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The Miscellaneous Thought Thread
- Thread starter mickEblu
- Start date
How many negative changes can one experience or bad news can one wake up to until you just stop feeling the same way about the place? It’s been one thing after another the last few years but it really got bad this last year + starting with the Splash announcement.
PiratesMansion
Well-Known Member
The standby queue discussion is valid, but really should be its own thread at this point.
Add me to chorus who was last impressed by Moana and haven't really liked anything Disney's made since.
I thought Ralph Breaks the Internet was terrible and one of the worst things Disney's ever made.
Frozen II had its moments but never became a coherent story.
The concept behind Raya was solid if generic. But the quality of the script ruined the movie for me.
I would love to say I feel better about Pixar, but that's really because of Soul. Otherwise, I haven't liked anything they've done since Incredibles II.
Add me to chorus who was last impressed by Moana and haven't really liked anything Disney's made since.
I thought Ralph Breaks the Internet was terrible and one of the worst things Disney's ever made.
Frozen II had its moments but never became a coherent story.
The concept behind Raya was solid if generic. But the quality of the script ruined the movie for me.
I would love to say I feel better about Pixar, but that's really because of Soul. Otherwise, I haven't liked anything they've done since Incredibles II.
Stevek
Well-Known Member
Rat Chat, for what it's worth, has said there are plans to roll it to both WDW and Disneyland.
Mac Tonight
Well-Known Member
It is interesting to wonder what my “tipping point” would be to fully stop going to the parks. I hope I’ll never have to find out.
But, the older I get (I’m still in my 30s) the more I find myself craving things from the past. There is increasingly less and less in the modern world that I find attractive. Most things are just cheap and disposable with no real sense of value placed on quality.
I guess I am just realizing more and more how grateful I am that I was raised on Epcot Center and Disneyland pre-Iger.
Communicora
Premium Member
Is anyone from here featured in this article?
www.buzzfeednews.com
Disney Adults Don’t Care If You Hate Them. They’re Having Fun Anyway.
For these "House of Mouse" fans, the brand offers more than childhood nostalgia. It's an ever-present lifestyle and they're not ashamed of it.
www.buzzfeednews.com
For me it might just be death by a thousand paper cuts and not just necessarily one thing they can do. I’ll make a short list off the top of my head …
- TOT removed for GOTG
- Pixar Pier
- Avengers Campus
- Splash removed for PatF
- Project Stardust
- Rivers of America reroute
- New Big Thunder Trail
- Galaxies Edge
- Fantasmic 2.0
- Mickey’s Mix Magic
- Horrid POTC auction scene
- “Inclusion” changes in general like removing “ladies and gentlemen…”
- The mobile phone onslaught
- The TL neglect while billions of dollars are spent around the resort
(Although I’m ok waiting until Chapek is gone)
- Rumored premier pass/ standby pass coming
I’m sure I’m missing a few. Now I’ll acknowledge that some of what I listed was necessary to an extent like Project Stardust. Of course not everything on this list is completely bad. If something made this list it’s because it was better before or what was replaced felt more like Disneyland/ a Disney park. Or it’s on the list because of the potential for the IP or real estate lost and not meeting the high expectations.
Now all they have to do is ruin NOS’s intimacy by connecting it to a new land to the West for Disney Forward, kill off Splash, try and ultimately fail to fix TL, get rid of the lagoon, Autopia and all the trees for a Frozen ride and restaurant and lastly remove the “waste of space” that is Storybookland and the destruction of DL will be complete. Oh yeah for good measure they should include as many future HM movie tie ins into the ride as possible. And who knows with the “ladies and gentlemen” non sense maybe Mickey Avenue taking over Main Street isn’t that far fetched.
SuddenStorm
Well-Known Member
Indy is in horrific shape. Both the snake and rolling boulder aren't operating, the preshow film has been significantly shortened, and various other lights/smoke machines aren't working properly. It makes you wonder how bad an attraction actually has to look for Disney to say "You know, we probably shouldn't operate it looking like this."
