Disney News and Information — by fans, for fans

I can pretty much pinpoint the exact moment when food prices for sit down restaurants at Walt Disney World elevated beyond the reach of my budget. It was just following the first off-season offering of the free meal plan with your Walt Disney World vacation.

Prices rose along with the increased demand and, many feel, that the quality went down in inverse proportion. Oh, we tried to continue our occasional fine dining experience, but the value for the dollar was just no longer there for us who remember what it was like when prices were reasonable, reservations available, and food quality still the tops. Eventually, we just gave up eating at sit down restaurants all together.

The hard fact is Disney hasn’t really missed us at all. They’ve increased the prices and the demand for dining is as high as ever. In fact, demand for more dining is a large part of what’s behind the closing of the night clubs at Pleasure Island and planned addition of more eateries.

Thankfully, throughout this mess there have been a few Disney restaurants where the value for the dining dollar still exists. Yes, they’re at the top of the line in terms of price. But for a special occasion they’re worth it. The New York Times takes a look at four of those establishments; Jiko, Flying Fish Cafe, California Grill, and Victoria & Albert’s. Set your mouth to watering now.

I spent a long day at the Magic Kingdom Saturday. Summer crowds were evident, but it wasn’t oppressive. If anything it might have been a little lighter than usual. But that may be related to changed vacation patterns with the holiday weekend coming up.

Sadly, the park appears to be cutting back on some of the simplest maintenance. Many attractions were covered in litter. Splash Mountain was particularly bad with water bottles and gum on nearly every surface. We went on Splash 5 minutes after opening too, so there was no excuse not to clean up during the over night shift.

Ended the night with a viewing of Spectromagic. They’ve slowly been upgrading this old parade and last night I noticed a ton of new costumes. It’s still a great parade, but it could use some additional sprucing up and perhaps a new float or two. Technology has advanced so far since when it was created, you know there is some out of this world stuff they could be doing.

I’ve put a few photos down below and more up on Flickr for your browsing pleasure.

[Read more →]

Yesterday we took my daughter to see Wall-E. I wasn’t sure if it was going to be a little intense for a 2 year old, so we watched a few of the trailers and vignettes of our robotic friend online before we left. My daughter was laughing and giggling throughout each one. By the time we got to the movie theater and claimed our free Wall-E watch (for being the first crazies to go to a movie at 10 in the morning?) she was saying “Waaalll-eeee” with the best of them.

Before the movie began, apart from the popcorn and the shock that the theater was full at 10am, I was ENTHRALLED with the the short cartoon before the feature presentation. It’s one of my favorite things about Pixar movies. But, I think this short might be the best yet. It was straight up old-school cartoon slapstick humor about a magician trying to pull a rabbit out of his hat. I’m giggling just thinking about it. (And that bunny might be one the cutest CGI characters I’ve ever seen.)

Then Wall-E began…First, let me say, I’ve never done a movie review before. I stick to tv recaps where I can gush about each and every line and scene. But when it comes to movies, I hate knowing the ending. I don’t even watch trailers because I don’t want to know ANYTHING about it. I love the surprise! That being said, I’ll try to give you a little something without spoiling it, ok?

The plot.
The world is trashed. Literally. So trashed that everyone has moved off the planet to a five-year intergalactic cruise until a group of robots called “wall-e” (Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth-Class) has cleaned up the trash. Well, something went wrong and 700 years later, ala Gilligan, the world’s inhabitants are still cruising, the earth is still trashed and only one Wall-E remains. Our little Wall-E.

Wall-E is a cutie pie little robot who collects fun trash (rubix cubes, Christmas lights, Zippos and spare parts galore), loves Hello Dolly (he likes to watch it via his ipod and VCR) while continuing his directive of cleaning up earth. One day a huge spaceship lands and lets off one little information-gathering-robot named Eve. (Or as Wall-E says, “Eeevvaa.”)

I think Wall-E is instantly in love with our fact-finding-bot, but Eve is a little too concerned with her mission to start a relationship with this trash compactor on wheels. (Oh, I’m dying to tell you what happens!) So, when she completes her mission (whew!), she is transported back to the mother-ship, which just happens to be the Axiom, where our old earth inhabitants are living.

Our earthlings are apparently living it up—they have everything they need. They are now transported along by hover chairs, feasting on food in a cup and they experience everything via a virtual screen constantly in front of their eyes. They all look like giant dough boys and could care less about doing anything for themselves.

Wall-E hitches a ride on the spaceship to be with Eve and chaos ensues. Ahem. I think that’s all I can say. Except for the ending is happy.

The Characterization.
This is what makes Disney/Pixar so great. We love a cowboy doll, a colony of ants and a cooking rat because of their characters, not their computer animation (although, seriously, the CGI was amazing).

