Day 958: Big News

So far in relation to the D23 Expo I've talked about the amazing people and the huge show floor, but what's really the reason we all head to the Expo? The news of course! The giant announcements for every part of the Disney company, including Disney Parks and Resorts, Walt Disney Animation, and the popular panel of the weekend, the Live Action panel!

I personally was only able to attend one of these big panels, and of course it had to be the Parks and Resorts panel! Amazingly, at the last minute, they announced that we were allowed to bring in cameras, meaning I not only got to live tweet the entire panel, but I also have several pictures of the amazing additions yet to come to the Disney parks!

The big announcement of the day, however, didn't come during the Parks and Resorts presentation though. Instead, at the finale of the Live Action presentation, the newest addition to both Disneyland and Walt Disney World was announced. That new addition? Star Wars Land!

To kick off the Parks and Resorts Presentation they showcased a short promo video for Star Wars Land, and then announced that Star Wars will be introduced to the park in more "force" over the next few months as we approach the premiere of Episode 7: The Force Awakens. The new land, however, will feature a planet we've never seen before while also featuring both new and familiar Star Wars characters. In the next few months, we can also expect to see a brand new planet on Star Tours straight out of The Force Awakens and new additions to the Jedi Training Academy. Finally, following the success of Star Wars Weekends, a new seasonal event will be coming to the Disney Parks on both coasts: Season of the Force. This event will include new custom fireworks and an update to Space Mountain at Disneyland called Hyperspace Mountain.

When it comes to Walt Disney World, the biggest news in the presentation was definitely the extra addition of our very own Toy Story Land, which will premiere at Disney's Hollywood Studios and will feature new attractions and a completely new themed land based around Andy's backyard. Growing on the popularity of Toy Story Midway Mania at Hollywood Studios, this new addition will also feature a new Slinky Dog Family Coaster and Green Alien Flying Saucers beyond the secondary TSMM!

In a bit of an awkward spell, there was discussion of the new Frozen Ever After addition coming to Epcot. I definitely know I'll miss Maelstrom, and it seemed that the remainder of the audience was with me, but I'm going to put my trust in Walt Disney Imagineering and I hope you do too. Cars Land and the expansions at Disneyland brought a lot of faith for me in the amazing experiences they can produce, so I'm excited to see where this new attraction will take us as well.

And, as expected, there was lots of talk of Avatar Land, which is now officially called "Pandora: The World of Avatar." Joe Rohde gave an absolutely breathtaking presentation on the new area of Animal Kingdom along with the other advancements throughout the park. First, we learned that it will be the fireflies that host the new nighttime elements throughout the park, and that Kilimanjaro Safaris will be extended into evening hours and include two new species. The Rivers of Light, taking place on the river that flows through the park, is sure to be nothing short of spectacular, as it will incorporate light, water, and fire along with live performers for a full live-celebrating show.

Then the updates on Pandora continued, featuring a preview video and a surprise appearance from James Cameron himself! "The Flight of Passage" was officially announced as the title for the Banshee attraction, and we learned that Pandora won't be about charging in as we usually see in some of the other parks, but rather a full immerseive, detail-oriented experience that forces you to stop and admire the beauty of nature.

From there on, announcements continued for other Disney parks across the world, including a HUGE surprise from Stan Lee! Let me tell you, you haven't lived until you've been in the same room as STAN. LEE.

However, the presentation didn't end there, as we continued to Soar across the world, leading right up to the announcement that both Disneyland and Walt Disney World will soon feature a brand new Soarin' experience, Soarin' over the World. I've been saying for years that Epcot's Soarin' should be updated, and from the looks of it, this new film will be sure to take us on a grand adventure!

And to finish things off in a typical Disney style, a beautiful and touching tribute to Nighttime Disney Shows from around the world concluded the presentation. Part of which you can see in my first vlog from the D23 Expo:

To be completely honest, I wasn't expecting any part of IllumiNations to be in the tribute, so when they began to sing "We Go On" I just completely lost it. I don't think I've ever cried so fast in my life! 

The future of the Disney Parks is certainly exciting, and I can't wait to soar across the world to experience as much of it as I possibly can! What part are you most excited about? I think it's definitely Star Wars Land for me, that or the Rivers of Light presentation at Animal Kingdom!

Have a magical day!

