This holds no water. He’s acting as if they built generic spaceships there too, and that there isn’t the holy grail of all Star Wars locations: the Millennium Falcon.
Do you really think that if they tore down the giant petrified trees, and ripped out and replaced the green real trees with piles of desert sand, and put a “Mos Eisley“ sign above the cantina, that suddenly thousands will show up in droves?
Harry Potter’s world is very ‘building’ centric. Hagrid’s Hut, Ministry of Magic, Shrieking Shack, 12 Grimwald Place, etc. these are all places that can be re-created more or less realistically in the theme park setting.
Star Wars jumps from planet to planet. Not only is this difficult to re-create in a theme park, but it is also not the most important part of Star Wars. I’d rather be on the Millennium Falcon than be on Besbin. I’d rather be at a woodsy rebel base that I’ve never heard of, than at a jokey “Look at all this white concrete pretending to be ice” fake Hoth. I’d rather that a large ride (which takes me to a star destroyer) be hidden behind unique rock work than WDI make some vain attempt at a forced perspective Death Star. The MF is really iconic because that's the ship that has defied SW outside of thee prequels. Its the one constant you seen in both the OT and ST. I'm actually curious after Episode 9 will that be the last we see of it for a long time but I guess so since they are moving on to different eras.
Anyone who is making these coy arguments about how they should have built the greatest hits of the Star Wars planets as a theme park just isn’t thinking hard enough.
