robbalvey

The lap-bar only Boomerang. Hopefully the comments here won't be as horrible as the ones on YouTube which is pretty much just the wasteland of humanity these days... Now... POST YOUR COMMENTS!

I'm glad I'm not the only one. Seriously, I feel the lands looks amazing and the rides are pretty good (I wish they were a bit less screens and more action, but that's just me) but they really outcast people who aren't familiar with the material. It's a shame...

This is exactly correct. I absolutely *HATE* the way Universal makes non-Potter fans feel like their are morons when they step into their lands and when you try to ask someone "what does this mean" they basically tell you in the Potterest of ways "Oh, wow, you're a fucking idiot for not knowing. Why did you even come into this land you stupid muggle???" Whereas with Pandora, I have still not seen the movie and I knew absolutely NOTHING about any of the characters or the storyline, in fact I actually knew less about Avatar than I did about Harry Potter the first time entering that area. The land is welcoming and their demeanor is to "teach" assuming everyone that enters is stepping into the world of Pandora for the first time. I know now what a Na'vi is and how to say Hello and "Rise to the challenge" in whatever language they speak on Pandora! lol I only know what a "muggle" is because after being called one over and over and couldn't actually get any of the "team members" in Potterland to tell me, I just Googled it. And my first thought on that day was "Wow, maybe if the people in this land could have actually TOLD ME instead of treating me like an idiot and having to go Google it myself, I might actually appreciate this more and want to know more about the property, but instead I'm totally turned off by it." Seriously ever since that day I've had a bad taste towards Potterland because I feel they treat it like a secret club or something. "Leave and go read a book and come back when you're not a Muggle" is the attitude I get from it. And I can't stand that. And I get it, they are supposed to be "in character", but the problem is to someone that doesn't know those characters is that they don't come off in-character, funny, or "mysterious" they honestly just come off as assholes. And from a story-telling aspect don't even get me started on some of the stupid crap in Potterland. I had one of the team members come up to me while I was taking a picture and try to "pretend" that they didn't know what a cell phone was. But then their nametag clearly says "Julie from Davenport Florida" and her favorite movie is "Ghostbusters." Like, "really Julie from Davenport, Florida, you don't know what a cell phone is?" They could have at least given the Potter people Potter nametags that fit within the story of the land if they are going to have people "in character" come up and tell me stuff that you don't believe already, but makes it even harder to believe when their favorite Universal movie is staring at you in the face. Oh, and explain to me again why you can't have Coca-Cola in London but you can have Boddington's beer? Yeah, I think I'll stick to the areas outside of Potter land... While I know Star Wars more than I know Potter, I'm also not the biggest Star Wars fan either. I'm going to hope you are right that it will be a mix of the two. Clearly Avatar, while still being the world's #1 highest grossing movie, didn't stick with people as well as franchises like Potter, Star Wars, and Marvel does. So obviously going into Star Wars land, more people are going to be in the know, but I run into people all the time that are either very casual Star Wars fans, or know little about it. Even myself, I've only seen 4 out of the 6 Star Wars movie and the last one I actually have only seen on an airplane! lol I'd have to think that Disney will do their best to try to capture those people and turn them into fans, instead of insulting them and turning them away like Potter does. Honestly I went into Potter with a completely open mind, and the creative behind the land killed it for me, and ever since I've never been able to be a fan. But, you know...as a non fan there was always at least Dueling Dragons to ride! Oh, wait...

