Sleeping beauty's Castle in Laker Purple and GoldLets start with the crowds, I began my day in DCA and the crowds were heavy but minimally affected where I was going or what I was doing. What was cool to see was the Ratatoullie float rejoin the Pixar Play Parade. I am not a huge parade fan but this was great to see. This is one of my favorite floats of any parade and its return signals the height of the season and hopefully an end to the entertainment cutbacks. I didnt get to stay for the Electrical parade but I plan on going back Monday to properly take a look at the new floats and effects. The crowds getting ready for the parade were insane, the entry plaza was starting to fill around 7:35, a full hour and change before the parade began. Take a look at the Disneyland News Today website for more pictures and news about the parade and other events.
I moved over to Disneyland at the begging of my friends who accompanied me. The Park was twice as crowded as DCA, walking down main street was honestly more difficult than I can ever remember. What I found very cool were the Lakers NBA Finals shirts. They looked great but only 18 of each side were made and sold at the Emporium and World of Disney, luckily I got one for my younger cousin and it was literally the last one to be available anywhere. Besides the crowds and lack of Lakers shirts not much was different from a normal day, but when the lights went down the park came alive.
The excitement before Magical was palpable. I was sprinting towards the HUB to try and get a good viewing spot but it seemed I was about 2 hours too late and I arrived in the sea of people moments before the first fireworks were fired and Eden Espinosa's enchanting voice rang through the night. I have seen her perform in Wicked a couple times and she was brilliant but her singing some of the most heart wrenching Disney songs of all time is above any of what I had heard her sing before, it was pure beauty. The music was by far the best aspect of the show and the rest was good, but not anything near the Disney great. The largest part of the show was completely missing, the official public debut of Dumbo. The new puppet was absent and at the moment can only be seen on Youtube, but will hopefully will fly today or as soon as possible. I was extremely disappointed that this crown jewel of a new fireworks display was missing. After the disappointment in Magical I was really looking forward to Fantasmic.
After making my way over to New Orleans Square and taking a ride on Pirates, with some very annoying passengers intent on bothering the people dining at Blue Bayou, I attempted to find a good vantage point for Fantasmic and it seemed that if I wasn't in place before the first show there were no other good seats to be had. Prior to the show an announcement came on saying that Fantasmic had reached capacity! I have never seen or heard that before and it was shocking. So again, I didn't have the greatest view in the world but I saw what I needed to and definitely enjoyed myself. The new HD projectors were okay, from my position the images did look clearer but not much. The new Tick Tock was amazing. The movements were perfect and mimicked the original animations perfectly. The brilliance of his green glow against the water and back drop was superb and really gave him a new life. This moved him from a prop in the Peter Pan sketch, into his own category and focal point of the show. The highlight, or should I say highlights, were Flotsam and Jetsam. They were perfectly evil, maniacal, creepy, and added a brilliance to a great section of the show. The movement of their tails in the water was masterful. Without seeing the Dragon I must say these two, however brief their appearance, definitely made the best addition to the show. Fantasmic is better than ever and is still my favorite Disney show.
(Flotsam floating through the Rivers of America. I apologize for the quality)My overall grade for this night was a B-, failing grade for Disney. I can't imagine what the entertainment team is doing with a night such as this. Magical was okay, Dumbo was absent and the fireworks are still oriented to the left. It made me want more and when it ended. I was wondering when the real show was going to begin, that could just be me being cynical at not seeing Dumbo. Still though it wasn't what I expected Disney to do. The crowd situation was horrible, and before you flood me with comments saying its Disneyland what do you expect, let me just say it was the way crowds were handled. I am all for more people at the parks because I want everyone to enjoy them but when the crowds are so out of hand and Cast Members are yelling at the same person to keep moving when they can't and are yelling from opposite sides then there are issues. I was also really disappointed to see Cast Members in the wrong lands. I may be nit picking here but a Fantasyland costumed Cast Member should not be serving me a pretzel in Tomorrowland. Disney is perfection, it's what makes them perfect and makes them Disney, The crowd situation compromised the true feeling and look of the parks and the indivigual lands.
I have come to expect a lot from the parks and every time I see things like these happen it makes me realize why I am going to work for Disney. I want to give everyone the best time that they can possibly imagine and help them enjoy the parks as much as I do. I hope that one day I will be fixing and preventing issues like the ones seen last night. When I release my brilliant summer spectacular you can bet it will be more of a success than the opening of Summer Nightastic.
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