News Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser Permanently Closed Fall 2023

Animaniac93-98

Well-Known Member
While I'm sure the number of people willing to watch a 4+ hour YouTube video about a defunct tourist attraction is somewhat limited, it appears that this is reaching a fairly wide audience that likely includes a lot more mainstream viewers than Disney news typically garners. One has to wonder whether it will have any effect on Disney's business philosophies that have been so clearly called out in it, or at the very least, whether it will make customers more skeptical of the practices already in place.

I've wondered how Disney reacts when videos like this, or Bright Sun Travels recent "Disney World is too expensive" video get literally millions of clicks (Defunctland's Fastpass video has over 20 million views), when their own social media posts struggle to get more than 10-50k views each.

Publicly, we know there is no formal response, but you'd think someone would be paying attention to this kind of spotlight.
 

donaldtoo

Well-Known Member
That such a person had so much to dislike about this project tells you how far they missed the mark.

I watched the whole 4+ hours of that video on and off, over about an 8-ish hour period yesterday.
A bit tedious in places, but it was extensive and a good overview.
Many of us had a bad feeling about this idea early on, especially once they announced the price point.
Just seemed like such an unsustainable business model.
Even if it was a dream you saved for to only do once, that would be a problem, as Disney only got that big money from you one time at that location.
And, if you had plenty of money and were able to afford it anytime you wanted (and how could it be much different every time…???), why would you when that money would afford you so many other superior options for travel all over the world…?!
Seems to me it would be a one and done for the vast majority, just to say they did it once.
 

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
I've wondered how Disney reacts when videos like this, or Bright Sun Travels recent "Disney World is too expensive" video get literally millions of clicks (Defunctland's Fastpass video has over 20 million views), when their own social media posts struggle to get more than 10-50k views each.

Publicly, we know there is no formal response, but you'd think someone would be paying attention to this kind of spotlight.
The defunctland should be mandatory viewing before anyone engages in wdw talk
 

Serverfarm

Member
Only watch a few sections...
  • DIS promoting old good reviews videos to drown this video: in effect last 35hrs looking at SEO stats :cool:
  • Jenny's video is fairly accurate, but somewhat too dramatic. The main reasons for closure were super simple: 1. attraction was for a niche audience (at its core was a role play/escape room attraction), and 2. clear future labor cost were going to skyrocket vs guest volume (e.g. whales didn't show up in droves). Recall the main metric at parks is... throughput (Chapek's solution was price gating and merch, lol).
  • This hotel and Batuu was supposed to be the victory lap to Wizarding World and Jenny actually sums up a verdict nicely (and expect major concept & execution changes w/DLR's Pandora '2')
  • Cynically, the real lesson of SWGSC is corporate: it's a lesson on how to fail up (look at who's running WDI and who got the promotions & who got the shaft).
 

V_L_Raptor

Well-Known Member
Jenny's video certainly got noticed... nothing from the c-suite beyond "staying the course" with their current strategy, but consternation internally is percolating.

It was the best autopsy I’ve ever seen. Worth the time, albeit in manageable chunks over a few days. The last few sections are exquisitely damning.

I only hope the climbing view count lights a few fires under that consternation.
 

Miss Rori

Well-Known Member
Publicly, we know there is no formal response, but you'd think someone would be paying attention to this kind of spotlight.
I don't know, it's not like they've done anything to counter all the good-faith critiques of Wish that proliferate on YT, much less indicate they've learned any lessons from how that project went so wrong. (I wonder if Disney corporate is so sick of good-faith complaints about the parks and films that they decided to make a PR move against Nicholson just because she's one person!)
 

V_L_Raptor

Well-Known Member
I don't know, it's not like they've done anything to counter all the good-faith critiques of Wish that proliferate on YT, much less indicate they've learned any lessons from how that project went so wrong. (I wonder if Disney corporate is so sick of good-faith complaints about the parks and films that they decided to make a PR move against Nicholson just because she's one person!)

Huh. I guess I missed that. What PR move did they make?
 

Miss Rori

Well-Known Member
Huh. I guess I missed that. What PR move did they make?
Well, both Screen Rant and Gizmodo, two nerdy media news/clickbait sites, put up "articles" out to rebut the Nicholson video today (Friday). The Screen Rant one was taken down mighty fast from what I can tell, but this one (which doesn't actually mention the video, but why would it go up otherwise?) is still up:


Pretty much everyone on social media sees the articles as glorified press releases.
 

ChrisFL

Premium Member
One (current?) imagineer on twitter was complaining about public discourse not understanding how much work goes into projects...then said it wasn't about jenny nicholson's video specifically...but not sure what other major discourse is going on. Anyway, it seemed like an odd take.

Yes, you can put a TON of work into something and still do it in the wrong direction.

I was trying to find the post, but can't locate it now. It was reposted by someone I follow and didn't recognize the imagineer.
 

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