(Note: This blog post was written on September 7 due to the Disney Trip and College Move-In).

Day 957: On the Show Floor

If the D23 Expo is one thing, it's HUGE. This one convention houses every form of Disney you can think of, from Star Wars to Princesses to Marvel to Once Upon A Time and everything in between, and so much of it exists on the ever wonderful show floor, open to everyone for exploration when you're not standing in line for one of the many events.

Luckily, I had plenty of time to investigate every corner of the show floor, and I had many, many awesome finds, starting off with the absolute couldn't miss John Lasseter shirt collection! With his custom shirts for every movie from Toy Story all the way up to Inside Out, I definitely had a few favorites, which you can find in my vlog from the Expo, specifically Part 2!

Our next big find was definitely the old Disneyland PeopleMover cars on display. Jonny pretty much freaked out, and I definitely was even elated to have a chance to sit in one of the historic cars! The same can be said for a Skyway Car photo op that I finally got around to on the last day of the Expo! 

One of the most amusing things I happened to find on the show floor was definitely a familiar one! You might remember the entire fiasco surrounding the Epcot Starbucks You Are Here Mug, in which I snagged one of the original series before they were pulled from the shelves in honor of the purple monorail. So within two days I became the owner of a $200-$300 mug and was pretty impressed with myself. This one was on display at the Theme Park Connection Booth and I believe the selling price was indeed $200. I got mine for $30.

The Floor was also filled with AWESOME Photo Ops, including a few of our favorite Disney characters. I may or may not have almost taken the cardboard Flynn Rider home...

If you walked only a little ways onto the Show Floor it wasn't hard to find the real, life-size Pizza Planet truck as well. Sadly I never got around to taking a picture with it myself, but the mere idea that it was there is pretty awesome. I mean come on, it's the Pizza Planet Truck! Who doesn't want to drive that? 

Disney, of course, has many huge show floor displays, including one from Walt Disney Animation and Pixar Studios. One of the biggest films Disney is hyping at the moment is the newest release from the main studio, Zootopia, which I'm absolutely excited about. Part of their promotion was a series of logos and posters for various businesses and films of Zootopia. Here's just a couple of them...

Also one of the main displays, Avatar gave us a first look at some of the spectacular sights and experiences we'll enjoy in Pandora when it finally makes it's appearance at Disney's Animal Kingdom in a couple of years. To be completely honest, before heading into D23, I wasn't particularly thrilled about Avatar, but after these new mock-ups and presentations, I'm eagerly awaiting these new adventures that will take Animal Kingdom to the next level! More on that another day though!

Star Wars, as you can imagine, was also a huge part of the Expo, and on Sunday I had to take the time to go and meet my very favorite droid for the first time ever. Gosh, R2 was just adorable, and how kind of him to take time out of his busy schedule to visit the attendees of D23 for three whole days!

Like I said earlier, Once Upon A Time was definitely a part of the fandoms in attendance too! You can't even imagine how awesome it was to walk around the show floor and see other Oncers and just be like "These are my people." It's a theme that definitely was prevelant throughout the entire trip!

While checking out the last of the show floor with friends, I also stopped by the Target booth, where I got to make my own little animation! It was actually a super exciting experience, enough for me to make mouse ears that took just a few seconds! Plus now I have this awesome GIF! I've never been GIFed before!

And finally, a lot of my time was spent right here, at the Maker Booth! Over the course of the weekend I got to meet many of my favorite Disney YouTubers and had a real chance to visit with some new ones! YouTube has become a huge part of my life over the past summer, so I definitely felt right at home there!

If you head to D23 in the future, be sure to make time for everything the show floor has to offer because let me tell you, this isn't even the half of it! Over the course of three days I got to see so much, including stores, upcoming films, items from the Disney Archives, fellow Disney fans, tons of amazing cosplays and DisneyBounds, and lots and lots of magic! 

Have a magical day!

(Note: This blog post was written on September 7 due to the Disney trip and College Move-In).

Day 286: Avatarland?

In order to not reveal any spoilers from tonight's SPECTACULAR episode of Once Upon a Time, I'm putting off that post until tomorrow. That at least gives people a little bit of time to catch up. Plus, I'll probably rewatch the episode on Hulu before I blog about it, just to clarify my own feelings a little more. It was a really really interesting episode, to say the least, but we'll talk more about that tomorrow.

