News Splash Mountain retheme to Princess and the Frog - Tiana's Bayou Adventure

[Incomudro]

That’s part of what bugs me most of all - the hubris that they could improve both on Splash and PATF.

For sure.
The script in the form of the film was handed to them.
But no... They're smarter than that.
They're tossing that aside and coming up with what they believe today's audiences want.

 

[GhostHost1000]

For sure.
The script in the form of the film was handed to them.
But no... They're smarter than that.
They're tossing that aside and coming up with what they believe today's audiences want.

Which might fail. Even if this is tied to the new Tiana series coming to D+, most won’t ever watch that vs those that know and enjoy the movie.

I gotta say there was plenty of content to use from within the original movie to make an entertaining attraction, but I’ll still stand by Splash was the wrong place to force Tiana into and I think the storyline they are trying to come up with and the reaction on social media from it all is proving that even more.

 

[splah]

Taking bets on whether the “missing ingredient” turns out to be “soul” and/or “love”

 

[GhostHost1000]

Taking bets on whether the “missing ingredient” turns out to be “soul” and/or “love”

Hot sauce in a popcorn bucket

 

[drizgirl]

For the story they're creating, Tiana and her movie don't really seem all that necessary.

You could have the same plot and setting without the specific inclusion of Tiana, Naveen, Louis etc. They're already making original music and other characters for it.

Exactly. I go to theme parks to ride the movies. This sounds like the sort of thing they used to release direct to video, not put in the parks.

 

[TalkToEthan]

The young girl in the picture with the other 8 workers is the only one not wearing an apron......disappointing to see

 

[Animaniac93-98]

Exactly. I go to theme parks to ride the movies. This sounds like the sort of thing they used to release direct to video, not put in the parks.

The backstory does read like bad fan fiction.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

I don't know how someone can watch The Princess and the Frog and have their main takeaway not be the visuals, the music, the humor, the characters, the morals etc...but "Tiana is a woman who owns a business! What a #girlboss"

I mean, yes, that is true, but her being a workaholic at the expense of friends and family wasn't framed in a good light in the actual movie.

 

[Magicart87]

The backstory does read like bad fan fiction.

Except fan fiction pulls inspiration from the source material. This is somehow worse than that.

I'm pretty sure ChatGPT could come up with a better plot.

 

[lewisc]

Taking bets on whether the “missing ingredient” turns out to be “soul” and/or “love”

Hallmark movie the ingredient would be love.

Isn't it obvious? The missing ingredient is salt and Tiana will never again run out

 

[Scuttle]

The backstory does read like bad fan fiction.

It’s hard to believe it’s this bad. I could have come up with a better backstory all by my lonesome. I swear they are trolling the Splash fans with the hot sauce deal.

 

[gerarar]

The storyline perfectly fits in with Dinosaur's setup!

 

[EPCOT-O.G.]

The backstory does read like bad fan fiction.

This goes back to my point that I’ve not yet seen any indication that WDI’s best and brightest are working on this. There’s a deft way to weave a message (or messages) within a compelling narrative. Other than a grab bag of laudable goals, it’s very unclear to see how this presents a compelling narrative within the parameters of the existing ride structure.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

Taking bets on whether the “missing ingredient” turns out to be “soul” and/or “love”

 

[Drdcm]

I’m still going to give imagineering the benefit of the doubt. This must be PR driven and not imagineering given the topics they’ve chosen to focus on. PR isn’t motivated by our experience, it’s the company’s image that is their priority.

Their PR has been odd for a while now. They have been reactionary and sometimes actively hostile towards fans and some news websites. They’ve been unable to navigate any controversy without alienating large swaths of fans and creating enemies. It’s just one misstep after another.

 

[Tom Morrow]

Just reading that thing, you can imagine the levels of focus grouping that every element of that backstory went through to try and please everyone.

-She's a capitalist...but she gives back to her community!
-She's a strong, independent woman...but she also lets her employees co-own and help run the business!
-People might complain that Louisiana doesn't have mountains...let's invent an overly-elaborate salt mine backstory!
-People, understandably, didn't like how Tiana was a frog for most of the movie...let's keep a rigid sequel timeline so we can't bring back Facilier or Ray!
-People, understandably, want the first black princess to be a good role model...let's give her an additional 1,200 businesses to run since just the one from the movie, which she fought to open in the middle of the Jim Crow-era, might not be feminist enough.

Guys...just send us through the environments from the film but keep Tiana human this time. This didn't need to be hard. You didn't feel the need to give an overly-elaborate backstory to the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train or Frozen Ever After.

I'm reminded of The Simpsons' "Poochie" episode, where they try so hard to please everyone and check a bunch of boxes that they come up with something undeniably lame.

 

[GhostHost1000]

I’m still going to give imagineering the benefit of the doubt. This must be PR driven and not imagineering given the topics they’ve chosen to focus on. PR isn’t motivated by our experience, it’s the company’s image that is their priority.

Their PR has been odd for a while now. They have been reactionary and sometimes actively hostile towards fans and some news websites. They’ve been unable to navigate any controversy without alienating large swaths of fans and creating enemies. It’s just one misstep after another.

I think the (poor) decision to replace Splash was PR driven, but the attraction story and components are likely imagineering. I cannot give them a pass on that.

I have a bad feeling the forced things happening with this attraction are going to cause this replacement of splash to fail both with fans online and it may not even be as popular to guests in the park as splash was

 

[EPCOT-O.G.]

I'm reminded of The Simpsons' "Poochie" episode, where they try so hard to please everyone and check a bunch of boxes that they come up with something undeniably lame.

Again, some of our greatest works of art manage to balance multiple meta commentaries and do so within a compelling narrative. It can be done. It has been done with diverse casts. It just feels like this was workshopped to death to include those things you list, AND tie it in to a try to be released D+ series, AND had to hew to an existing and difficult to reengineer ride system.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

I’m still going to give imagineering the benefit of the doubt. This must be PR driven and not imagineering given the topics they’ve chosen to focus on.

A one minute YouTube video of an Imagineer showing off work on one of the AAs for the ride would have been far more interesting and done a better job getting people excited for the attraction.

When promoting a ride, people want to hear about the actual ride, not a fictitious brand of hot sauce.

 

[EPCOT-O.G.]

I think the (poor) decision to replace Splash was PR driven, but the attraction story and components are likely imagineering. I cannot give them a pass on that.

I have a bad feeling the forced things happening with this attraction are going to cause this replacement of splash to fail both with fans online and it may not even be as popular to guests in the park as splash was

Yep. PR’s job is to highlight and magnify what Imagineers create, not the other way around.

Again, the decision to drop this news late on a Friday was a choice. Whether that choice was driven by basic marketing incompetence or embarrassment is anyone’s guess.