The Fabulous Disney Babe
Page 3 of 4

(c) Feld Entertainment

The lights dimmed, the show started, and Alien rocks skimmed out onto the surface of the ice, cutting through the heavy fog. Then, a cool fifties-style rocket ship glided through the curtains on the back of the ice. The top popped open and out skated Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, and Goofy, all clad in silver space outfits reminiscent of those used at EPCOT Center. Goofy fell down right in front of us, and did some amazing tricks and pratfalls all over the ice. Minnie noted that they were surrounded by bizarre alien creatures and asked us all to raise our right tentacles if we could understand them, then our left, then to clap in time with the music. Donald had a fit with the map, and it ended up with Minnie taking the rocket and leaving, with the other three chasing behind. Cool.

The planet surface remained and turned red, and a blast of pyro announced the arrival of Buzz Lightyear. The rocks opened to reveal two of The Evil Emperor Zurg's henchmen inside, and Zurg's face appeared out of the darkness at the top of the stage. The battle ended as in the video game in the film (how's that for avoiding spoilers?) and the action cut reasonably neatly to Andy's room. When "chicken man" was on TV, however, he was just standing up at the side of the audience - it didn't really capture that he was on TV, just that a chicken man was yelling in a corner of the arena. It was like watching one of those Variety shows on Telemundo.

(c) Feld Entertainment

However, when Big Al, as he's called in the Feld credits, takes to the stage, he steals the show. He does this cool little dance when he goes to steal Woody - and they have a creative and interesting way of dealing with the whole size issue - he had the audience rolling. Next, the curtain becomes a huge zipper, which Woody opens and is attacked by a gleeful Jessie. The action follows the movie pretty closely, except that, apparently, they couldn't get Mattel to okay the use of Barbie, so instead they have the Beach Girls (ice-dancing to a lengthy Beach Boys medley) and during Woody's Roundup, odd-but-cool Elvis-y cowboy puppets and big-haired cowgirl puppets take the stage. We'd gotten cotton candy in a Buzz Lightyear bag with a Dave Feiten cone hat on the top, which Alice insisted I wear (she had brought her Jessie hat, jacket and doll from home) and the scene that features the Feiten cones reminded me of the Goofy cartoon short when the mild-mannered Mr. Geef gets behind the wheel and turns murderous. It's very cleverly done.

(c) Feld Entertainment

There's a few slow patches, as I'm just not much of an ice skating fan. I'd have to ask one of the two Nancys what any given move was. But it was fun, and I want a Zurg doll like the one in the show. It's big and smoky and way, way cool. I'd put it next to my Moonliner Coke Machine and scare the neighbors with it at Halloween. Jessie's song is done as a solo skate, and is lovely. Woody sat at the edge of the ice, trying to hush the kids screaming at him. "Yell louder" said the mother of one of the little dears. Oh, for a roll of duct tape.