The Disney Living Character Initiative

Welcome back to another edition of the Disney Dish podcast with Jim Hill. It's me Lent Testa. And this is our Chef for the weeek of Shursdayay june twenty second, twenty twenty six on the show todayod, news, including new fireworks. And listener questions, what's the difference between a forty eight dollars steak and a sixty five dollars steak. plus surve. Then in our main segment, Jim looks at immagineering's work on living creatures in the parks, like Lucky the dinosaur and Muppets mobile labs Let's get started by bringing in the man who points out that Willie Nelson released the song, Mamas, Don't let Y your babies grow upp to be cowboys in nineteen seventy eight. And exactly eighteen years later, in nineteen ninety six, Paula Cole wrote a song asking, Where have all the cowboys gone? Its mister Jim Hill. Jim is it going B, that is a perfect example of cause and effect. Okay. but's. But that's it. Speaking of Wildy Nelson, he famously performed at the opening night party for Disney MGM back on april thirtieth, nineteen eighty nine, shared D really? He did. He did. He shared a bill with the poointer sisters and George Burns. Now also worth noting that Mr. Nelson performed a number of times at the White House with perhaps his most famous performance happenaing on september thirteenth, nineteen eighty, a massive outdoor concert on the South laawn, even A there was a special moment during this concert where Willie performed a duet with first lady, Rosaln Carger. I didn't even know she was a member of the Grand old Opery, but okay. All right. There we go All right brring up that story and again, september thirtieth, nineteen eighty because in his autobiography, which Willie published in nineteen eighty eight, he mentioned that before the concert he slipped away and got up to the rooftop of the White House where he then fired up what he called a fat Austin torpedo. right? And And not only that he may may have shared this with Jimmy Carter's son Chip The statute of limitations has long expired, Jim. Go ahead. abbsolutely. But I bring this up because again, autobiography published in nineteen eighty eight, we jump ahead now to the spring of ' eighty nine, where Michael Eisner, the then CEO of the Walt Disney Comany actually reaches out to the cast member who's been assigned to be Willie Nelson's celebrity handler while He's on property. Oh you know what that Hey, by the way. I'm sure everything's gonna to be fine. That's it exactly. If mister Nelson asks for access to the roof of the Chinese Sedar or any other building on Disney proroperty, you're to just say no So I love that you included the phrase J just I know that's beautiful. There we go. Yeah, Willie Nelson's a national treasure. He is, he is. And speaking of national treasures, Jim, let's do a quick shout out to our subscribers. Thanks to everyone who subscribes over to patreon. com slash gymLMedia including Ryan Nolan, Scott Shaw, Brian Collins, Chad Ryan, Eko O A, and Jen Surma. Jim These are the Disney imagineers whose ideas sadly did not make it into the final version of Hollywood Studios upcoming Magic of Disney Animation including Achery prractice with Merida, cliff diving with Pocahontas, and Ariial's trading body parts for fun and profit workhop. True story There's only room for so much stuff, Jim. There we go. And again, she has a wonderful cave filled with stuff. There you go. All right, onto the news. Jim. The Disneyish News is sponsored by unlockedmagic d. com from our friends at dVcrentalstore d. com Disney says the haaunted Msion has nine hundred and ninety nine ghosts, but has anyone ever really checked Teach your kids the importance of independent research and good math skills by visiting unlockmagic dot com now for discounted theme park admission at prrices Better than Disney's. All right, ono the news, Jim. Every show should begin with a round of self congratulations. On the march twenty third show, we answered a question from Joe who couldn't book a Disney World hotel room for one night for his parents because Disney's website, there were no rooms available and when Joe checked later, there were fifteen hotels with availability And we said It's unlikely that the entire Walt Disney resort was sold out, what was more likely was that the reservation system Disney uses was holding back rooms for people looking to book stays longer than two nights. And that gets Disney more revenue and it also prevents the night over night map of hotel room occupancy. from looking like a block of Swiss cheese. Jim Disney recently applied for a patent around hotel room assignments that confirms this is what happens. And they actually use the phrase virtual reservations, where virtual reservations may be created and or updated by an optimization module that says that the virtual reservation is something that Disney creates and it acts like the riom is booked, but it's not And the point there is to avoid short gaps between one reservation and another so that they can assign longer reservations or satisfy longer reservations when they come in. So Jim, this is the first time we've actually seen written proof in a patent That this is what Disney does. But it answers a lot of questions, right? Oh, absolutely. I mean, you know, it's nice to have verified what we suspected, but at the same time, it just, you know it just seems like Disney is continuing to stack the deck toward obviously folks who are booking two, three, four day stays have deeper pockets. Yeah. But it's nice to see that actually that there's confirmation that that happens. So we know we know how they in order to win at the game, Jim, you first have to know how the game is played. And so that's what helps us with Yeah. Yeah they go. Also Jim, our friends over at WDW Magic are reporting that Disney's made perman the verification of Disney Rort stays for guests getting on buses or boats at Disney Springs Hi Jim This is almost certainly to avoid having people park at Disney Springs for free and take buses to the parks, right? Yeah. A quick question. So is it that they have to show A resort ID or you what are the bus drivers doing? We're not sure how that implementation is going to work. My sense is