All Things Disney - Except Movies

As I remembered, Avatar is not a great movie. The CGI characters look fine (sometimes a bit weird) but the best part of the visuals are the landscapes and the dragons the Navi fly. Some scenes were really stunning and hold up amazingly well 11 years later. The battle scenes at the end were also very cool.

Many have said it before but the story is one we've all seen a million times...it's Dances with Wolves but the Indians are blue and from a different planet. It couldn't be more obvious. The invaders have much better tech and the natives are connected with the land, have long black hair and shoot bows and arrows. And the star starts off trying to infiltrate them but then falls in love and changes his mind and of course his OG plan comes out eventually and his love interest gets all pissed but comes around by the end. Some of the dialogue is straight up cringe worthy. There are parts that are played straight but come off as really awful jokes. I mean come on, the only original part of this movie was the VFX.

One thing I forgot about though was that the native's home base was a giant tree. That fits so well with Avatar Land being in AK since the centerpiece of that park is a giant tree with a ton of different animals carved in its bark.

I am happy I watched it though. The Flight of Passage ride is all about flying on one of those dragons and I forgot how that was directly related to the movie. Same goes for a lot of the props in the queue for the ride that are directly taken from scenes in the movie.

IDK/it feels kinda weird that I don't really like the movie but love the theme park land.

Avatar Movie: 2.5/5
Avatar Land: 5/5
 
I took all the normal pics while at Animal Kingdom of the animals and rides and all that but check out what caught my eye:




The Otter Grotto is sponsored by OtterBox! Hah! That's the best corporate tie in ever!
 
IdRatherBeSkiing said:
I am probably the only person that has never seen that movie.
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I, too, have never seen Avatar. Or any James Bond movies. Or any Harry Potter movies. Or any Star Wars films. Or Casablanca, Citizen Kane, Gone With The Wind, Titanic or The Wizard Of Oz. I've seen only one superhero film and I can't say what it is because this thread is for "All things Disney, except movies." It starred Kurt Russell and Kelly Preston. You can look it up. In one scene, a school bus (through the magic of special effects) becomes airborne. The secene was shot at Devil's Gate Dam in Pasadena, just a few miles east of where I live.
 
Channel98 said:
I, too, have never seen Avatar. Or any James Bond movies. Or any Harry Potter movies. Or any Star Wars films. Or Casablanca, Citizen Kane, Gone With The Wind, Titanic or The Wizard Of Oz.
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Not a surprise (I still think the Wizard of Oz omission is insane, though). I've never sat through an entire Groucho Marx or Three Stooges movie. So there.
 
Yeah I'm surprised anyone over 40 or so has never seen the Wizard of Oz.

Have not watched Avatar yet, but I probably will soon enough.
 
Even by my very low bar for Disney insanity, I've gone nuts this week. But there is a pretty simple explanation.

Monday was the 1 year anniversary of Hendrik kicking the bucket. I anticipated being kinda sad so I scheduled an epcot trip. As always it was fun. And here is what may be the cutest thing ever; Pooh trying to catch butterflies with a net.



Turns out I didn't really feel sad. Of course I'd rather have a living father but I wasn't down in the dumps or anything. I took my day trip to epcot and came home. Then this morning I woke up and was totally jonesing for more Disney. So I quickly put some things together and got in the car. Got back up here at around 2pm and spent from 3:15pm until close at MK. I also got a room at my cheap motel again and I'll be doing MK round two tomorrow.

Now I don't think I need a shrink to figure out that the anniversary and my 2 Disney trips in 3 days are directly related. Dead dad anniversary = not fun, Disney = fun. Put them together and they cancel each other out I guess.

I did Astro Orbiter today. The first time I've ever been on that ride. If you don't know it's like Dumbo but on the roof of the WEDWay People Mover (that is sadly closed until October) and goes a little faster. It was fun and you get really good views of the park. Here is a pic of the new Tron coaster construction from up there:



It's amazing to me that I've been going to these parks since elementary school and there are still rides I've never done.

I did a bunch of stuff today, the park was nearly empty. 7 Dwarfs Mine Train was only a 20 min wait! Space Mountain was a walk on (so I rode it 4 times)! And for some reason it's easier to get reservations. I was able to make the reservation same day. I thought that would mean they were letting more people in the parks but like I said the place was as empty as Disney ever gets.

Couple more pics...

I really want to stay at The Contemporary with a park view one day. Too bad it's like $600/night. I thought this was a good one, taken from the boat on the way back to the parking lot with the monorail about to go in the building:



Thunder mountain was only about a 5 min wait. Crazy!



I only spent about 4 hours there today due to my spur of the moment decision. Tomorrow I'll have the full day.
 
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JHDK said:
I really want to stay at The Contemporary with a park view one day. Too bad it's like $600/night. I thought this was a good one, taken from the boat on the way back to the parking lot with the monorail about to go in the building:
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Can you still ride the monorail through there?
 
We rode the monorail through when I was there in 95. We were poor students, so we stayed at Sport.
The architect that did the Contemporary also did the Capitol Records building.
Capitol_Records_Building_in_Hollywood.png
 
I went to the parks 6 times this month. This month was my first time back since October 2019. I re-upped my annual pass back then but my 2019 pass had not yet expired so this month was also the first time using it and I already more than paid it off.

The weekday select annual pass for FL residents is $370.

I made two trips where I stayed overnight. There is currently a deal where they have a 2 day pass for $130 so that's $260 right there. A 1 day, 1 park pass is $109 so there is another $218. Add in 6 days of parking at $25 a pop and we have yet another $150.

For a grand total of $628. Subtract my pass from that and I saved: $258!

Now let's factor in some non-park related costs. It takes less than 2 tanks of gas for me to get there and back but let's call it 2 so it's easy so that's 8 tanks since I did the 2 overnights. At around $25 per tank that's $200. Then factor in the tolls. I was lazy and took the FL Turnpike the whole way all but once. Doing that is a little less than $30 in tolls. Once again to make it easy let's just say I took the Turnpike every time so that another $120.

So $320 in getting there fees. Now we are at all 6 visits to the parks costing me $62. Factor in another $20 for dollar menu trash food I buy up there, along with the 2 motel fees of $49/night and going to the parks 6 times in a month cost me a grand total of $180.

I can cut that total down by avoiding 100 miles of tolls each way and bringing my own food which I will likely try to do this month.

Overall I'm pretty happy with that and I'll probably find myself back up there sometime this week.
 
Channel98 said:
According to Celebrity Net Worth, Whoopi Goldberg is worth $45 million. How much of that is she willing to contribute?

www.cnn.com

Whoopi Goldberg wants Disney to build a Wakanda theme park

"The View" co-host Whoopi Goldberg is calling on Disney to build a Wakanda theme park in honor of the late actor Chadwick Boseman.
www.cnn.com www.cnn.com
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While they have built Toy Story and Star Wars lands, they are not going to build a whole land for 1 part of Marvel. In Anaheim they are currently building a whole Marvel land. In epcot they are building one ride for Guardians of the Galaxy (which is going to be awesome btw.). They may build a Black Panther ride at some point and have it be part of the Marvel land but that would be it.
 
This fish playing a sax made out of coral encapsulates my love of Disney and why I make the 200 mile drive to get here so often at the drop of a hat.




Like I said before, that Little Mermaid ride in MK is a real sleeper hit and has become a must do every time I'm here. Today was no exception.
 
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