Splash Mountain looks the best it has in years, but it also seems like when one thing gets fixed something else breaks. At least it has most of its figures in place, even if a few aren't moving. There were some speakers working I don't remember working before the closure, though there's a few that it seems stopped working as well. I only got in four rides, so I hope to revisit over the next few months, especially as it gets colder to really get in some time on that ride.
Haunted Mansion looked amazing- I rode it first thing in the morning and wasn't bothered by the changes to the load area. It helps that we basically walked through it quickly and our eyes hadn't adjusted so the lighting seemed perfect. The graveyard scene looks the best it has in years- I certainly can't remember a time when it looked better then it does now. If they got rid of Constance the ride would be near perfect.
I thought Pirates looked great- and the changes in the second half of the ride don't outweigh the '60s charm of the first half that's mostly untouched with a few improvements here and there.
Operations is struggling- Indy, Space, and Matterhorn had multiple multi hour closures yesterday- often at the same time which adds significant stress to the other E's in the park. I honestly think Space Mountain was closed longer then it was open yesterday. Mansion went down a few times as well, and Rise didn't start boarding until about noon. We got in line for Rise at 12:10, and after making it through the hanger the ride broke down again before getting grouped. We were walked out and it was down for another few hours- though it did operate reliably after it reopened the second time. Line management was inconsistent and inadequate, with long lines spilling into walkways. Which is weird since Disney knew exactly how many people would be there that day.
I didn't realize Lincoln was only open 12-8, so when we wandered down at 9 to watch it and it was closed it was a huge disappointment. Reduced operating hours for attractions is a relic of the Pressler era- I understand right now it's a necessity because of the staffing shortages but I hope this doesn't become the norm. Painters were still painting on Main Street in the morning- which makes you wonder how much Disney really cares about Disneyland's show. It's interesting to me that the same company that advertised Galaxy's Edge as the peak of themed design is demolishing Toontown in view of guests and painting Main Street during operating hours. The details are important- and it seems like Disney is missing the forest for the trees here.
The Canoes ended up being my group's favorite ride of the day. I was the only one who had actually done them before, and everyone else was like 'dang that was actually tons of fun'. It helped that our Canoe guide was phenomenal. Somehow the kid behind me found a way to splash water forward, so I ended up getting wetter then I did on Splash Mountain, but such is life. It's a miracle the Canoes are operating right now.
Splash Mountain looks the best it has in years, but it also seems like when one thing gets fixed something else breaks. At least it has most of its figures in place, even if a few aren't moving. There were some speakers working I don't remember working before the closure, though there's a few that it seems stopped working as well. I only got in four rides, so I hope to revisit over the next few months, especially as it gets colder to really get in some time on that ride.
Haunted Mansion looked amazing- I rode it first thing in the morning and wasn't bothered by the changes to the load area. It helps that we basically walked through it quickly and our eyes hadn't adjusted so the lighting seemed perfect. The graveyard scene looks the best it has in years- I certainly can't remember a time when it looked better then it does now. If they got rid of Constance the ride would be near perfect.
I thought Pirates looked great- and the changes in the second half of the ride don't outweigh the '60s charm of the first half that's mostly untouched with a few improvements here and there.
Operations is struggling- Indy, Space, and Matterhorn had multiple multi hour closures yesterday- often at the same time which adds significant stress to the other E's in the park. I honestly think Space Mountain was closed longer then it was open yesterday. Mansion went down a few times as well, and Rise didn't start boarding until about noon. We got in line for Rise at 12:10, and after making it through the hanger the ride broke down again before getting grouped. We were walked out and it was down for another few hours- though it did operate reliably after it reopened the second time. Line management was inconsistent and inadequate, with long lines spilling into walkways. Which is weird since Disney knew exactly how many people would be there that day.
