The source i've spoken with has an excellent track record as well. On both this attraction as well as many others. They were the one who broke that initial info dump I posted back in 2022. While everyone else was assuming this was still a low budget overlay with hollowed out sets and very few AA's. This includes the amount of new original major characters being created. And later (again before anyone else) that the AA's would not be face projected. I was also told in June last year that the attraction was going to open significantly earlier than originally planned, some at WDI pushing for 5-6 months earlier. That all ended up being spot-on.
I'll reiterate that I think the renders Archive posted do originate from Disney, not fanmade fakes. My contention is the way in which people are trying to extrapolate information and jump to conclusions based on what is and isn't present in them. These renders are extremely simplistic and were clearly being used for internal testing for certain figures and angles, they're not in a remotely complete enough state to be making any concrete assertions about how many figures will be present in the final show-ready scene. Whether these assertions are from Splash Archive, or from his friend who got ahold of the renders and was simply relayed their own claims, I do not know. But I suspect there is some mistaken information involved here.
When Archive first posted about these renders on Twitter in July of last year, he claimed that it would only have six animatronics, as the official finalized number. That post is still up for reference-
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When Archive was informed that he was missing three additional characters that had already been confirmed over two months prior to this tweet, he changed the number to 9 in a post on this forum. And he said that 9 was now the true final number with no chance of any additional figures beyond that. Something i'm inclined to believe is not the case. I suspect that Archive's numbers were inferred based on counting how many characters physically appear in the renders, and that they adjusted that number after they discovered that Disney had already confirmed there were more.
To reiterate, the fact that every one of these renders demonstrates a different combination of characters (one of them without any characters at all, and another showing two in a basic t-pose stance) should at least serve as a warning not to jump to conclusions about what the final count will be.
At this point, I am not the only one on this forum who heard that the ride will have a very impressive quantity of AA's. I don't think anyone has been told a specific number yet, or they're keeping things close to the chest if they have been. But several people with good track records here have independently heard from their own sources that the "dozens" claim by Disney is the real deal. And not just a meager 24 or even 36, but considerably more still. Allegedly something that should satisfy people who valued that particular aspect of Splash.
) but it wont enlarge...anyone?
