On Friday, May 20th after eight months of renovations, Hollywood Studios reopened Star Tours, the Star Wars-inspired motion simulator ride, just in time for the first of many Star Wars Weekends which attract thousands of fans to the Disney parks on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays every May and June.
Star Tours: The Adventures Continue and its sister ride in Disneyland which reopens in June have been revamped with a new flight path, new characters, state-of-the-art 3-D effects, and even a new line queue. Each ride experience will be a little different as the simulator flies through one of 54 different scene combinations, including a pod race on Tatooine and a visit to Padmé Amidala’s home planet, Naboo.
Sign for Star Tours: The Adventures Continue, photograph by Samantha McElhaney
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On June 3rd, 2011, more than 20 years after The Little Mermaid splashed into theaters, Disney’s California Adventures theme park will finally launch an attraction starring everyone’s favorite mermaid, Ariel.
Ariel’s Undersea Adventure is a five-and-a-half minute ride-through attraction that takes guest on a journey through scenes from the beloved movie, with a soundtrack that includes some of the film’s most popular songs – “Part of Your World,” “Under the Sea,” “Kiss the Girl,” and “Poor Unfortunate Souls.”
Concept art for Ariel's Undersea Adventure at Disney's California Adventures park, copyright Disney
Disney Fans Insider recently published an article with fascinating behind-the-scenes details about the new attraction. The article highlights the technical advances in digital 3D design programs that allowed the Disney Imagineers to fully realize the 183 characters featured in the ride, from animating Ariel’s hair and designing “skin suits” to creating the sea witch Ursula, one of the most advanced Audio-Animatronic figures ever built.
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I have been to Walt Disney World five times in 25 years, from my first visit at age four to my Disney honeymoon last fall. Five visits isn’t much to brag about, and that number is easily eclipsed – yearly – by Florida locals with season passes and Disney fanatics with frequent flier miles. I’ve been to all four resort parks, but there’s still a lot of Disney World that I’ve never experienced, including Epcot’s International Flower & Garden/Food & Wine Festivals, the Disney marathon, and the spectacular holiday lights.
A view of Cinderella's Castle at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom, photograph by Valerie Champagne
Although I occasionally suffer Disney withdrawal symptoms, I’m happy with the infrequency of my park visits. Other than saving $$, the greatest advantage to visiting the parks every few years is that the magic never gets old (even when you do!), and there’s always something new to see.
I don’t remember much about my first visit to Disney World, other than watching my two-year-old brother transform into a hitchhiking ghost at the end of the Haunted Mansion ride. There were four of us squeezed into the Doom Buggies: my parents on the ends and my brother and I in the center where the ghosts are projected. The Haunted Mansion was my first Disney memory and it’s still one of my absolute favorite Disney attractions that only gets better with age.
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The Disney Princess franchise, which features a line-up of Disney’s most beloved heroines, is one of Disney Consumer Products’ most successful campaigns, helping raise product sales from $300 million in 2001 to $3 billion in 2005. The success of the line is far from surprising; after all, what little girl doesn’t fantasize about growing up to be a beautiful princess like Cinderella or a kick-ass warrior like Mulan? Disney Princess merchandise makes the fantasy come alive through costumes, clothes, dolls, tea party sets, sing-along CDs, bedding, accessories, castle play sets, books, figurines, and more.
Seven of the princesses featured in the current Disney Princess line, copyright Disney
Officially, the current line includes nine “princesses”: Snow White, Pocahontas, Aurora, Ariel, Tiana, Cinderella, Jasmine, Belle, and Mulan. In the past decade other characters have made unofficial appearances in the line, and recently Rapunzel from Disney’s Tangled has been featured in a number of Disney Princess sets. Given Tangled‘s enormous success at the box office, it is likely that Rapunzel will soon join the ranks as an official Disney Princess.
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