Details. Details. Details. Disneyland is all about the details. One might think when starting a project from scratch that uniformity is key to telling a narrative story. When I cut a video, I need to make sure that all the graphics flow, fonts match, sizes match and are aesthetically pleasing. The key to my work is not to be noticed. Disney took this to the next level when creating a park with many different lands, messages, and simultaneous stories.
Today, I’d like to point out the amazing signage at the park. In just under 20 minutes, I captured so many different signs in the park. From Tomorrowland restrooms to New Orleans Square, one is bombarded by messages pointing in one direction or another. These signs are so perfectly themed that one might not even notice them.
Baby Changing Station
I don’t know what it is but these 19th century signs just make my day. Super simple and unique yet effective. It really matches the theme of the First Aid and Lost and Found offices over on Main Street USA which is also modeled after a late 19th century town. This sign was found in Tomorrowland but draws the connection to this particular storyline.
My Favorite Restroom Signage 1My Favorite Restroom Signage 2
These restrooms look almost untouched since 1955. They’re tucked away between Innoventions, Autopia, and the Tomorrowland train station. Starting with the signage up top, I think it’s the yellowing of the plastic sign, the font size and shape as well as font color that give it away. In addition to its tucked-away nature, I like to think that this building looks just as it did when the park first opened (even though its adjacent attraction, Carousel of Progress, didn’t open until 1967.)
The lower sign suggests a future when alien and human life might live together. I particularly love the Women’s signage as the taller alien woman looks to be wearing a dress but upon further inspection, she’s got some kind of tentacle/scale motif going on. Nice touch. Even the alien language here continues the theme in a more cerebral way. By far one of my favorite park details.
Speaking of Autopia…
Check out this Autopia sign in Tomorrowland. Complete with pistons supporting the letters and a checkered flag, one could see this sign without knowing there was a ride and “get it.” Ingenious.
No dancing!
There are plenty uses of this sign around the park. The first time I noticed it was on Haunted Mansion and it was pointed out by a buddy of mine. Since then, I have noticed it in every park I have been to. While it’s standard safely protocol and less about the imagineers trying to tell a story, storytelling seems to be inherent in the guests now as we make our own stories for standard signage. We like to think that one must remain seated and not dance on the rides. Seems to stand true, in a sense.
“Welcome, foolish mortals…”
From the font to the color scheme, the imagineers nailed it with this attraction. The wait-time board matches the attraction signage which matches the look and feel of the attraction. And, while I could have desaturated the colors in this photo and made it look more cold and “scary,” I chose to really keep it true to how it appears in person because even then, the sign itself “betrays an aura of foreboding…” The imagineers hit a home-run with this attraction’s signage and trend-setting font.
We miss you, Country Bears!
Finally, we take a look at a reference to an old attraction. The Country Bear Jamboree, while gone from Critter Country at Disneyland, is alive in plenty of references throughout the current Critter Country. Even the Winnie the Pooh attraction has some of the old animatronics from the old show. But in this sign from the Hungry Bear restaurant, we see our cast of misfit critters thanking us for visiting. Not sure if the kids will get it but it still fits within the theme of the land and parents will get a smile remembering the attraction that used to be. Luckily, the parents can still take a trip to Walt Disney World and show their kids a version of the show that still operates daily in Frontierland.
While we only touch on some of the great signage, take a look around next time you’re at the parks. There are details all around you that you may take for granted — and that’s their job!
Today was the day I was to finally ride the original Tower of Terror. I was SUPER excited!
At last!
Disney’s Hollywood Studios is a smaller park that’s more focused on shows and entertainment than attractions but the few attractions they do have really pack a punch and the shows are among the best I have seen at a Disney park. Orlando seems to be a haven for film and stage hopefuls with plenty of roles to go around. Really top notch stuff coming out of these parks!
So we entered through some familiar looking gates — the new Disney California Adventure Park gates, while modeled after the Pan Pacific park theatre are actually modeled after Disney’s own Hollywood Studios park. I had no idea until DCA’s walls were about to come down in front of the new gates and a buddy of mine showed me a picture of the Hollywood Studios gate. I was surprised and thought that DCA’s walls had come down early. It’s striking how similar these parks look from the front!