And then I was going to write about how Princess and the Frog is playing while I write this and finish my homework, and I was almost done, when I realized that I wasn't going to blog about that either. I knew I had something in my head to blog about, I just happened to keep forgetting it. Honestly, I had an entire blog post finished about Princess and the Frog when I realized that I really needed to blog about this instead.

Avatarland.

Just a day or two ago the very first concept art for Avatarland was released, and to be truthful, I don't know what I think. I did not enjoy Avatar as a film. I just didn't like it. My brother loves it, and my family in general likes it I think, but I just never got into it. So when I heard they were bringing it to Animal Kingdom I was really skeptical.

Now I think I'm even more skeptical, but I don't really know. Here's a rundown of what's going on.

Things over in what is now Camp Minnie Mickey will look a bit different. Ok, a lot different. We're talking floating mountains and all these waterfalls and basically Pandora all over the place. My big question here is how is this going to look? I mean, where is the transition going to be from Animal Kingdom as we know it into this? 

Next, in what I assume will be a new thrill ride, bringing the number of E Ticket attractions up to 5, we'll ride on one of those things. Whatever it is. A Banshee? I don't know if I like this addition because it sounds a bit like what's already at Universal...even if they did kind of take that from Disney. It's a complicated relationship. Of everything being added this is the one I think I'm the least excited for.

And then we have this. Some sort of boat ride, I think? Well, ok, I know it's a boat ride, but what in the world is it going to showcase? What's the storyline going to be? Every Disney attraction has a storyline, right? Maybe it will be like the story of the movie, but we'll see.

Now here's where things get weird. This expansion won't just be Avatarland. We're getting a full-scale night version of Animal Kingdom. That's right, we're adding new stuff everywhere. This part, quoted from the Disney Parks Blog is, "a new nighttime spectacular where live music, floating lanterns, water screens and swirling animal imagery all combine to bring a show to Discovery Riber that will delight our guests and truly cap off their day at Disney's Animal Kingdom." But that's not all. We're also getting a, wait for it, nighttime version of Kilimanjaro Safaris. 

Now, I love Kilimanjaro as much as the next person, although it's been going down in my rating book since they got rid of Little Red and the storyline of the poaching. I miss the adventure. But the animals go in every night. HOW are they going to pull this one off? 

I guess, overall I just question how this is keeping the original focus of the park. I don't want more thrill rides at Disney's Animal Kingdom, and as much as I'd love to see Camp Minnie Mickey turned into something awesome, is this all really the answer? Yeah, it's probably the lowest attended (or Hollywood Studios is, but it's close), but do we need floating mountains and Pandora and another thrill ride and a nighttime version of Kilimanjaro Safaris? 

I'm not whining about this, I'm just as excited to see what's coming as the next person. I'm just skeptical, that's all. I'm saying that, for me, a person who isn't a fan of Avatar, Imagineering REALLY has to wow me this time. If they can wow me, then this will be a wonderful addition to Animal Kingdom, and they often times do just that: wow me. But after my dislike of Ariel's Undersea Adventure, they're going to have to be really careful. Plus, what about all the animals? Am I the only one thinking about how Pandora isn't real and this isn't doing anything to educate us about the animals that share our planet? 

I guess I'm just really really conflicted, because one part of me sees why this is going in and is excited, but the other part of me is like "wait, what?" because what about the original theme? How IS this going to fit in? What about the care of the animals? There are a lot of questions here, and I hope we get answers soon. Plus, it doesn't help that plans for this have been a long time in coming and we're going to have to wait even longer to see this thing come to exist. We waited a really long time for New Fantasyland...and we're waiting still longer and longer when it comes to the finishing touches. So when can we expect any of this to happen? 

So what do you think? Avatarland got you excited or are you like me, skeptical? 

Here's today's Disney History: 1940: Disney Legend Dave Smith, official Disney historian, author, archivist and the ultimate authority on all things Disney, is born in Pasadena, California. The founder and first head of the Walt Disney Archives, located in the Frank G. Wells building at Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, California, Smith is also the author of such books as Disney A to Z and Walt Disney Famous Quotes.

Oh, but before I leave you, here's a funny video because this was kind of depressing:  

Have a magical day!