And this is part of the issue I have with it personally. Not only am I not a Harry Potter fan, but I'm also not a fan of the way Universal presents the property. IMO, I feel as though they have a perfect outlet to introduce the property to someone that is not a fan or knows little about it, so that they could then BECOME interested in the stories, but instead they do the opposite. They assume everyone entering the lands has read the books or seen the movies, and anyone who isn't in the know they treat like an idiot. (Don't even get me started on my whole "what is a Muggle" experience.) Universal's presentation of the property has actually made me LESS interested in knowing anything about the property! And this begins my rant for another time where I feel that the Harry Potter lands have been the downfall for Universal to anyone who isn't a fan of the property. Not anymore, but pre-2010, people did. Lots of people. Potter killed part of what Universal was, and I will never quite forgive them for that. We used to go to Universal ALL THE TIME and even stay on property almost as much as we did Disney from 1999 - 2009. But ever since 2010, I'm not sure we've actually stayed on Universal property once. The shift in focus of the park just doesn't appeal to us, and instead of complaining about it, because I get that we are in the minority, we just choose to visit other parks instead. I agree 100% - and I fully get why it's going away and really, I'm fine with it. I'm not one of these people who will get sad or defensive over a ride leaving if it makes sense for the park, and this makes a lot of sense. Case in point: you're a coaster nerd and if you are "OK" with arguably one of the world's best roller coasters leaving for more Harry Potter stuff then that shows the weight that property has with it's fans, and you can't argue with that!

The reality is going to be that most people in the roller coaster community would rather have dragons than ANYTHING that isn't dragons. Let's be honest here... Dueling Dragons was made at a time when B&M was doing ballsy, forceful rides that were pushing the intensity and creative envelope. And even though Dragons doesn't duel anymore, it's still probably in the top 5 of B&M inverted coasters. Losing that and being replaced with ANYTHING is going to be a blow to the coaster community. BUT... it's no secret that Dragons has not been a success for the Harry Potter lands and even JK herself isn't thrilled by it (pun intended) and as sad as that is, that's the reality of the situation. When was the last time we lost a "top ten" steel coaster? Fire Dragon one once ranked the #9 steel coaster in the world by Mitch Hawker's Poll. It seems absurd to me that a park would want to just throw away one of the world's best ranked roller coasters that STILL to this day runs AWESOME! Seriously, a night ride on Fire Dragon is STILL balls out insane! And they want to tear that down? What??? I can't be the only one who feels this way, right?

To be honest, I don't think they really need to do anything. I mean, from a guest perspective, most guests don't even know the the names of each rides let alone the theming. I can't tell you how many times I've heard guests refer to Space Mountain as "the white one" or Big Thunder Mountain as "Big Foot Mountain" so really, I think it will be just fine the way it is! lol I feel like the rumor mill has been so crazy on the whole Tron/GotG/Ratatouille/Beauty & The Beast rides that at this point I'm only going to believe anything when we see an announcement. All I know is that the amount of new attractions going into the park from like 2010 onwards is CRAZY and I don't think we've seen this much development since the late 80s when Studios/Typhoon/PI all went in, and that's a GREAT thing!

Why? I mean they have two "mine trains" in the same park! Are you really complaining about another potential awesome coaster in Magic Kingdom!?!?!? #dumb Seeing as Tron is one of the most awesome coasters Disney has ever made, anyone who complains about it replacing small go-karts shouldn't be allowed to ride it... I guess I won't be allowed to ride it then. Rides like the speedway are theme park staples. So that's why parks like Tokyo Disneyland, Hong Kong Disneyland, and now Magic Kingdom are removing them? Man, it sure would be nice to have less stupid people on our forums...

Why? I mean they have two "mine trains" in the same park! Are you really complaining about another potential awesome coaster in Magic Kingdom!?!?!? #dumb

Same.

I think most people watch these shows and think "oh, it must be so much fun to do them" and I guess if you're just there as a "rider" it is, but when you're on a show as more than that, it can be a bit frustrating just like any other "job" can be. Case in point - the shoot at Nagashima Spaland. The show wanted to meet up with us since TPR was going to be on tour at the park anyway doing filming. The production company brought in a second unit to also do filming. The guy who was in charge of the production unit (another American guy) spent nearly two hours trying to rig up the cameras onto Steel Dragon refusing to listen to anything we suggested. That completely ate into the ERT session that we actually paid for as part of our tour. After all was said and done, we removed their cameras from the ride, I rigged up my cameras in about five minutes and we were off and running. What you see on the show was the footage I shot. Thankfully the park, being amazing Japanese people that they are, saw that the production company had ate into our time and gave us some extra ride time that morning, along with getting on Ultra Twister and I believe even brought some people through the "Fast Pass" entrance later that day. This was the struggle I had on many shoots with the show. They brought in people who had zero knowledge of how to shoot footage on a coaster, they didn't want to listen to an outside "consultant" most likely because they were paid to come in and film, and if they needed to be told by someone else how to do it, why would they get paid again to come shoot, right? The attitudes of most of the production companies I had to deal with was horrible, and all I was doing was trying to make their footage look better. At the end of the day I ended up basically just doing my own thing and in 100% of those cases, the footage that was used was the stuff I shot. It's frustrating. I would consider myself an "expert" at filming roller coasters as I don't believe there is a single other person in the world who has shot professional footage on as many rides as I have. But all the production companies that we worked with were pretentious and rude and felt they could "do it better" and all the footage they would shoot looked like absolute garbage. So was it "fun?" I mean, sure, I guess if you consider that it's a "job" and it's a job that is more fun that let's say lifting heavy objects. Would I do it again? Probably, mainly because I can't stand to see crappy roller coaster footage on TV when I know how to do it better.

