News Zootopia and Moana Blue Sky concepts for Disney's Animal Kingdom

[BlakeW39]

Sucks that Disney is so severely lacking in creativity that they can’t come up with a suitable concept based on freaking DINOSAURS without an IP.

For real. It doesn't take a creative genius to make a land based on the 'age of the dinosaurs' appealing to park goers.

No way you can convince me the average Joe walking around DAK wants Zootopia more than dinosaurs. It's not about what what people want, people just want more attractions. It's about what Disney execs want, i.e. "brand" and "synergy," not what parks fans want....which is creativity, thematic direction, and quality.

 

[Skibum1970]

Sucks that Disney is so severely lacking in creativity that they can’t come up with a suitable concept based on freaking DINOSAURS without an IP.

I'm not sure if it is that or if they are too scared to take chances. If I were in Imagineering, I'd talk to some Disney film writers to come up with a good plotline for the ride. Not sure if it would work but they could use a different perspective. Based on how Epcot has been treated, they definitely believe that people will only ride IP-centered rides or they are too focused on selling film merchandise via the ride gift shops.

 

[seabreezept813]

For real. It doesn't take a creative genius to make a land based on the 'age of the dinosaurs' appealing to park goers.

No way you can convince me the average Joe walking around DAK wants Zootopia more than dinosaurs. It's not about what what people want, people just want more attractions. It's about what Disney execs want, i.e. "brand" and "synergy," not what parks fans want....which is creativity, thematic direction, and quality.

I can’t believe Zootopia trumps dinos. If there’s one movie my kids could care less about on DisneyPlus it’s Zootopia. And while it was entertaining, I also wouldn’t pick it to watch. I’m shocked it has a fan base.

 

[BlakeW39]

I'm not sure if it is that or if they are too scared to take chances. If I were in Imagineering, I'd talk to some Disney film writers to come up with a good plotline for the ride. Not sure if it would work but they could use a different perspective. Based on how Epcot has been treated, they definitely believe that people will only ride IP-centered rides or they are too focused on selling film merchandise via the ride gift shops.

ehhh....I don't think it has to do with them being scared to take chances. I just think it's current WDC priorities surrounding franchises and synergy. A new E-ticket is gonna be a major draw regardless of whether or not it's tied to an IP; just look at Everest. It's not really a 'risk' for them to build original attractions like I keep hearing people say. Like a movie not based on an IP could flop and lose money, a new attraction not based on an IP isn't gonna flop or lose money, most likely.

 

[Brer Panther]

*I know, I know - water and the environment blah, blah, blah but Moana wasn't about that. They talked about living with their environment in one song that was more about staying put (kind of like the Truman Show) than about the earth and ultimately, the water wasn't some natural resource to be protected - it was some magical living thing and the big conflict wasn't resolved by people learning to recycle, it was resolved by a demi-god learning to accept his value outside of praise and making atonement for bad actions by returning something to a god that he stole from it and a girl-power character standing up to her father and charting her own course and relating to a "goddess" which was labeled and misunderstood which is all fine - I thought it was a great movie - but it had about as much to do with the actual concepts of nature as the Jungle Cruise movie did... oh wait, she saved a baby sea turtle from being eaten by another natural animal... like happens as a part of nature - she got in the way of that so of course this is a movie about earth and nature or whatever - sorry, this rant was not directed at you!

**It's called Animal Kingdom - not Wild Kingdom, not Nature Kingdom but Animal Kingdom. They have walking trails where you can see Tigers and a ride that shows animals with an attempt to fake their natural habbitats. There are no trails devoted to plant sightings and no rides of full ecosystems the way there are in the Land pavilion. They do point out the big fake trees in the safari tour so I guess that's something but I don't think anyone is there to take in the cement trees with doors on the back sides.

THANK YOU.

they definitely believe that people will only ride IP-centered rides

Which is kind of baffling considering that non-IP rides like Soarin', Test Track, Spaceship Earth, Jungle Cruise, Big Thunder Mountain, and Expedition Everest still get long lines.

 

[Dinoman96]

It would be perfect man. There are so many directions you could go in for a third location-based DAK land. A Europe land semi-similar to Beastly Kingdomme. A Rapa Nui themed land with island/oceanic wildlife, or an Australian land with a mix or reef life and Australasian fauna. Or even a Latin American type land with fauna from Central and South America. I could go on. I want one so badly lmao

NOT
AN
IP

IPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP

 

[SpectreJordan]

Sucks that Disney is so severely lacking in creativity that they can’t come up with a suitable concept based on freaking DINOSAURS without an IP.

It's crazy they're not trying to top IOA's Jurassic Park land. I love that land & River Adventure; but the latter is starting to show its age, the land would too if it wasn't for Velocicoaster. There's not much more Universal could do there either because of how little land they have.

Disney could show up with an awesome dinosaur E-ticket full of crazy good animatronics. Completely blow Universal away when it comes to dinos. Buuuuut they won't.

 

[Tha Realest]

Sucks that Disney is so severely lacking in creativity that they can’t come up with a suitable concept based on freaking DINOSAURS without an IP.

