You have a lot more confidence in Iger’s ability to picture a creative endeavor before it’s complete than I do. Everything we’ve seen from him during his tenure indicates he’s a very literal person without much imagination for how something undefined could be.
Just look at the types of projects that have been approved while he’s been in charge of the company: countless sequels, spin-offs, remakes, and other similarly reductive films and tv shows. It’s increasingly rare that anything truly “new” gets approved, and when it does it typically seems to be low-budget things that are quickly pushed to the side and forgotten.
Even when adapting existing properties into new experiences, we almost never see things that capture the spirit of a specific element and imagine from there (like Peter Pan’s Flight) or reimagine the property’s presentation entirely (like The Lion King on Broadway). Instead, we get very literal projects that just take things we already know and put them into a new format, with exceedingly little new or special added in the process (like DCA’s Carsland or the Frozen sing-along). Sure, these things may be executed with a lavish budget, but they rarely bring anything new to the table.
Even if his opinion of the walkthrough was truly leaked (which I sincerely doubt), I question putting too much weight into Iger’s interpretation at this point. He’s a painfully uncreative individual whose only real imaginative prowess to date seems to be “idk, more trees?”
Don’t get me wrong, very little of what’s been publicly released for this project inspires confidence that they’re going to get it right. I just don’t put much value to Bob Iger’s (alleged) understanding of how an unfinished project will turn out.
