The event was a rousing, unmitigated success. Despite the inconvenience caused by the early closing that night, fans were able to sit and catch a glimpse of their favorite stars, and a lucky bunch (who donated $1000 to the Boys and Girls Club of Los Angeles) got to attend the premiere.As if this wasn't enough, Disneyland will be following this up on June 2nd with the grand opening of Ariel's Undersea Adventure (not due at Walt Disney World until fall 2012), and then the next day will be the first day of their Soundsational Summer, the name given to this year's annual summer promotion. Among the offerings, a new parade(yes, Disneyland gets ANOTHER new daytime parade, while Walt Disney World has been showing a variation on the same parade for 15 years now) called Mickey's Soundsational Parade, featuring Mickey leading a drumline. The parade is getting all new floats, not the recycled floats that Walt Disney World has peddled on guests since the 25th anniversary. (Want to see evidence - Click Here to see pictures of the WDW floats that have been in use for years)
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| Concept art for Mickey's Soundsational Parade |
Across the Esplenade at California Adventure, their enormously popular nighttime dance/street party returns, this time with a Tron theme, to be called ElecTRONica.
These special offerings are paired with the premiere of Star Tours: The Adventure Continues (which will actually open in Walt Disney World first, for a change), the return of the (outstanding) Magical fireworks (featuring a soundtrack performed by the superb Eden Espinosa), twice nightly performances of Fantasmic, American Bandstand (a showcase for local bands), and the continuation of the barely a year old World of Color. If the past is any indication, all of these events and parties will be a rousing success, done exceptionally well, of a high quality, and make guests happy. Why? Because it's Disneyland, and their management team GETS it.But, let's head southeast to Disney's flagship resort, Walt Disney World, where things are decidely less rosey. Their management team, led by the incompetent Meg 'In-over-her-head' Crofton (And I thought my middle name was bad: Mike.) has decided not to bring back their summer series this year, which last summer was not only enormously popular, but enormously expensive. Instead of the Summer Nighttastic Fireworks (the most impressive pyrotechnic show WDW has ever done), it'll just be Wishes this summer, as it is every night. There will be no new parades, or even a return of an old favorite, like there was last year. Instead they'll continue to ride the wave of The Magic, The Memories, and You, which to be fair is simply outstanding. The show premiered in February and was a triumph for Walt Disney Imagineering. The problem is, Crofton and her cronies are complacent. Rather than building on the show's success, they're content to sit back and watch the cash roll-in. Which brings us to a key difference between Disneyland and Walt Disney World, and specifically their management teams. The folks at Disneyland understand that you have to spend money in order to make money. They are constantly swapping out entertainment offerings, creating new shows, new fireworks, new EVERYTHING. Not the case at Walt Disney World. Let's look at an example. Walt Disney World has used a variation of the same daytime parade for over a decade- Share a Dream Come True/Celebrate a Dream Come True/Disney Dreams Come True, etc. The "revisions" have been nothing more than some slight changes to the sountrack, and the swapping out of some characters here and there. However, the floats are virtually in tact. In the time that this parade has been playing, Disneyland's Magic Kingdom has had 5 completely new parades.
Another example. Both Disneyland and Walt Disney World show Fantasmic nightly. Same name, so there should be no difference, right? Wrong! Disneyland's Fantasmic is superior in every way, right down to both shows' climactic scene where Maleficent turns into a dragon. At Walt Disney World, the dragon is simply a head on a giant stick with a curtain dangling from it:
The dragon in Disneyland is an 80 foot tall, fire breathing animatronic dragon that appears to rise out of the water. Take a look at him: If you don't think the differences between the two dragons have a huge effect on the overall quality of the show, then watch videos of both shows. You'll see just what the fully animatronic dragon does for the show.
Disneyland's version of the show also features an animatronic Ursula, who appears to rise up from the depths of the sea. She is soon joined by Flotsam and Jetsom, who weave through the water. At Disney World they use a projection for this sequence.
In Disneyland's Peter Pan sequence (which exists instead of the hideous Pocahontas sequence at WDW), Captain Hook is menaced by a large crocodile that weaves through the water.
When asked about the possibility of the animatronic dragon (nicknamed Murphy) being incorporated into the Walt Disney World version of the attraction, Meg could supply nothing more than a snarky comment about how Disney World's dragon "works every single night", a rather poor allusion to the maintenance problems that delayed the arrival of Murphy to the Disneyland show.
And the list goes on and on. I could fill this post with examples of how things are just done "better" in Disneyland than in Disney World. From holiday decorations to attraction refurbs, to live shows, it just all seems to be done with more care in Disneyland.
The obvious next question than would be, "why?" Disney World brings in more money annually than Disneyland does, so shouldn't they be getting more "love," so to speak? Now that I've laid the argument out for you, in part 2 of my rant, we'll discuss the reasons why this inequity occurs. Stay tuned...
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