Greg Maletic: Disney's Biggest Theme Park Mistakes - May 5, 2008

Greg Maletic: Disney's Biggest Theme Park Mistakes
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Disney's America

Disney's incredibly lucky that this park wasn't built. I wrote about it in an earlier column about California Adventure, which I'll quote here:

"Disney executives should thank their lucky stars that that park wasn�t built in Virginia, California, or anywhere else. One can imagine after the first two years of lackluster attendance (as evidence, think for a minute: can you come up with any great ideas for new attractions in Disney World�s Liberty Square? Have any of your most promising ideas for future Disney attractions been situated there?) roller coasters, white water rafting rides, and simulators would flood the park, trivializing its mission and thereby becoming exactly what its detractors said it would be all along."

The sad part, however, is that in simply announcing the park the damage was already done. Disney became the company that destroyed Civil War battlefields; the company with the gall to imply that American history was too complex and intimidating for the average citizen to understand without having Mickey Mouse hold their hand.

Sprinkling Disney Characters on Something Makes It Better

Looking at it from today's super-synergized marketing perspective, it's amazing--and I mean stunning--that the theme park that Walt Disney unveiled to the world in 1955 devoted only 20% of its real estate to the characters that had made him famous. Fantasyland was where the characters lived, but the rest of the park was devoted half to Disney's own childhood, and half to the hobbies and interests that dominated his life after he'd became less enamored with animated films.

That the Disney characters weren't very important to 1955's Disneyland isn't necessarily a condemnation of the movie take-over that's been in full swing since the early '90s. But it is a reminder that those characters aren't necessary to making the park a fun and relevant* experience to guests. Disneyland became a sensation in its own right; the movie tie-ins were secondary. That they're perceived as essential now is an idea that, at the very least, can be questioned.

*relevant: a word that should never be used when describing features in a Disney park (see this article)

Disney Substitutes "Fake" for "Real," Even When Real is Cheaper and Better

Finally, here's one that I think Disney fans don't notice very much, but I believe this to be the number one reason that those not enamored with the Disney parks are...well, not enamored. It's a massive blind spot that the company has never seemed to rid itself of.

At the end of Disney's CircleVision tour of Canada in that country's Epcot pavilion, audiences are treated to a song written especially for the attraction, "Canada (You're A Lifetime Journey)." This film is designed to communicate the majesty and grandeur that is Canada, yet somehow, Disney decided that real Canadian music can't convey that feeling adequately; instead, they hired the guy who wrote the "Universe of Energy" theme song to tell you this in more explicit terms. C'mon: there isn't any actual Canadian music that would communicate this idea even more spectacularly, and in a more authentic fashion? None?

This "Disney-magic-is-better-than-reality" problem reached its apex in the previously-mentioned Disney's America, with Disney seeming to imply that Washington D.C. and an authentic Civil War battlefield weren't up to the task of telling America's story. But this problem crops up in smaller ways in the rest of Disney's parks.

Disney's Hollywood Studios is a tribute to the movies, yet you won't see any movies there. Rather than be given the opportunity to see, say, the climactic scene from Casablana acted out by legendary actors, instead, we're treated to the mostly terrible Great Movie Ride, where we get to see that same scene from Casablanca acted out incredibly unconvincingly by a pair of animatronic figures. If "The Movies" are really deserving of a tribute as grand as Disney's Hollywood Studios, why do we get the animatronic substitute, when the film version would be more entertaining to watch, tie more directly to the park's mission, and wouldn't require the expenditure of millions of dollars in research and development?

And one final example, in this quote from Joe Rohde, discussing the Animal Kingdom park:

"Each Disney theme park has a centrally-located defining monument - a castle, a huge sphere, a mountain � that iconically ironically defines the park as space, and as story. Because of our themes, the Animal Kingdom team was driven towards a natural icon. We developed the �Tree of Life�, a hundred-forty foot tall sculpted tree composed entirely of the shapes of animals from every realm of the Animal Kingdom."

Yet it didn't occur to the team that built Animal Kingdom that a "hundred-forty foot tall sculpted tree" is not a "natural icon?" It's cement and plastic. There's nothing natural about it. Again, we see this ongoing pattern: nothing "real" could possibly be grand enough for this park; we're going to have to fake it up to adequately convey to you just how amazing the natural world is. Was this irony lost on everyone who worked on this park?

To be clear about the point I'm trying to make, I'm not saying that "Canada (You're A Lifetime Journey)" is a bad song. Nor is the Tree of Life ugly; in fact, it's pretty amazing. Disney's execution tends to be excellent. But sometimes Disney plays into the hands of those who would paint the parks as being vapid and artificial with its frequent assumption that everything can be improved with a little Disney Magic. Sometimes "real" is more than good enough.

Conclusion

So there we are. No doubt my vision of a "mistake-free" Disney resort tramples right over what a few of you might think is the perfect vacation. Let the firestorm commence. What did I get wrong? What did I miss? What are your biggest "theme park mistakes?"

Discuss It

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-- Greg Maletic

In addition to being a lifelong Disney park fan, Greg Maletic is a designer, software developer, and the producer of the documentary TILT: The Battle to Save Pinball. He is based out of San Francisco.

The opinions expressed by our guest columnists, and all of our columnists, do not necessarily represent the feelings of LaughingPlace.com or any of its employees or advertisers. All speculation and rumors about the future of Disneyland and the Walt Disney Company are just that - speculation and rumors - and should be treated as such.

-- Posted May 5, 2008

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