And that’s not all. There’s even a Carthay Circle Theatre (which is a shop rather than a restaurant) and a lot of the same building replicas DCA has in it’s Hollywood Blvd. area. Even the gas station looks a lot like Oswald’s at DCA. I went to high school in Hollywood and lived there for about 5 years and they really nailed a lot of the tiny details. Their Crossroads of the World replica (information station at the park) is uncanny and their Max Factor building (a shopping plaza) is spot on.
Hollywood Studios’ Carthay Circle TheatreLooking back toward the main gate.
After taking in the main drag Hollywood Blvd., we took a right and headed down Sunset Boulevard toward the Hollywood Tower Hotel known as Tower of Terror.
A beacon for the show business elite!
We took tons of photos of this attraction which seems to house more homages to the show than our DCA counterpart. Traveling through the 5th dimension caused me to laugh out loud in glee the first time the doors opened and we moved forward. It’s really neat and almost too stimulating upon the first ride. There’s just no way to sell how incredibly detailed and awesome this ride is. The day we came home we went to DLR and rode Tower and while it’s still a great ride and superior in a few areas, as a whole, I would have to say that Hollywood Studios’ version of the ride is in a completely different league.
Awesome!A hidden Mickey!
Next it was onto Rockin’ Roller Coaster starring Aerosmith. We had done this at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Paris and I remembered really enjoying it. The queue in Paris seemed a little more detailed but the facade was much better at Walt Disney World.
Huge guitar here!
This ride has some great holograms for the pre-show and a nice story and great theming. We are granted backstage passes to a concert that’s happening in 10 minutes and Aerosmith has demanded that their manager sense a limo our way to get us there. Unfortunately there’s traffic but our “driver” seems to know some back-alley shortcuts. We take off into the dark night past some hollywood landmarks along with some rockin’ tunes. It’s a whirlwind thrill and if I had to compare it to something, it would be a mix of Space Mountain and California Screamin’ at DCA.
We grabbed a quick bite at the farmer’s market area. What was nice was the even though this was standard theme park fare, it’s pretty regional so BBQ baked beans and cole slaw are common hot dog toppings. I loved it! They also had bacon macaroni and cheese toppings. A great treat I have yet to discover at our 3rd and Fairfax farmer’s market.
This walking magician puts on a great show!More magic at Hollywood Studios!
Our first new-to-us attraction at this park was The Great Movie Ride. While it’s a great ride, it seems to be a lot like Jungle Cruise in the way that your “skipper” can make or break the ride, and you have multiple ones so landing multiple good hosts can be difficult. We had two pretty bad ones but there are some great things to look at. I liked how large the ride vehicles were. They really move a lot of people in there!
The Magic Castle on the mural?Singin’ in the Rain!
The Voyage of the Little Mermaid was a fun show with some cool laser effects and some great puppetry. However, there’s a whole scene where Ariel is live on stage singing a song and animated Ariel is singing and swimming on a projection right next to her. Seemed like a mixed message. It’s also a very truncated version of the film’s story. You should go into this having already seen the film.
The Voyage of the Little MermaidGreat Ursula!
Star Tours! While exactly the same as ours in almost every way including the queue (minus a few things), the exterior of this one is superior to Disneyland’s. There’s an AT-AT out front walking through the Endor Moon terrain. Super fun to look at and walk through!
The Endor Moon!
Walking straight into the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular, we had no idea what to expect. We walked into a very large set so we figured there’d be a lot of col stuff to see while the actors made their way from section to section in what may be a 15 minute show, or so. However, after the entire set gets used in the first scene, I was worried there wasn’t going to be much more to see. Then, the set change happened. This has to be some of the most incredible set design I have seen at any Disney park! The scenes are HUGE and the stunts are great. I highly recommend this show!
So awesome!
On our way back to Tower (I know, I know…), we stopped into the Beauty and the Beast show. Yet again, if you’re an out of work actor, make your way to Orlando because these shows are just top notch! Absolutely terrific performances all around and this show is a little longer than The Little Mermaid show although there’s still some plot holes if you have not seen the film.
