Rise in Disney theme park expenses causing fan frustration

I think the Peter Pan stuff is tongue and cheek but let's talk about that attraction for a minute. It is still immensely popular. That children today can enjoy it with joy similar to their experience on an attraction like Remy speaks volumes about Walt's vision...and also tells you that a good, immersive story is far more important than the ride technology.

In fact, I think that is why you still hear people reminiscing about a ride like Horizons. That wasn't exactly earth shattering technology but it was a pretty darn good story.

Conversely, Body Wars was the exact same technology as the very popular Star Tours...but it was an awful story.

I don't think the intent is to belittle Peter Pan, it's to point out that the tools have improved an awful lot. I mean, look at what a staged scene looks like now, mid-ride in Seven Dwarfs by comparison. It's insane.

I still think Disney and Universal are both genius to create a coaster where a mid-ride block stop is inevitable and then create a show scene to make it a highlight of the ride.

None are as good as the Mystic Timbers shed, but it's still a nice effort.

Good point Jeff. The lift hill on Frozen Ever After is a pretty good mix of a ride need and storytelling also.

Peter Pan is too short. There I said it.

Oh wait, is this the Disneyland Peter Pan?

I went to Epcot tonight after work. If this is what everyone hates Disney looks like, I'd hate to see what it looks like if everyone likes it. So crowded.

We're kicking off a trip with a visit to Plants & Food & Wine tomorrow. Based on the availability calendar, it's going to be hopping all week.

That's interesting. I booked today yesterday, and I can get any park any day this month other than tomorrow (which starts 9 hours from now). Maybe they know we dropped a hundred bucks today on food and booze.

Not a Disney expert by any means, but isn't this supposed to be a "low-crowds" time? This is when we did both of our latest family WDW trips. (full disclosure, this was 6 years ago. Time flies).

This upcoming week is spring break for much of Florida, Texas, Ontario, and probably a few others.

Not a slow time in Orlando. I'm pretty sure this would be the blackout period for the annual passes we used to have.

If you had Gold, surprisingly not. They only do the mid-April blackout. If you have the new Sorcerer Pass, the closest replacement, it blocks Wednesday to Saturday of Thanksgiving week and the latter half of December, and that's it.

I had an Animal Kingdom reservation for today, but opted for SeaWorld when I saw the Kilimanjaro Safaris wait time was already over an hour at 9am.

That'll be the wait on Mako with one train. :)

Admittedly I was impressed today. Granted, it is the first day of Spring Break here in Orange County, but Mako and Ice Breaker both ran two trains and weren't stacking! The toll booths were a horrific cluster at 10:30ish and it took about 15 minutes to get through with a backup of only 8 or 9 cars per booth. And despite it being Spring Break, Manta didn't open until 11 and Kraken at 11:30. But I got multiple rides on Mako & Ice Breaker in the hour and a half I was there and never waited more than one train for Mako and about 15 minutes for Ice Breaker.

So, would you say the rise, is causing a... resistance?

I'll see myself out..

I have today off and booked a Hollywood Studiis reservation last night.

I "slept in" until 8:30ish. The park opens at 9, with resort entry at 8:30. The tipboard feature on the app showed I was too late to get a Rise Lightning Lane, and most Genie+ attractions worth anything were booking evening times. Had I booked one, by the time my two hour window ended anything worth booking would be gone.

Standby lines for the big rides were all 90+ minutes, with Rise at 190 and half capacity Tower of Terror at 130. At 8:30 in the morning. A half hour before the park technically opened.

I do appreciate that the tipboard shows Genie+ availability (did it always?) but it would be very easy to purchase without looking at the tipboard and then realize you were essentially paying $15 for one ride to redeem 8 hours in the future, rather than the full lineup advertised.

If we are moving toward the Gonch model (TM) of the highest possible price point to increase revenue while also lowering attendance for an optimal experience, we aren't there yet. Just browsing wait times right now, it's actually a pretty miserable experience given the higher than ever cost.

With so many of the WDW fan sites being super cringey and click-bait filled, Disney Tourist Blog always is my one go-to when I genuinely want to see how something works, get an attraction review, or get some advice. After opting out of Hollywood Studios and going to the Florida Mall Sears for some work khakis at 50% off, I came home and read this.

If I wasn't local, there is no part of me that would read this (or any of the linked articles) and go "I want to go to Disney World!"

https://www.disneytouristblog.com/hollywood-studios-genie-plus-prio...ide-ranks/

In the immortal words of this guy, "It's too crowded here"

One of the other sites plays the algorithms so hard now. Link bait headlines, six introductory paragraphs loaded with keywords, at least six "articles" a day. It was a struggle to train Google to stop putting their stuff in my news feed.