She's not lying...

Well, one could argue there is also a Toy Story ride in Magic Kingdom and one at Hollywood Studios (with more on the way.) Not saying I prefer one over the other, but Ratatouille just turned ten years old a few days ago, and it doesn't seem like it's a property that stands out to most guests the way Beauty & The Beast does. Either way, the more Disney characters in Epcot the better!

It was work.

In case you haven't noticed, there are a lof of things that "don't make sense" in this business! I'm not saying I think you're wrong, I just wanted to point out that fun little factoid!

And here's a POV of Dragon Gliders thanks to CoasterFEV!

No I meant some of those images that look really weird. Are they pictures of slides or something?

Great! Let us know how it goes!

What are we actually looking at here?

I have to be honest, it sounds like you guys have kind of answered your own questions. Being in So Cal your only options are: Disney, Universal, Knotts, SeaWorld, Legoland. So I would at least give each one of those parks a courtesy visit to see if it's worth going back to. Really, though, sounds like you guys are just Disney fans.

I'm honestly really indifferent to it. As you mentioned, I'm not the biggest Pirates fan as it is and really only ride it when I'm with someone who is in town and hasn't been on it in a while. I'd say it's the "E Ticket Attraction" I ride the least here at WDW (and I prefer the WDW version because it's shorter.) Personally, my vote would be to rip out all the old versions and put in the Shanghai version. Sure, there would be people freaking out about it at first, but then after the ride the new version their complains would quickly go away.

And keep in mind the perspective in that video. The castle is about 180 feet tall, and it appears as a tiny speck towards the middle bottom of the video. The fireworks they shoot up all around the lagoon from probably at least 10-12 different locations spanning close to a mile between the furthest launch locations, are MASSIVE! It's quite an incredible sight to stand back and watch!

The grand finale of the 4th of July Fireworks at Walt Disney World is incredible! We watched from the Polynesian Resort on July 3rd as they run the same show on the 3rd and the 4th every year. They only do these "perimeter" fireworks a couple of times a year, and in the video you can see the tiny castle off in the background and the HUGE FIREWORKS all around the lagoon! It's one of the most impressive shows that Walt Disney World puts on every year!

OK, now that I've handed out a few forum bans and cleaned up this thread a little bit let me just make one thing perfectly clear... If you feel the need to come on our forum and be a horrible obnoxious person to our other members, especially respected members who have been on this forum for a very long time, you will find yourself no longer welcome to post here. This is theme parks we are talking about. If you are taking things so seriously that you cannot control yourself and can't be a decent human, we don't want you on our forums. Have I made myself clear? Thanks for your understanding.

The grand finale of the 4th of July Fireworks at Walt Disney World is incredible! We watched from the Polynesian Resort on July 3rd as they run the same show on the 3rd and the 4th every year. They only do these "perimeter" fireworks a couple of times a year, and in the video you can see the tiny castle off in the background and the HUGE FIREWORKS all around the lagoon! It's one of the most impressive shows that Walt Disney World puts on every year!

So DisneyQuest closed forever tonight. Let me express how sad this makes me... . . . OK, I'm done. There are a group of people holding a funeral for DisneyQuest. We found the five people who care! lol Rest in Peace DairyQueen....