Here are my two favorites:

Wall-E was absolutely adorable. I immediately loved him. He was quirky, sweet and lovable. Even while being square dirty and unable to talk! When he was dancing along to Hello Dolly and using a trash can lid (or was it a hubcap?) as a hat, I could have eaten him with a spoon! Wall-E’s words were few (try about 2). The first half was simply Wall-E and Eve saying their names. But the lack of dialogue added to their charm.

MO. The cleaning bot. He was the funniest, cutest little guy! At one point, he’s got the choice to get off his path and follow the dirt he needs to clean, or stay on his path and ignore the dirt. He agonizes over it! But for the rest of the movie, watch what he does! Hilarious!

The message.
Love the planet. Recycle. Keep it clean. Stop being a consumer. Get off your easy chair and DO SOMETHING.

It was a major statement about the environment. I usually don’t get into “statement” movies, but I thought this one was strong without being pushy. It didn’t seem political, just normal everyday don’t-be-a-litter-bug type stuff. (With the exception of the President; his company began with the letters BU and ended with RGE. Which they kept showing right by his head. Remind you of anything?)

The rest of the message was really about love. It was about giving up yourself and doing something for others and by default for the whole world. I thought it was perfect.

For the moms.
My two year old liked it. It wasn’t scary. There wasn’t really any violence. It was more intense–mostly explosions, like spaceships taking off and robots being exploded. The most risqué part was Wall-E finding a bra and putting it on his eyes like glasses. And Wall-E and Eve share a little electricity (you know, a kiss).

For the Pixar/Disney Fans.
I love when the animators throw in little easter eggs to the audience. I think Pixar is pretty notorious for doing it—well, so is Disney with all their Hidden Mickeys. I just KNEW there would be something in Wall-E’s trash stash, but just couldn’t find anything! I guess my eyes weren’t quick enough. But after scouring the internet, I saw that Rex and Ham from Toy Story make an appearance. So, look close for them.

Then, of course, the Pizza Planet truck from Toy Story was in a landfill that Eve scanned. I was excited when I noticed that one! Let me know in the comments if you found any others. (And yes, I did see the Mac shout-outs…)

Oh, and the credits! The first half was the epilogue! The second half was like watching an old video game. (Sorry, I’m not a geek enough to know the style…it just reminded me of the arcade games I played at the bowling alley when I was a kid!) And if you stay till the very very end, you’ll get one tiny little laugh. (It’s not an out-take, but still funny.)

In Conclusion.
I adored it. Disney/Pixar never disappoints but going in I wasn’t excited about a robot-sci-fi movie as I was about cowboy dolls or tropical fish. But little Wall-E won me over.

Just grab the whole family and go see it, you’ll be saying “Waaalll-eee” for the next week, I guarantee!

(& my blog, ohamanda.com)

From almost at the beginning of that period when Walt Disney was envisioning how his little part to be known as Disneyland would come together there was a Haunted Mansion. At one point it was located on Main Street, in another in Adventureland.

Disney Artist and Imagineer Sam McKim had done a concept art drawing for the project when it was still going to be a walk-through attraction. If you ever wondered what that building would look like had it been built, Joe over at the Disneyland 3D blog has been working hard to make that dream a reality.

The Ghost Relations Department has a guest post from Joe with marvelous renderings and amazing detail of this work in progress. You may notice this version is a little more rundown than the one inside Disneyland today. That’s because Walt hadn’t yet made his decision to keep the outside clean with all the ghosts on the inside.

One thing is true, almost anything those old masters worked on in Imagineering could still be built in a theme park today.

It’s hot everywhere and it’s a good day just to take it easy. With that in mind, here is some recent Disney news to explore:

• WALL-E had a strong Friday and Saturday and now appears to be on the path to a $63 million box office for the weekend. That is somewhat over the industry’s $50 million expectation and a bit better than the Chinese Panda’s opening. /Film has collected a list of Easter Eggs and hidden gems in Pixar’s WALL-E. If you’ve seen the film, go see if you caught them all. Then go back to see the ones you’ve missed and help keep the box office numbers of for next weekend too. Already there’s a buzz for “best picture Oscar” for WALL-E too.
• There’s now a petition to save the Adventurer’s Club at Walt Disney World’s Downtown Disney dining and entertainment complex. It’s been up for less than a day and already nearly 1000 signatures have been added. Go add yours and send a message to the Mouse House that closing the club should not be an option.
• Future Travelers to Orlando will find their flight options limited. Many airlines have cut routes or reduced flights into and out of the tourism mecca. Good thing the US has that high speed bullet train network up and running finally. Oh wait, you mean nothing has been done to improve our transportation infrastructure for the last eight years?
• TreeHugger.com is a bit disappointed in the new Disneyland Dream Home. Not for the reasons you might think, however.
• A 17-year old was struck and killed by The Batman roller coaster at Six Flags Over Georgia. It’s a tragedy for all involved and my condolences to his family. However, when you climb over two fences and past a half-dozen warning signs, you’re the one at fault.
• Finally, please take a look at my current selection of eBay auctions. Seven end tonight. Most of them are Disney related. Your support helps The Disney Blog and you get something collectible in return.