Tale as old as time…We were in the area!
Next was more of a showcase of all things Walt. Put together by D23, One Man’s Dream is a huge love letter to Walt with props from his boyhood desk with his name etched into the wood to his Glendale, CA office as it would have been seen on the lot. It’s a wonderful museum of Walt Disney treasures with an amazing film at the end that’s sure to bring tears to your eyes. Well done!
Bring a tissue or 5!Walt’s Office
After this, we wandered the park awaiting Fantasmic! at 7pm. We planned on grabbing good seats at the amphitheater so a 5:30 arrival was key. We walked thru the Pixar area where their Toy Story Midway Mania was. We skipped it as the lines were just outlandish and we aren’t huge fans of the DCA version so we figured we weren’t missing anything. We saw Pizza Planet (having my birthday there next year for SURE! (I kid…)), a huge Muppet store (we skipped MuppetVision 3D), the backlot area (the backlot tour was down for the duration of our trip there), and skipped the Lights! Motor! Action! stunt show as we had seen it in Paris. After some sightseeing, it was time to go see the East Coast version of the Disneyland classic.
It sure is different!
I took a little nap while waiting for the show but we certainly had GREAT seats! While it’s different, it was cool to see some added scenes with rarely seen characters like Pocahontas. Their dragon is like our old dragon and they have a smaller and sort of dinky version of the Mark Twain for the finale. All in all, it’s still a magical show but in the amphitheater setting, it seems a little too far away. I was still able to grab some awesome pictures. See if you can spot the Mickey with the weird eyes. What’s THAT about?
NO!Mickey encounters the snake!DragonSlaying the dragon
Tons more Fantasmic! pictures below! After leaving Hollywood Studios for the night, we headed over to The Magic Kingdom to take advantage of the extra magic hours. We headed over to the Tiki Room but they closed early so we went to Tomorrowland to check out Space Mountain which wasn’t bad. It’s very different and more like the pre-1998 DLR version. I really liked the star effect inside the queue — it was very convincing. Unfortunately we were not able to play with the interactive queue. Has anyone done it? Is it any good?
En Route to the Magic KingdomThe Mountain!Great end-queue visuals
Before we left for the night, we went on TTA’s Peoplemover. It moved a lot faster than I expected and was visually different from our old Disneyland version but it was still a great ride with some incredible park views!
TTA: Peoplemover
Another perfect day at WDW in the books! Nice touch upon exiting the Magic Kingdom for the night and retiring to our hotel room once again.
I. Love. Star Tours. The thought of them touching it 5 years ago would have scared the bejesus out of me. Sure, there have always been rumors circling about the outdated ride technology and a possible update to the attraction but isn’t that nostalgia what we love most about the parks? The Pepper’s Ghost effect has been around for hundreds of years and the Fantasyland rides are always among the longest of the lines in the park. Plus, we all know how badly Lucas and Co. messed up the Star Wars world by CG-ing (we coin terms here at Remain Seated Please) everything in lieu of practical effects.
Yet, Star Tours: The Adventures Continue NAILS IT. I was so sad on my final trip to the Endor moon but when the RSP crew got to ride the new attraction for a passholder preview, all of us were stunned. The story varies from ride to ride but at the ride’s core, you are at a Star Tours port awaiting your flight to an undisclosed location. They prep you for your flight on the Star Speeder 1000 by issuing you galactic flight goggles and then send you on your way.
The preflight sequence gives you a glimpse into the workings behind your port’s door. While your ship is being fueled, cleaned, and maintained, C3-P0 follows R2-D2 to your vehicle for a systems check. While our R2 unit is loaded, 3-P0 releases our pilot, Ace, in order to repair our navigation systems prior to takeoff. We then get the normal schpiel about galactic flight regulations and as soon as our star speeder is prepped and has approached the launch platform, the doors open and a steel flight path takes us into our ship.
