9/12/14: Maelstron is Officially Being Turned into Frozen Attraction at Epcot

While I also think EPCOT is the wrong place for Frozen, I honestly don't care anymore about that stuff, since we got Buzz Lightyear in DLP's Discoveryland. Disney gave up a long time ago on making such things right. As long as an attraction fits remotely into the land, I'm okay.

Tony Baxter doesn't mind Frozen being in Norway, so I'm fine too.

I quote myself from February

 

At least those Disney characters were visiting the real country of Mexico, just like they did in the film(s) where they explored the culture and traditions of the real country. Other than some incidental design aesthetics, there's nothing about Frozen that is in any way related to Norway; the plot is entirely unrelated to the scenery surrounding it. I'd even go so far as to say that the setting weakens the story, since Elsa's snow powers would be much more impactful in a warm climate than one that is used to harsh winters

 

I definitely agree that Disney doesn't seem to care about that sort of stuff any more, which is a real shame. The non-character stuff is what makes Disney seem so special to me; the character branded things are really no different than the Universal attractions that seem awkwardly dated and out of place after a few years when the hype has died down. Disney still has some moments of greatness, but it seems that they're using increasingly amazing technology to deliver fairly mundane products. Hopefully this will begin to change when Iger leaves in 2 years

While I respect a lot of what Tony did for the parks, in some ways he reminds me of John Lasseter. Both do a lot of good for their projects, but seem completely detached from things that aren't theirs. If a similarly misfit attraction was being placed in Imagination, I would expect Tony would care a lot more (granted, that pavilion has been a disaster for 15+ years, so anything would be an improvement at this point). But since it's not his baby, he's curious to see how it turns out even if it's not the right fit

 

So very, very nice.

 

Let's wait and see if he actually leaves. I'm still not convinced and honestly I fear far more what's coming next. I wouldn't be surprised if he still wants to be around when SW Land opens and Indy hits the screen for one last time again.

While I'm also not the biggest Iger fan, Disney did not so bad under his leadership, at least from a Star Wars and Marvel fan point of view. In my opinion, the parks also got a lot of attention with SDL, HKDL expansion, two new cruise ships are coming, DLP refinancing and Ratatouille happened, DCA expansion (and now after seeing it in person, this park is great), Avatarland, Disney Springs, New Fantasyland and DHS makeover and Star Wars Land are coming. The only thing I really don't like is the focus on Disney IPs. And even that happened since Walt Disney himself, sometimes more often, sometimes less often.

However I'm also not entirely happy with WDI's current work, especially like you with the character stuff. Now I've also seen both Universal resorts in the US and besides Harry Potter there's nothing special about Universal. Disney is still ahead of them, because the only thing Universal creative can do are screen based rides. In fact, even Forbidden Journey and Escape from Gringotts are screen based. And from what I gathered online from SDL visitors, POTC took the lead in that field back from Universal. Still I wish, WDI would be allowed to do more like Mystic Manor, Roaring Rapids, Soarin', Expedition Everest or Grizzly Gulch again. As a Marvel fan I would like to see a state of the art attraction.

This might be true, but he still is responsible for the best themepark ride ever (Indiana Jones) and for the most beautiful castle park, so I value his opinion. Nonetheless I totally agree with you, that Frozen would fit better in Fantasyland or even in DHS (it's a movie). I'm curious about Arendelle coming to TDS. Right now it looks like it got cancelled, but even OLC does stupid things, like putting a Nemo ride into Storm Rider.

 

Saw some video footage of the new 'Frozen' ride - it's definitely an improvement over 'Maelsrom' which I always found to be pretty lame.

That said, justifying that 'Frozen' = 'Norway' is a stretch and shoving characters into EPCOT's World Showcase seems to irritate such a small percentage of guests that I'm sure Disney figures 'oh well!'

 

I agree. I'm just glad to have something new and enjoyable in there. Maelstrom had gotten very stale and was horribly in need of maintenance. I guess I am past looking for thematic integrity at Epcot. That ship sailed long ago. I just want interesting, enjoyable attractions that are well maintained. Frozen Ever After seems to offer that.

 

Iger has certainly done stuff for the parks, but he's allowed far less investment than in the past. It seems like he's done a good job of increasing the ownership of the international parks, but the stateside parks have mostly been stagnant under his control. Since 2008, WDW has only added 2 new rides (Mermaid and Mine Train) across its 4 parks. Meanwhile, prices continue to increase while entertainment, hours, and staffing are all reduced. Getting less for more, and the stuff that's there is all old

Where the investments have occurred, they've all felt like they're trying to make up for lost time after so long without proper additions. Prior to DCA's redo, there was talk of removing the park entrance gates and charging for individual rides, allowing it to become an open extension of DTD. Much like the new hub, MK's Fantasyland additions were done to add capacity as attendance grew and the number of attractions guests experienced on average dropped below the acceptable threshold. And DAK and the Studios additions are coming after decades of struggling to become full-day parks. Yes, it's nice that they're finally getting some love (though the insanely huge budgets are somewhat questionable), but it's hardly the systematic organic growth that the parks had under Eisner and before

 

Doesn't MyMagic+ count as an investment in the parks? That's a pretty big one.

 

Depending on how you look at it, it could be considered an investment in the parks, but the impetus for it was a lot of lifecycle replacement of obsolete back of house infrastructure. Much of it would have needed upgrades regardless, so they were able to add some guest-facing upgrades to it and say that it was a huge new project

While the MM+ project (eventually) got those things up to date, it has been far more expensive than was initially forecast, and has not provided anywhere near the return on investment they were expecting. They spent enough on the system to build a brand new theme park (excluding the rebuilding things and bribery in Shanghai's inflated budget) and have little to show for it. The one thing that it made abundantly clear is that 3 of the parks are significantly lacking capacity to have any sort of meaningful FP service. Given the number of FP-ready attractions in each park, that further pushes crowds to the already-overburdened MK since it appears to have far more to do based on the online system that guests use to make their reservations. If anything, it's the reason that they finally buckled down and began the Studios revamp (and supposedly Epcot work is in the pipeline as well)

They may have spent a ton of money on it, but it's been a financial disaster, worse than DCA1.0. It was one of those things that must have looked great in a board room, but it never made sense to people with actual experience inside a theme park

 

Though WDW guests almost universally LOVE it. Is that worth nothing?

 

Not sure whether the gamble paid off is relevant. It still counts as investment in the park. And it was a bit more than replacing obsolete infrastructure. I think Iger deserves credit for doing something that was pretty risky.