Extinct Attractions – One Man’s Dream II: The Magic Lives On

Welcome to Extinct Attractions. This week, I’ll be diving into what I believe is the only Disney Parks sequel attraction on record, though it was more of a rehashing than a sequel per se.

The creation of Tiana’s Bayou Adventure is cruising along with water now flowing in the flume and a first-look of one of the Tiana animatronics recently revealed. The version in Magic Kingdom will open this summer, with Disneyland’s a little bit behind as Splash Mountain closed a bit later. Both versions will be impressively transformed from Splash Mountain into Tiana’s Bayou Adventure in about a year and a half, which is an extreme sprint by Disney’s standards (lest we forget Tron Lightcycle  / Run).

For those looking for one more trip to the Laughing Place, all they need to do is hop on a quick plane ride over to Tokyo, where Tokyo Disneyland is keeping the original version around for the time being, though I’m sure they are keeping an eye on the retheme domestically to see if they’d like to make the change themselves.

Via Spotify 

Now that we are talking about Tokyo Disneyland, let’s finish out our look at the different versions of the show One Man’s Dream that had called Disneyland and Tokyo Disneyland home. My last post focused on the closure of Tokyo Disneyland’s first version of the show in 1995, when a show called Feel the Magic took over the theater before making way for Once Upon a Mouse. But even with those new shows, guests never forgot about the original One Man’s Dream, so on July 3, 2004, Tokyo Disneyland took the plunge and opened what I believe is the only true sequel to a Disney Parks attraction, One Man’s Dream II: The Magic Live On.

Now sequel was an interesting term for the show because it was more of a rehashing of the original, with some segments switched out, than an entirely new show continuing on a story. The show followed the same structure as its predecessor, starting with Mickey and Minnie in front of their black and white house. The house was a bit more subdued than the original version, but when Mickey handed Minnie some flowers, the stage truly came to life, especially with dancers representing the full gamut of the rainbow.

Turk and King Louie appeared next for a jungle hoedown with “Trashing the Camp” and “I Wanna Be Like You” combined in a medley for King Louie’s dance club that was named Coco Banana. Both of the monkeys had some really funny Hawaiian shirts on as they danced around with some of their monkeys, helping set the tone for the upcoming fun.

Via Disney Geek 

The next segment of the show was themed around A Bug’s Life, which was such a cool thing to see because I had never seen a live show with those characters in it. They’ve been in a few of the Pixar-themed parades, but nothing really with them as walk around characters. Flik and his gang of circus friends popped in to do some of their tricks, with my favorite trick occurring when Tuck and Roll were shot from a cannon across the stage. It was the chaotic fun that we had come to expect from the movie and was just so cool to see on a stage.

Peter Pan and the gang of pirates were up next, with the section remaining pretty much unchanged from the original, though Captain Hook and the Crocodile both underwent a bit of a facelift, with Captain Hook now appearing as a face characters and the Crocodile gaining a lot of bulk and becoming an inflatable that was about half the length of the stage, but still silly looking enough to not scare anyone.

Via Flickr 

The show then jumped into a villain segment, which again began with the Evil Queen transforming into her Hag appearance, though this time she basically sang a rock song, which was super fun because it was both out of place and perfect. The action then transitioned right into Judge Frollo who came out with some spooky monks to sing part of “Hellfire” while some real fire was blasted in the background. To close it out, Maleficent appeared with some henchmen to parade around the stage and cause the thorny vines to appear. Prince Phillip then emerged to defeat Maleficent and unveil Aurora who he awakened with a kiss.

The action then flowed right into the princess portion of the show with Snow White and Cinerella popping on stage with their princes, as well. The rest of this section was pretty much the same as what we had seen in the other versions of the show, but they added a more robust background to the stage and the smooth transition from villains to princesses was a really nice touch.

Via YouTube 

One Man’s Dream II also had a Hollywood section of the show, but they really upped the chaos level up here, basically substituting theater for a Hollywood film set. Donald was playing a movie star, who kept jumping from movie to movie as a cowboy, surfer and more with the “director” trying to grab as much footage as he could. There was some kind of moving walkway that he was on that kept the action going and really just led to some fun hijinks.

But after that, the show moved on to business as usual with the red carpet scenes that we had seen before and each of the characters dressed to the nines before transitioning to a song all about Mickey Mouse in a dance club type setting, where Mickey got to pop and lock along with some other characters, though this version had an awesome addition of a giant Mickey Mouse statue as well.

All in all, the show was a lot of fun and a very fitting way to succeed the first version. It modernized a lot of the experience and highlighted some of those lesser used characters like Flik and Frollo. The only thing came together so nicely that it is no wonder it was a fan favorite to the point that the show required a lottery to even get tickets.

Via Disney Wiki 

But alas, all that is good ultimately comes to an end and One Man’s Dream II: The Magic Lives On called it quits on December 13, 2019 to be briefly replaced by It’s Very Minnie and ultimately Club Mouse Beat. At 15 years, it was one of the longest running shows in the park’s history, with most barely lasting five. If you factor in the seven years of the original, no show tops it and that is quite a legacy.

Via Touring Plans 

As always, don’t forget to check out my interactive maps of the Disney Parks throughout the years where you can watch or learn more about all the attractions from every Disney park around the world.

Thanks for reading and have a magical day!