Yes. But. Their competitors have a firm hold on that IP. It would be like Universal trying their hand at an attraction featuring prince-, er, female royal heirs. At this point I think dinosaurs are synonymous with Jurassic Park, and few other attempts have made much cultural penetration. The second best effort is kind of backdooring into it with Skull Island/Kong (also historically a Universal property)

 

[Mike S]

Yes. But. Their competitors have a firm hold on that IP. It would be like Universal trying their hand at an attraction featuring prince-, er, female royal heirs. At this point I think dinosaurs are synonymous with Jurassic Park, and few other attempts have made much cultural penetration. The second best effort is kind of backdooring into it with Skull Island/Kong (also historically a Universal property)

Plenty of Dinosaur stuff is made and sold that’s not tied to Jurassic Park, way more than Zootopia ever did.

If Disney made a ride equal to or greater than the Jurassic World ride in Beijing it would be a success.

 

[Bocabear]

At this point I would rather see Dinosaur either get a proper land and treatment completely replacing Chester and Hester, or become something completely different... Indiana Jones jungle Outpost, Moana's Rapa Nui, Mystic Point....Anything... The ride is stale, the land and Chester and Hester area are over-ripe for redevelopment....Now that Uni just debuted their Jurrasic Coaster, even having the originally planned Dino-themed coaster seems like a bad idea...Why not a water based ride system adventure flume thing wrapping the old Dino show building which could all be re-themed to a pre-Colombian temple and do a brand new exploration of the Indiana Jones ride...kind of like Pandora, it could offer a thrilling vehicle based ride and a new water based ride all in the same basic footprint creating a new "must Do" hub...something fresh to this park...and new.

 

[SpectreJordan]

I desperately want more Indy at WDW, but Animal Kingdom isn't the place for it. That series has nothing to do with animals or even nature. The only reason it seems like it'd fit is because a lot of the locales of the movies fit in with AK's Africa & Asia.

It'd fit in as well as Zootopia, aka it wouldn't. Indy would fit in with the look of AK more than Zootopia, but that's about it.

 

[Incomudro]

GMR being replaced by MMRR was definitely one of the dumbest ideas WDI's ever executed. Compared to GMR, MMRR has lower capacity, fits the park less, is shorter, and to top it all off seems to be cumulatively regarded as mediocre. What a wonderful way to waste, what, oh a couple hundred million dollars or so. Jesus, it's just baffling. Even if GMR had low guest scores, this wasn't the solution....like at all.

As an aside, I think TWDC's current refusal to maintain ride effects, show elements, AAs, etc. is absolutely disgusting. The amount of money they make and they still choose to actively reduce quality simply because they're big babies and don't want to spend money to actually keep attractions working properly. It's genuinely pathetic

Although I enjoyed MMRR, your second paragraph is so spot on.
This company is so far removed from what it was, and what it used to hold in high regard.

 

[Incomudro]

Lol ah yes, the 'Wall Street excuse,' which I have heard exactly 889777989 times.

The WDC has no problem looking out for their long term interests in other divisions, such as streaming, which obviously hurt the value of their stock. It's just the parks they treat like crap. How many people have blander memories from WDW due to rides not firing on all cylinders or with broken effects? Everest goes from a world class E-ticket to a rollercoaster on a mountain, hmm they got bigger rollercoasters at Universal. Let's go there instead. Smh.

They treat their classic films like crap, remaking them in horrid live action/cgi messes.
They have virtually zero creativity in films anymore.

 

[Incomudro]

I'd gladly take Zootopia in Hollywood Studios over Animal Kingdom. That park needs a lot more capacity as is.

It'd work in HS for sure.

 

[999th Happy Haunt]

DINOSAUR Attraction Continues to Struggle Ahead of Possible Zootopia Retheme at Animal Kingdom

Multiple animatronics are not working at the DINOSAUR attraction months before a possible Zootopia retheme could be announced

blogmickey.com

Ugh.

Blog Mickey seems to believe a retheme announcement will happen at Destination D23 in September.

 

[MagicHappens1971]

DINOSAUR Attraction Continues to Struggle Ahead of Possible Zootopia Retheme at Animal Kingdom

Multiple animatronics are not working at the DINOSAUR attraction months before a possible Zootopia retheme could be announced

blogmickey.com

Ugh.

Blog Mickey seems to believe a retheme announcement will happen at Destination D23 in September.

I wouldn’t be surprised if beyond big thunder in the Moana Zootopia expansion, are both announced. Maybe a nighttime parade as well

 

[Indy_UK]

You’re all hopeful, it will be a new cupcake

 

[Andrew C]

You’re all hopeful, it will be a new cupcake

Less icing this time...

 

[MisterPenguin]

Less icing this time...

OMG, you're already retheming the cupcakes!!

 

[BlakeW39]

You’re all hopeful, it will be a new cupcake

at this point I'd rather them just give us new cupcakes

large scale investment, at their hands, usually does more harm than good these days. crazy as it sounds.