A flight person gives us our final check and sends us on our way… but without our pilot! C3-P0 is now at the helm and no one at Star Tours is paying attention to his distress calls. This is where the differring stories begin.
There are rumored to be 54 different story combinations, all of which I will not give away but it seems that the stories are broken up into 5 different sections. Each segways into the next seamlessly through clever storytelling by the WDI team. We rode about 10 times over the course of a few days and can say that while it is exciting to have randomized flight sequrnces, there does not seem to be 54 sequences.
Now, a cast member did tell us that during previews not all destinations were being previewed and more destinations like the Endor moon and Geonosis. We have not, however, taken another flight since the ride’s greand re-opening June 3rd of this year and I have not seen anything new come up on any Disney blogs or Twitters. Have you seen them yet?
Even so, the good sequences and destinations are GREAT. Unfortunately, the bad ones are just boring. The CG, however, looks incredible thoughout (sans the preflight sequence. They really bought the farm on that one.) I had to go to Hoth 4 times before I even thought to look for CG environments or elements. For someone as finnicky as I am about such things, that’s a great sign. Fake environments are so distracting and for them to be 3D on top of that is just icing on the cake of diappointment (great band name, by the way). But this ride breaks that mentality. They pulled off great CG, great 3D, and a great story.
I highly recommend this ride for children of all ages. It’s interactive (one of your fellow passengers is a Rebel spy, as it turns out!), funny, gorgeous, and thrilling! There are numerous nods to the original attraction, there are special guests from the Star Wars films that visit you during the ride, and a great randomized ride sequence. The rumors of other destinations like Geonosis and the Endor moon are glimmers of hope that this ride will be more well taken care of by WDI and Lucas this time around (Remember when star tours motion simulator format was sold upon the idea of easy updates and enhancements?)
I loved Star Tours but Star Tours: The Adventures Continue pulls off the greatest feat of all – replacing an amazingly popular E-ticket attraction with something better.
I love all of the hidden gems in the parks. From Europe to Anaheim or Mickeys to restrooms, there are so many small details and special touches that really drive the vision of Walt Disney into genius.
This gem is one I was shown by a cast member inside the brand new Star Trader in Tomorrowland. It’s a hidden Mickey do you see it?
It took me a while to find it but sure enough it was there. i actually thought this was the one she was talking about.
This also made me re-think my skepticism about the one on the planet at the Space Mountain exit. These hidden Mickeys are so well hidden that some can just be glanced over without a thought.
What are some of the most illusive “hidden trasures” you have found at the parks – be it hidden Mickey or otherwise? I cant wait to tell you about all of the freemason symbols throughout the park.
Sure you may have the glove, or the little red leather jacket, or perhaps even a decent moonwalk, but let me ask you this, do you own an LED Captain EO Disneyland visor? I’m guessing that you probably don’t, not because you aren’t the biggest Michael Jackson fan of all time, the kind of fan who pretends to know all the thriller dance moves, but because this item has become a rarity in the Michael Jackson and Captain EO collectible market. Let me for a moment reflect on why I think that is.
Apologies in advance for all the questions; I enjoy a certain rapport with my readers, but have you ever in all of your days at Disneyland spotted amongst the crowds of Disney park-goers someone wearing this piece of sparkling Disney imperfection? The answer is probably no, that is unless you’ve actually had the rare opportunity to catch my blinking head in the park, and the reason for this is immediately apparent for anyone who has ever witnessed or worn this piece of Disneyana.
The problem has to do with the fact that the LED lights are powered by a 9-volt battery. Yes you heard that correct, a 9-volt battery strapped to the side of your head just in front of your left ear by your temple. The battery hangs loosely inside of an elastic loop and batteries can get hot, hot enough to burn the side of your Michael Jackson loving face. Sometimes the price to pay for hip retro fashion is a nasty 9-volt battery burn, lucky me.
Note: The black electrical tape pictured is strictly to compensate for elastic wear and tear.
The day was upon us! We were finally about to go on Star Tours: The Adventures Continue! But before that, let’s get started on our entire trip.
A beautiful day at the Disneyland Resort!
