A Walk Around D23: Disney Parks and Resorts Pavilion
Hi everybody!
My sincere apologies to everyone who’s been waiting for me to continue our tour of the D23 Expo – unfortunately, the real world kept interfering with my plans to return to Shandy’s Corner. As a reward for you patience, I’m going to postpone our escalator ride to the second floor of Expo and show you the highlight of the Expo show floor – the Walt Disney Parks and Resorts exhibit.
If you’re a fan of the parks and resorts like me, you geeked out the minute you approached the Parks and Resorts pavilion, Why?
Ho hum, I hear you say – it’s just some kind of odd illustration. But as you get closer, take a good look…
The outside wall features a collection of attraction posters from all the parks, including more than a few posters from extinct attractions. (Note to WDI: PLEASE make this into a screensaver and sell it! Really. I’ll be the first to pre-order it.)
Anyway, after you stand in a queue (yes, you even queue up to go into an exhibit about the parks), you’re admitted into the pre-show area, which features a wall display made to look like an old TV.
The pre-show is a brief “sizzle reel” done up in the style of the classic Disney TV shows; the themed “lands” from the Disneyland TV show are echoed here in the lands of the exhibit.
But how do you get into the exhibit? At the end of the sizzle reel, your TV becomes the portal to the exhibit.
Pretty cool, huh? And we’re just getting started.
The first room in the exhibit gives us a peek at Cars Land, the new land coming to Disney’s California Adventure in 2012 that will allow us to visit Radiator Springs and all its residents. The centerpieces of this exhibit are models of Cars Land and the facade to Radiator Springs Racers, the land’s E-ticket attraction. The models even come in three handy sizes – small…
medium…
… and humungous. The Imagineer standing next to the model should give you some idea of this model’s scale.
Actually, this is a good time to point out something interesting about the Parks and Resorts exhibits. All those Disney folks that you’ll be seeing as we go through the exhibit are Imagineers – and not interns or folks that that they just hired, either; the presenters are experienced Imagineers who worked on the projects they’re exhibiting, and who can tell you all about what you’re looking at. But I digress.
Also in this first hall is our friend Lightning McQueen. Lightning’s got a bit of laryngitis today, but you can still see how the Imagineers will be making his lips move when you encounter him in Radiator Springs Racers.
The next room in the exhibit tells about the history and the future of one of the most important elements found in many classic Disney attractions – Audio-Animatronics. As you enter the room, you first encounter a man who’s a milestone - the Mr. Lincoln AA figure from the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair edition of “Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln.” This is only about the third time the Mr. Lincoln figure has been seen in public since the end of the World’s Fair.
Next to Mr. Lincoln is a very accurate replica of a suit worn by President Obama. Another one of these is worn by the President Obama figure in the recently revised Hall of Presidents at the Magic Kingdom. (Is it my imagination, or is Mr. Lincoln looking longingly at Obama’s suit?)
Across the way, you can see some equipment used to program Audio-Animatronic figures – from the joystick that Walt used to move and program the Enchanted Tiki Room’s Barker Bird on an episode of “Wonderful World of Color” to the sophisticated board used to program figures in the 70’s (covered with drawings by animator and Imagineer Bill Justice). Representing today’s programming technology is an Imagineer using a computer to animate the next-generation Mr. Lincoln that will be going into “Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln” at Disneyland later this year.
Next to this exhibit, we can see some exhibits dedicated to the technology and science that makes the figures so lifelike, like samples the “skin” put on the figures and a gigantic moving eyeball.
There’s also a show nearby to introduce you to Otto, an AA figure that demonstrates features of new systems called Autonomatonics. These systems are prototypes today, but someday, they’ll allow figures to modify their show routines in response to the audience, by doing things like counting the number of people in the audience and looking for smiles on the faces of guests.
But the big stars of this room are without a doubt two autonomous AA figures you may have seen on TV or in the Disney parks – WALL-E and Lucky the Dinosaur. They trade off making appearances about every 15 minutes or so, and guests can queue to have their picture taken with them.
I know it’s going to be hard to tear yourselves away from WALL-E and Lucky, but we’ve got one more room to explore! As we enter the third room, we get a look at some adventures we’ll be able to experience outside of the Disney theme parks. For example, remember when you were in pre-school and you’d play and make things in the sandboxes or sand tables? Well, the Imagineers are giving guests the chance to do that again. As you might expect when Imagineers are involved, these are no ordinary sand tables – with a little technological magic, the shapes and contours you make in the sand tables come to life in colors and animation.
Speaking of playing in the sand, how’d you like to see a little of the soon-to-open Disney Vacation Club resort in Hawaii? Well, you’re in luck – there’s a model and some illustrations on display.
Next to the Hawaii DVC Exhibit is a model of the Disney Dream, the next ship to be added to the Disney Cruise Line. Not far from the model is a replica of the statue of Admiral Donald, which will be in the atrium of the Dream.
Now, there are some exhibits of the new Mickey balloon that will be in the next Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade and exhibits on Adventures by Disney and the DVC Villas at the Grand Californian, but if you’re anything like me, you’re not paying much attention to these things. Nope – you’re looking at a large model of the new lands coming soon to Hong Kong Disneyland!
And the model is jsut the beginning. The remainder of the room we’re in is devoted to the three new lands to open at the newest Disney magic kingdom, with overviews of the lands and of the headliner attractions in them. For example, there’s a display on Mystic Manor, the new generation attraction that’s kinda like the Haunted Mansion, but kicked up a notch. Just looking at the concept art and the room diagram makes me want to start planning a trip to China.
There are also exhibits on Toy Story Land (although the details on what was coming there seem to be a bit sketchy so far), and Grizzly Mountain, a new western-themed area with a wild roller coaster. With a name like Grizzly Mountain, you’d expect to run into a few Audio-Animatronic bears somewhere along the way, and the Imagineers don’t disappoint.
Unfortunately, that’s the end of our tour of the Walt Disney Parks and Resorts pavilion, but we’ll continue our tour of the D23 Expo soon. There’s still a lot more fun stuff to see!