Positive Reviews for Pixar’s WALL-E are coming in faster than anyone can really keep up with now that the movie has hit the big screen across the nation. Every minute another dozen twitters about the movie are posted and the buzz continues to grow.

• There’s a great review by Dennis West of the Groundling’s Review - “The wonderful part of this movie is how the simple fact of Wall-E’s presence impacts every person he comes in contact with, and changes them all in very positive ways.”
• /Film chimes in with it’s WALL-E review. “Andrew Stanton has created a masterpiece on the same level as recent classics like There Will Be Blood, The Departed, Pan’s Labyrinth and Children of Men.” I think they liked it.
• Stephanie Fox over on the excellent Sci-fi blog IO9 has created this great chart called “The Measure Of A Robot” that places WALL-E and EVE among the pantheon of famous tv and movie robots.
• Keith Emerson writes an open letter to Disney Executives begging them to continue to give Pixar free reign to create masterpieces like WALL-E.
• Forbes makes a good point, that Pixar is continuing to deliver for Disney at the box office and at the retail register.

This just in from Walt Disney World. They’ve sent along more details of their bold new vision for making Downtown Disney even more family friendly and removing all of the more adult-targeted entertainment.

Some thing to note, it looks like the ‘Pleasure Island’ name may stick around, although I imagine the final decision has yet to be made on that.

Finally, they explicitly don’t mention “The Adventurer’s Club” in the press release. That tells me they’re waiting to see if there is sufficient desire from the public to save the unique themed experience. So get the letter writing campaigns and websites launched if you want to save it for future generations.

Of course there is always the rumor that “The Adventurer’s Club” will be moved and used as part of the new boutique park “Night Kingdom”, or whatever they’re calling these days.

Update: well this FAQ on the Pleasure Island official page says that Adventurer’s Club will be closing. It also says that in lieu of admission to Pleasure Island they’ll be substituting a round of golf at Disney’s Oak Trail Golf Course… hmmm.

Additional details below the cut:

Previously: Pleasure Island to Close its Night Clubs.
[Read more →]

Back on April 16th DisneyGossip.com reported that Pleasure Island would soon be closing its clubs while Disney implemented a new family friendly feel for the whole general Downtown Disney Area. Today Disney finally made the official announcement.

Put September 27th down on your Calendar as the last night to party at all six of downtown Disney’s Night Clubs. BET SoundStage Club, Mannequins Dance Palace, 8Trax, Rock’n'Roll Beach Club, Comedy Club, and that other one will be closed after the summer rush is over.

So far no word if Adventurer’s Club will remain open, but an Orlando Sentinel article says that most of the non-nightclub businesses will remain open, so there is hope.

Disney claims to be looking world wide for good properties that will offer the right mix of shopping, dining, and entertainment for the area. Can you think of any that might work? For instance, My wife wants to stake firsties for the right to put in a Starbucks franchise in the revised version of Downtown Disney.

Update: More Details on what’s coming to Downtown Disney.

Try not to get excited, but the BOLT trailer looks amazing!

The rumor a few years ago was that Anheuser-Busch was shopping around their theme park properties known collectively known as “Worlds of Discovery”. Only problem was NBC/Universal was doing the same thing and no one was looking seriously at either. As it turns out, both sets of theme parks were profitable, and with a little more investment, they’ve become even more profitable. So the sales were off the table for a bit.

Now Anheuser-Busch, the parent company of Busch Entertainment’s Worlds of Discovery is preparing itself for a possible sale. I think they’d prefer private equity (think Chrysler) but there’s a chance they’ll be sold to international beverage mega-corp, InBev. As part of this, they’re looking at shedding side business lines that aren’t related to the core beverage products. That, despite their incredible promotional appeal, would include theme parks.

I am very worried that SeaWorld and Busch’s animal conservation programs would suffer under any new owner. AB did a ton of great work in this area over the years that went above and beyond even what the themeparks could provide. Also any new owner would need to be able to make the sort of capital investments that are required to stay competitive in the tough tourist markets where World’s of Discovery are located.

The Orlando Sentinel has more on the possible deal.