We arrived at the park at about 1PM and we headed straight to the Main Street station to try to hitch a ride on the Lilly Belle but the next available time was during our Star Tours adventures so we opted to forego a jaunt around the park to explore the Mary Blair exhibit some more. Her work really set a lot of styles in motion for the parks that not only lives on from her original designs, but transcends to new designs and attractions. What a great innovator!
One of her great triptychs on display
We then headed over to the lockers and — what’s this?! New lockers! Check out the photos below:
That’s kind of cool, if you ask me! They let you choose your own 4 digit pin! After the lockers, we went to the Star Trader. The new merch has just been released for the APs and I was SUPER excited to get the new older version of the Star Speeder: The Star Speeder 1000!
A great addition to my collection!
So amazing! We then checked out the uncovered FastPass distribution droids and marveled at their detail. Love stuff like this!
GONK Droids!
We then headed to our first attraction of the day, Pirates of the Caribbean, to check out the new Black Beard projection that has replaced Davy Jones for the summer. Robert was right last week when he reported the ride looking better than it has in a while. We even had a rowdy group of girls in our boat that calmed down about the time we hit the shipwreck scene (my favorite) — they must have been enthralled with the ride!
Nice wait time for Pirates...
The Black Beard projection looked GREAT! The waterfall effect looked better than the Davy Jones version and while he has the same script, I just liked Black Beard as a character much more than Jones. I wouldn’t mind them randomizing this section of the ride between the two villains.
If ye be brave of fool enough to face a pirates curse, proceed!
We then headed over to DCA and on the way met up with Geppetto on Main Street! Robert couldn’t have been more excited to meet his “Papa.”
"Hi, Papa!"
DCA’s entrance looks to be wrapping up construction and I still wouldn’t at all be surprised at it’s completion by June 3rd, but don’t quote me on that! But our real reason to head over to DCA just before our first Star Tours flights of 2011:
The Corn Dog Castle!!!
It was everything we remember it being plus they have cheese sticks! A corn dog was way against my diet so a cheese stick would have thrown me down a spiral which I might never return so I steered clear of that. But, I can’t wait to possibly try it in the future! On our way back to DL, we saw the cast member preview queue loading into the Little Mermaid attraction. How lucky were those people?! I cannot wait to ride TLM next weekend!
It was now time to check-in for our fastpasses to an intergalactic adventure aboard Star Tours! The process was well-organized and painless. We won’t cover any details on the ride as we don’t want to spoil anything for those of you holding out for June 3rd or a soft open (although you can find plenty of spoilers on some of our favorite Disney blogs by looking at their twitter feeds or sites here)
Star Tours: The Adventures Continue's FastPass queue
The GONK droids (recognizable from “A New Hope”) serve as your FastPass distributors and then you head across the path to Star Tours: The Adventures Continue (although the signs lead you to believe you’re about to ride Star Tours: The Adventure Continues.) The extended queue has awesome murals and music playing but the chains were not well laid out by the CMs so it was up to the APs to figure out a system best suited for navigating the queue. Not a problem!
Cannot wait!
The inside looks pretty much the same except a SP1000 where the SP3000 once stood, a new destinations screen, and a shiny C3-PO and R2D2. The real surprises were in the next room… but we’ll cover that in a future post! There are plenty of nods to the old attraction as well as some other attractions, some great hidden treasures as well as an AMAZING ride!
Just enough to tease...
The first time we rode, the ride stopped abruptly in the middle of our jump to light speed, our pilot abruptly turned away from us and the screen went up — I thought we were going to get boarded by Darth Vader and some storm troopers! However, I think some girls in the row below us pushed open the door on accident in the midst of all the excitement! (I don’t know that that’s what really happened or if that’s even possible — just an observation) We were then transferred to another star speeder through the entrance terminal which made it almost feel like we landed on another planet and were part of a layover on Tatooine or something (how amazing would it be if that were an option?!)
After that, we finally rode it in it’s entirety. After the ride, we were all in aggreance that the ride was just “OKAY.” But after our second, third, and fourth times, it was solidified: it had a GREAT story, an amazing randomized story arc, and it was “lightyears” beyond the old version. I will always have a place in my heart for Rex and his misadventures but with how well this ride was updated, I am proud to see it go to yesterland.
