jackskellington101

I still see Phase 2 of Harry Potter being the rest of Lost Continent, getting rid of Sindbad (eh), Poseidon (yay) and Mythos (boo), probably for something resembling Diagon Alley and probably resembling what the plans are for the Harry Potter at Universal Hollywood. Though my hopes are with all that it will become Sharktopus and the greatest thing known to man and alien, I think this is more for Transformers. Spielberg already dropped a couple months back when talking about Transformers for Singapore and CA that an Orlando one should be announced soon, and I think the space for Jaws is enough space for the show building they'd want to build. I think the choice was between Jaws and ET and Jaws just had the space needed, though I have a gut feeling ET is next...

Done and done. I really loved Mainland Europe and The New Hottness tours, with China and Italy also piquing interest. Damn you funds! Why must you be so low?!?

Daaaaaaaaaaaaaamn right on that "really nice Disney resorts" part. And someone beat me to the punch that Russel is digesting the blackened soul of Facebook a$$hat.

"Explain the options" = We don't have the money anymore. This will only get messier. Oof, what a total debacle. At least Prince Desmond was honest.

Come on Wagamama. I'd totally want that at the Wharf. It's a good way to solve the problem of Downtown being dead, but it's evident that they have no interest in recapturing the audience PI once had.

I just rode the Summer Nightastic overlay for WDW's Tower. I will say now, I'm going to go blow by blow for the whole experience (for a reason I'll get to) so if you want to be surprised, gloss over or plug your ears and eyes and go "LALALALALA" for a while. The beginning walk up is about the same. The music is much clearer and the lobby looks great. Not much different here. In the Library, the lightning and lighting effects were far more drastic, complete with the window in great sync. Then the fun really began. They totally reworked the sound and lighting design in load, making the load station even darker than it was and that boiler room really creepy. Like "Freddy's going to leap out and kill me" creepy. The sounds of a disembodied child laughing and the faint sounds of a really massive storm outside didn't help. Then it happened. What's "it"? Well, at what seemed to be pretty random intervals, all the generators for the service elevators stopped and then a loud "bzzap" signaled all of the lights (except for the ones directly over the load for what I can only think safety reasons) went dead for about 3-4 seconds. I'll admit, that did startle me for a moment, a definite noticeable change if you are in that "I know what's going on" mode. We piled into the service elevator and things began. The shaft is significantly darker with some different audio playing on the way up (you'll see that's a theme). Then the doors open to the hallway, as normal. The lightning struck outside the window and a blinding flash happens in the room. Ooooook. Thematic, or so I thought. Everything works as before, looks the same, the star-field looks great, doors close. Now here comes the big one. The doors open up again to...a star-field. Yep. No 4th dimension room. The elevator lurches forward, as usual, down the star-field hallway. The windows and walls on both sides have been covered up by a very obvious black curtain with stars and the hallway is eerily silent, from what I remember. And that's the best way to describe it. It's a hallway and feels like nothing more than that. Then, as the elevator centers itself, the end of the hallway changes to show...a mirror. Everyone who knows their Tower of Terrors knows where this is going. Yes, it is the exact same effect from the California/Tokyo/Paris versions of Tower, just this one is with a still image taken of the elevator car (note the flash from before). As the elevator continues through the door to the drop shaft, there is a very cool effect of the sound of broken glass (or mirror) and then 1930s era music playing over the Rod Serling narration. Playing over it enough that you can barely hear it anymore, to make it you plowed through the mirror and back into the night that the original 5 got zapped into the Twilight Zone. The drop sequence was air-time filled, but there wasn't anything that was overwhelmingly different to my memory. By that time, I had already face-palmed due to the loss of the 4th dimension room. For some reason, this really irked me. I know the current plan is to homogenize the experience with the Disney Parks with the "One Disney" plan, ensuring that a guest will experience the same experience no matter what Disney Park they go to, but that is achieved by sacrificing the identities of the individual parks themselves. I know the first draw of "it's Disney" doesn't matter what park you go to, but there has to be something else to draw guests to a certain property. If you make it all the same, then why would a guest from CA want to come to WDW? It's segmenting your audience by providing identical experiences to each coast, a process which may hurt in the long run. It's also with every change, WDW feels more and more like the red headed stepchild. I'm very proud of WDW, for obvious reasons, and it really hurts me to see it's identity slowly being pushed aside and the things that make it unique being turned into everything else. If I was in California, I'd feel the same way about DL, I'm sure. I walked out of the Tower, these thoughts running through my head and feeling generally disappointed and let down. Luckily, it's only temporary. I apologize if this turned a little ranty. I'm a nerd (obviously, I'm here) and I think about this stuff.

If memory serves correctly, I think Hersheypark had a mini Himalaya at one point in time. I want to say it was also in Carousel/Founder's Circle, but don't quote me on that. Fun TR! It's really neat to find those old gems out there.

^ Then consider my jealousy NOTED.

Though I don't speak Japanese, I do know what Fuji-Q means. I saw this on YouTube today and felt it very appropriate for the TPR audience. If my interpretation is correct, this is a Fuji-Q advertisement (or parody, I honestly can't tell) utilizing a Fuji-Q themed Super Sentai (a.k.a. the Power Rangers) group. Now if only the park was actually this entertaining...

Begin the Aladdin being removed from WDW rumors now...

It's been a long time since I've been there, but when I went I put Oblivion on the multi-ride list too. Yeah, it's short, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and mini-marathoned it and Nemesis. The gimmick search style of marketing isn't exclusive to just Alton, but Merlin Entertainments seem to really try for it more than most, between Alton and Thorpe, looking at Thirteen this year and Saw last year. It's a very risky venture and one that seems to burn really fast.

Ahh, life is good if I can get a good game of pinball. My go-to favorites would be The Addams Family machine and The Twilight Zone machine, though those are getting harder and harder to find in what little arcades are left. Down here at WDW, we mainly have the Pirates of the Caribbean machine (of course), but if you look around there's some verity around the different resort arcades and at Tomorrowland Light and Power, mainly Stern machines like World Poker Tour, RollerCoaster Tycoon, NASCAR, and the newer Indiana Jones machine (which has the easiest 8 ball multi-ball ever). The exception being Tomorrowland Light and Power which also has the two Pinball 2000 games from Williams/Midway (Revenge from Mars in 3D and Star Wars: Episode 1, neither of which last I played worked very well) and, oddly, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (a Sega machine with the greatest play-field music ever of Edgar Winter Group).

They seem to be really trying to mirror what Disney does with the DCL, but with a traditional cruising twist. I'm very interested to see what the first reports from the Epic are like. It looks like a really good ship experience to me.

I think Robb's quote of looks to be pretty on the money. I think once the landscaping gets in there and grows up a bit, it'll be even more interesting. Is it the biggest most thrilling ride in the world? No, but it's interesting and looks like a blast. It might suffer from being a little over-hyped, but as long as it's fun, that's what matters.

For me, growing up in the DC Metro area, I can totally see your point of view. Ashley, on the other hand, growing up in the Northwest totally misses the "nicer people" and "better drivers" from her home.