with the Sheraton and I would totally recommend it*. If it's not going in the $100 range (it can get waaay more expensive), it probably means the parks are too busy and you should avoid going. If it is in the $100 range, I really wouldn't justify staying off property. You are not likely to find anything for much less around Tokyo, and the marginal savings in this case would not be worth the loss to convenience. For all intents and purposes it's "on property". The monorail station is literally across the street, and if for some baffling reason you don't want to walk the 30 seconds, there is a shuttle bus that goes back and forth. I have no idea why there needs to be a bus (and a really nice one at that) to cross the street... Needless to say I always walked. I don't really know pricing of the Disney owned hotels, but I'd say they might be worth a 20-30% premium at best and maybe just for a night so you can watch Fantasmic from your Miracosta balcony. I have a feeling only true 1%-ers and not the faux ones can afford that though. *Should disclose that I'm an SPG platinum member, so upgrades to club floor, free breakfast, self serve bar, free internet, and a general loyalty to the brand etc. etc. cause me to be a bit biased.

I'm quite loyal to SPG, but nowhere near Platinum. The Disney owned hotels are ridiculously expensive, think closer to $1000 a night than $500 much of the year at Mira Costa. ... I stayed 20 minutes away in Odaiba at a Good Neighbor hotel on my last visit and the cost was $61 a night. Best I had seen at TDR was the Hilton at $185 a night.

-Maybe I like JTTCOE more than RSR after all...

Yeah, and if you had just experienced RSRs you'd likely like it more!

-On the Disneyland front, you have a love letter to Magic Kingdom, except better maintained and not so neglected attraction wise. It definitely has the best layout of the four castle parks I've been to. So much better guest flow between the side streets off main street and the fact that you don't have the train circling the park cutting attractions off.

-Regarding the rumour from Lutz I think Radiator springs would replace ROA wonderfully. It would be really well framed between splash and big thunder with the layout they have. I would like to see them maintain more water and foliage somehow though (Mater strikes a spring?) to help blend a bit. Currently ROA does not seem popular whatsoever.

I could easily see how Cars Land could be made to fit, but I hope that it doesn't happen. I just don't like removing a RoA from a park ... and that was about the only attractions I didn't get to while there.

-Monsters and Pooh are good fun. Both fall in the medium length wheelhouse somewhere between classic Disney Dark rides and the lengthy E-ticket dark rides (ie. Mansion and Pirate). They employ interesting technology, great AA's and clearly had a healthy budget with none of that value engineering. Enjoyed Pooh more than my first trip (I think I was somehow overhyped) and Monsters was under refurb last time. Monsters was definitely the most popular attraction in TDL all the days I visited. An 80-120 minute wait and fast passes were gone by noon or so. I only rode it using fast passes twice.

When I was there it was generally Pooh, Buzz andd Monsters (in that order) in terms of wait times. And, no, I haven't seen any value engineering at TDR at all.

-Star Tours, Space Mountain and Monsters all makes for a really great lower end to tomorrow land. TDL unfortunately falls flat in the upper portion. Buzz is ok, it's a better version than Disneyland I believe. EO needs to go, tomorrowland needs a good retheming (true for most of the castle parks) and the speedway is absolutely a waste of space. I get that it has some charm in the other parks, but it is so badly dated and needs to be ripped out. I just hope that TDL decides to lead the pack on this one and jump start a revision since it seems California keeps sticking it on the back-burner. Some of the freeway space should go towards another Toontown attraction, definitely my least favourite Castle Park land (I even prefer Toy Story play land in HK, blasphemy I know).

-Last thing I wanted to say was why are people so in a huff about Spectromagic? Nostalgia and never wanting anything to change is the whole problem with Magic Kingdom. I'm also sorry to say that the electric lights parade needs the old heave-ho as well. The conceit and music work just fine, but some of it really looks like someone strung a bunch of Christmas lights onto a float in their garage. I don't understand why people like 40 year old floats! TDL's parades (Happiness and dream lights) were great, mostly because their floats aren't older than I am.