I didn't realize Lincoln was only open 12-8, so when we wandered down at 9 to watch it and it was closed it was a huge disappointment. Reduced operating hours for attractions is a relic of the Pressler era- I understand right now it's a necessity because of the staffing shortages but I hope this doesn't become the norm. Painters were still painting on Main Street in the morning- which makes you wonder how much Disney really cares about Disneyland's show. It's interesting to me that the same company that advertised Galaxy's Edge as the peak of themed design is demolishing Toontown in view of guests and painting Main Street during operating hours. The details are important- and it seems like Disney is missing the forest for the trees here.
The Canoes ended up being my group's favorite ride of the day. I was the only one who had actually done them before, and everyone else was like 'dang that was actually tons of fun'. It helped that our Canoe guide was phenomenal. Somehow the kid behind me found a way to splash water forward, so I ended up getting wetter then I did on Splash Mountain, but such is life. It's a miracle the Canoes are operating right now.
Sorry to hear about the issues but glad you made it out and we’re able to ride Splash. I agree about Mansion. The graveyard and the ride in general looked amazing. Did they remove the scrims?
So no Splash merch anywhere huh?
SuddenStorm
Well-Known Member
The scrims are still there, but cleaned or something so they're barely visible.
I didn't see any Splash merchandise.
They did have this at Disneyana but I talked myself out of it-
SuddenStorm
Well-Known Member
Yesterday I mobile ordered Plaza Inn for a return time 30 minutes later. Pressed "prepare now" when my window opened and they had my food in like 2 minutes.
For $150 I would have passed too. I’ve come to realize Etsy and Instagram have better options for Disneyland signage than Disneyland
SplashGhost
Well-Known Member
I am glad that Splash was in better shape than recent years, I was afraid they would just let it decay because they were changing it in the near future.
The state of Indy and all those other issues sounds pretty horrible though. If I went on a day like that with an AP, it wouldn't be a big deal, but if I am paying the ticket price (even the discounted price), I would expect things to be running drastically better.
SuddenStorm
Well-Known Member
The merchandise as a whole was disappointing. I walked through the Emporium and didn't see anything I cared about buying.
SuddenStorm
Well-Known Member
You're completely right- and it makes me wish I could see the guest survey scores. You can't have rides breaking down left and right, reduced operating hours, reduced entertainment, a mobile order system that's a hassle, and poor show in the rides that are operating- and expect high scores from people paying over $100/day to be there. I've been on Indy many times without the boulder or snake working (though usually at least one is), but I also used to have an AP.
Indy's one of my favorite and a ride I have to do when I go. The first time I tried to ride Indy yesterday it broke down after we had waited 30 minutes in line and stayed broken down for about 3 hours. And that was what we had tried to do after waiting in line for Rise and having to get walked out of the queue- so two broken down rides in an hour. When we saw Indy had reopened we walked over and it was broken down again. Once we did finally make it on the ride was in horrible shape. And I paid $140 to be there that day.
Mac Tonight
Well-Known Member
I definitely agree with your list and it being death by a thousand cuts. Any one of those things on their own wouldn't move the needle too much (except perhaps GE, but when you add it up over time... yikes).
Having said that, turning Main St. into "Mickey Avenue" would definitely push me close to the edge...
SplashGhost
Well-Known Member
For $140 for a one day ticket, I would expect everything to be as perfect as humanly possible. One ride breaking down is one thing, but several rides breaking down and one of the headliners being in poor shape just isn't what I would expect from $140 a day.
I know people try to defend Chapek's whole strategy of charging more for a "better" experience by getting rid of APs, but from everything you say, I would consider what you went through a very bad experience and it would have felt like a ripoff. If Chapek is going to charge more, there is a ton of stuff that he is going to have to improve. I feel like his theory is that too many guests caused issues, so the cheapest thing for him to do is raise prices and get rid of APs (temporarily). The guests paying regular ticket prices and having bad experiences due to poor ops and maintenance are far less likely to pay for tickets again, or get an AP once they are available again.
Pretty much every problem Disneyland has had due to overcrowding could have been handled by better ops and adding more high capacity attractions, without having to adjust pricing.
George Lucas on a Bench
Well-Known Member
More money, less offerings. - Bob Cheapek