After our fourth go-round, our girlfriends went over to DCA to meet up with a castmember to preview TLM. Lucky girls! Robert and I took the opportunity to ride on my personal favorite attraction, The Haunted Mansion.
I. Love. This. Ride.
While Madame Leota wasn’t floating, we did see some other great things. We hung back when everyone left the stretching room and descended upon their doom-buggies. We took some great long-exposure shots of the hallway scene, as seen below:
There are several prominent ghosts that have retired here from creepy old crypts all over the world!
We met back up with the girls after HM and thought we might go check out the new restaurants at the Disneyland Hotel but opted for an awesome dinner at Tortilla Joes! This is one of my favorite restaurants on DD. After dinner (and losing a pin 🙁 !) we headed home, only to look forward to returning this Sunday!
I love Star Tours and I believe that I will love the new Star Tours, The Adventures Continue, but can we talk about some of the rumors and some of our issues with this new incarnation?
Potential Pros:
Multiple Destinations: I hope with my heart of hearts that we will be able to choose a gate when approaching the launch platforms. While a slightly longer trip with multiple destinations would be fun, I would also love it to act as more of a space port offering travelers choices.
Glasses-less 3D: I am not a fan of 3D at all but for some reason, I am way into this. One of the biggest problems the old ride had was the aging film projection. Nostalgic? Absolutely. Distracting? You bet’cha! This technology will probably be the most futuristic thing in Tomorrowland.
Seeing Rex Being Built in Queue: I haven’t seen this anywhere but with the hints that we are getting from TDA, I theorize that my favorite post-bird-animatronic droid will be working on Rex while listening to the radio and chatting it up with guests. A boy can hope!
Potential Cons:
Pod Racing: with as much backlash as there has been, how were they able to justify a pod racing scene? I can’t wait to see how they integrate this into the story.
No Classic Endor Moon Trips: Now, travelers are supposed to see Endor, Bespin, and Alderaan, but I am assuming that this will be within the new (older) timeline. I suppose I could bring my iPod and put on Rex’s old ride-through over one of the new trips, but it won’t be the same. Perhaps there might be a loading platform for a new “prototype” Starspeeder 3000 that is testing flights to the Endor Moon?
Hazy Areas:
Ace or C3PO? People seemed to be outraged that they chose a “new” pilot droid for the Starspeeder 1000 and soon after, it was revealed that C3PO would be the pilot upon takeoff. Was this a last minute addition? I am excited for C3PO, though — just seemed to be a weird way to announce it.
Updated Trips? One of the biggest selling points for Star Tours was that new trips could be added as necessary. It has only taken 23 years to follow up on that promise and that’s just too long. Might we see new trips every 5-or-so years?
Things I’d Like To See:
Adventure Thru Inner Space: I am sure that I went on it as a kid, but at best I would have been a year old. I would love for there to be a nod at the classic attraction somewhere. There may have been before — to be honest, I never thought to look. But, a nod to the past in a building that hasn’t changed much would be a lot of fun.
Starspeeder 2000: We will have gone from the modern (yet still run down) Starspeeder 3000 to the “old” (somehow more modern and souped up) Starspeeder 1000, I wouldn’t mind seeing a Starspeeder 2000 being worked on by R2 in the queue. Might not happen but would be a cool touch.
All-in-all, I couldn’t be more stoked for the new Star Tours. Already, the facade is getting an awesome facelift, the ride system has been updated, and there’s glasses-less 3D. With a potential to add trips to other Star Wars locales, I back it!
UPDATE: Robert just told me about the huge nod to Adventure Thru Inner Space in the old Star Tours. Please keep the heckling to a minimum. If you haven’t seen it, I suggest dodging right while avoiding a close call.
I created this little video just before Star Tours closed up for the reimagining. I used to have a toy as a kid that looked like the StarSpeeder 3000 and would basically do this around the playground. When StarTrader was selling these little replicas, I had to have one.