-Change is a good thing (as long as it is properly budgeted change). Sometimes the memory of an attraction are better to have then seeing it absolutely rot away or erode into irrelevancy. Disney sells nostalgia, but it also is what can make the parks awful with time. It’s ok to miss things and remember them fondly, but seriously, it’s just a cinnamon roll. If they never served them in the first place (like TDL) would you really care?

No, not with all the popcorn flavors ... and unique treats ... and menus that are different at EVERY location in the parks.

 

[WDW1974]

Speaking of capacity, I give a fuller description in the fireworks thread, but last night BACKSTAGE was turned into a fireworks viewing area. Then a dance party.

"Bad show" just doesn't seem adequate to describe it.

Well, it would suck if Disney had to have an extra 75 crowd control CMs and an actual plan beyond wasting tremendous amounts of tape on the pavement/walkways to keep things safely moving. Much better to toss out any aspect of caring about show and then add some tacky onto the trash.

 

[WDW1974]

Lone Range scored a B+ on Cinemascore, but only $9.6 million in its first day.

I'll add to it over the weekend.

 

[Calvin Coolidge]

OK, no Spirited Musings on the Fourth ... but I'll wade back into our film (and burger) discussion a bit.

All I'll have to say is, if you won't call Cars 2 or Brave or The Lone Ranger (or Five Guys Fries for that matter) "truly bad" then you must be a very generous man, and that is a great quality in many ways.

 

[WDW1974]

I saw this post on Deadlines box office thread and thought this sums up some of the problems with Disney's name on violent action movies

"This is Branding 101. I have been posting on this site for 4 years now, since Disney acquired Marvel, about the dangers of slapping their brand on too many unlike products, ultimately creating confusion for consumers and eroding its value in the marketplace. A brand that has historically been the trusted go-to brand for wholesome family entertainment cannot also expect its brand to stretch into violent adolescent (i.e. more mature) content. It needs a different brand for that. Parents trust the Disney brand. They expect to buy its toys and have them be ‘safe’ for their kids. They expect to watch its movies and tv shows and have them be ‘safe’ for their kids. Putting the Disney logo on The Lone Ranger creates confusion for everyone. It misleads parents into thinking this is ‘safe’ for young children, when it is extremely violent and inappropriate. It turns away the mature and adolescent crowd, who are either too confused by the branding to know what to make of it, or simply shrug it of as an uncool baby movie by virtue of seeing Disney’s name. How many times does this formula have to fail before Disney gets with the program? Okay, hungry for more money, Diseny decided it needed to break out of its ‘princess’ stereotype by appealing to older children, especially boys. That was obvious enough from the Marvel acquisition. But these violent, mature boy movies they have been making recently are so off-brand. Not only do they lose money, but they kill goodwill. If Disney wants to appeal to older kids, then stick with things in the High School Musical-type universe. Develop or buy a different brand with no links to Diseny, and use that to sell gore and violence to the older boys. Don;t co-mingle Disney’s sacred brand name with this stuff. Seriously. Branding 101 folks."

That's a bit funny if you read the Kim Masters interview of Alan Horn a few days ago in THR regarding why Disney couldn't/wouldn't make a film like Argo.

I am wondering if people are simply overstating the violence and how it is portrayed in this film. I don't hear the same complaints about Man of Steel where Supes (are you allowed to even call him that?) snaps Zod's neck like Iger snaps fanbois' dreams. Showing someone dining on heart tar tar isn't the same as intimating it. And showing violence where people die but never suffer or bleed is exactly what Disney has done for years. I haven't seen the film, but I really don't get the issue. World War Z (which I also haven't seen yet) got a PG-13 and it's about freaking zombies. If the Walking Dead were a film, it would get an R without question.

 

[El Grupo]

BTW, anyone else old enough here to actually have seen Disney animated films as slide shows with a sound tape when they were in elementary school? (someone say you were to make me feel less ancient!)

I believe I saw some of these, as well as documentaries produced/released by Disney's educational division.

Part of my uncle's responsibility as a school district administrator in the early 70s was overseeing all media and educational materials (films, textbooks, maps, globes, etc.) for the county. Many of the materials, including some full-lenth theatrical releases, were stored in a warehouse next to his office.

When I visited my uncle and aunt over the Summer, he would take me to work, set up a projector and screen and let me rummage through years of films while he attended to his tasks. Considering that there was only the three broadcast networks and PBS, plus no VCRs, at the time, this was a golden opportunity for a kid under 10.

 

[bubbles1812]

I'll add to it over the weekend.

Me too! (Dad really really wants to see it). Have to be wondering what the execs are thinking with numbers like that coming in. That means for the entire 5 day holiday, it'll make perhaps 50 mill or so on a movie that cost 225 million to make (and that's not including marketing costs!)! I still don't think this is a failure of John Carter level, but it ain't good.

 

[Kuhio]

I saw Monsters U recently and really enjoyed it. It's colorful and fun -- and I tend to like the Pixar movies that have created rich, fully-fleshed out settings. It's probably in the bottom 5 Pixar movies in terms of overall depth and "quality," but it's in my top 5 for pure enjoyment. Cars is also one of those movies I think is probably among Pixar's weakest, but is really watchable personally. (In contrast, I think something like Wall-E is a very, very good movie, but not among my favorites to re-watch.)

And I saw Monsters Inc. at home right after Monsters U... all I can say is that the state of computer animation has really advanced in the last decade with regard to things like textures and shading.

I also saw Brave for the second time a few days ago, and thought it was better upon another viewing. I think the main problem is it's visually very dark -- a lot of it takes place inside the castle or in the woods. Makes for kind of a dreary viewing experience.

I'm planning to see Lone Ranger sometime in the next couple of days, bad reviews and all. I really don't think it's "23% on Rotten Tomatoes"-level bad...

 

[WDW1974]

I don't want a Disney Castle preceding the Star Wars theme. It does set a different tone. I read someone saying they will miss the 20th Century Fox music and logo before Star Wars and I would agree.

I wonder why more PG and PG13 is running with the Disney name. I remember reading how Walt was envious at times with the adult theme movies knowing he had to keep his brand family friendly. That is where Ron Miller was genius with developing touchtone.

It doesn't set any tone. It tells you who released the film, possibly who made it. The Avengers was a huge film for Disney ... but it had Paramount's mountain on it because of the prior distribution deal.

You can be sure you'll prominently see DISNEY and a castle before you see Lucasfilm come Star Wars time. Just like you see Disney before Pixar and will before Marvel.

The only reason Touchstone still exists is to release Dreamworks films like Lincoln. This isn't the 90s with Disney, Touchstone, Hollywood and Miramax.

Disney has BRANDS now, but wants you to know they are all DISNEY BRANDS.

 

[WDW1974]

That train finale sequence, with the re-orchestration of the William Tell Overture, was awesome. Shows how important good music is to a film.

Or a theme park (see original EPCOT Center vs. today's Epcot).

 

[WDW1974]

The trailer for Thor 2 does not have any Disney logos.

No, because it is Marvel.

But when it is released you'll see Disney followed by Marvel.

 

[Kuhio]

Me too! (Dad really really wants to see it). Have to be wondering what the execs are thinking with numbers like that coming in. That means for the entire 5 day holiday, it'll make perhaps 50 mill or so on a movie that cost 225 million to make (and that's not including marketing costs!)! I still don't think this is a failure of a John Carter level, but it ain't good.

Lone Ranger probably shouldn't fail as badly as John Carter. Even though the Lone Ranger is a property that's a bit long in the tooth, there are still way more people who are familiar with it than with John Carter. John Carter also suffered because it lacked an A-list actor, had a title that was completely nondescript, and was marketed incredibly poorly.

Even so, John Carter wasn't horrible... it was just mediocre. I enjoyed it enough to not regret having paid to see it in the theater, but had no interest in seeing it a second time.

Still, Lone Ranger definitely looks like it'll fall far short of being a blockbuster. What was the last real Disney blockbuster that wasn't under the Pixar or Marvel labels? The first two Pirates films? Pirates 2 was seven years ago now...

 

[WDW1974]

24hrs later....
Yep...I still like it.

I'm in for a sequel.

I didn't realize that Disney had contacted you to play Extra No. 154: shot and killed in first 11 seconds with no face visible in 2.3 seconds of film time.

Congrats! You should build a mansion with the kind of cash you'll be earning!