that you're going to have to show something on my Disney experxperience or Sin and Magic band that says, yes, I've got a reservation. And the good news is, let's say you're Disney Springs And you want to go over to the Grand Floridian. as long as you have any Disney resort reservation, you could be saying it all our music. But the bus will take you to the Grand Floridian and as long as you have a reservation on site So it's really just for offsite people trying to resort hop. Yeah, I get that. I just I just feel bad for the cast members who drive the buses now. This is something extra that they have to do. Yeah, enforcement wasn't really in the job description. I wonder if they're going to get extra cast members and just put them out in front of the bus stops. This' a little easier. Yeah. The other thing that WW Magic is reporting is that this may extend over to getting to any of the resorts from anywhere else like the parks And this is the part that was a little bit more confusing to me. Like if I'm at if I'm at Disney's Hollywood stududios and I want to take a bus over to pop century or a Skyllander over to pop century Why can't I? Yeah. I mean you have literally either if you're there, if you're at the studio, you paid to park, you probably have an admission ticket if you unless you go over to the ticket booth and buy one. Yeah. They're already there with their wall at Disney. whyy would we need additional verification? Have you spent money? Yeah, this is the thing I was trying to figure out Like, if I'm in Magic Kingdom and I want to take the bus to, you know, the boardwalk What's what's the thing? what's the bad thing that's happening that Disney's trying to prevent by asking me if I have a resort reservation. The only thing I could come up with was some sort of weird pool hopping Loophole. likeike let's say you're staying in a one hundred and ninety two a hotel on one hundred ninety two US one hundred ninety two Aerlo Bronsson Highway you can uber over to Disney's Hollywood stududios and get dropped off there. No one's checking for admission, no one's checking for reserve virration because that's how drop offff works. I could then take my entire family, hop on the skyliner and heade over to pop Centry. for a pool day. I could do that Yeah. And then, you know just take an Uberf pops entry back to my offs site hotel. But how often is that happening And does the economic impact of that offset the cost and hassle of implementing this check on literally everyone else. Okay. That' haven't figured out. Yeah. Okay. o. I mean, I don't want to wander in a more sinister direction, you know that this is more related to security rather than could also be security, right? Right? That was my other thing. Yeah It could be. Yeah. could be.. That's fair tit. Yeah.. I mean that would be that would be a reasonable reasonable thing. The other thing is like I could see If I'm a guest at Port Orleans and I want to go get one of the beignets, which are appearing all over social media If the line for beignets is one hundred people long, and sixty of those people are not staying at the resort. I could see limiting access to the resort to resort guests because at that point Offsite guests or people not staying at the hotel are impacting the experience of people who stayed there. I could see my way to that. Yeah Yeah. J again, I just want to caution Disney about, you know, there's already a narrative out there that, you know, going vacation at Disney World is very, very expensive, but you don't want to add to that and it's such a hassle to use the buses pull up my phone and show that I'maying at the resort and yadda yadda yadda, you know just you have to show your travel your travel documents were exactly pay us. You know Exactly. pay my letters of transit from Casablanca There go All right. Our friends over at blogmicky. com have reported on a new two park two day ticket for late summer and early fall for one hundred ninety nine dollars per adult. Andageure it's only for EpCot an animal kingdom But the interesting thing is this, it's stackable with other existing hotel discounts and you don't require park reservations because it's a date based ticket. So you choose a start date and the ticket has to be used within four days of that date. You do only get one admission per park. used on two separate days. so you can't visit both parks on the same day. I think though you can go upcot, uppcot or animal Kingdom animal Kingdom. Like there's no restriction that you have to use each parts Here Jim, here's the interesting thing. I went back and looked all the way to the year two thousand and I could not find a similar park today ticket discount Disney does not generally release two day ticket discounts at all. So this is the notable thing about that. Oh, absolutely. and also factoring in it's to park two specific parks, you know, right EpCotT, you know, which can, you know, again, is huge and can eat a lot of people and and Animal Kingdom which need some help. you know, just interesting that, you know, studios isn't you know on this and certainly kingdoms I think what that tells us is that Magic Kingdom and Hollywood stududios demand are relatively solid right now. EpCod in Animal Kingdom, especially now with Dinalo Eclosed probably needs the help. Yeah, but a rare two day ticket discount. Okay. twenty twenty six is the year of surprises. It is. All right overver at Lakeshore Lodge I haveve learned this week that the pool area has a name called the Wetlands and it's going to be Pocaonas themed. I think that's good. What do you think, Jim? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I have to admit some of the concept art that you have here in the show notes the oversized cattails in the water playay area This This is interesting. I'm guessing those catills are going be encrusted in foam because you're gonna have a bunch of kids running around in water and you don't want them running into it. Yeah. Oh dear, I hadn't even thought of that. Yes. Yes. home from Disneyw was a complimentary head injury. The lazy River though looks fantastic. I mean, we haven't talked a lot about the ool complex at Lakeshore Lodge, but it's probably going to be the nicest one in any Disney resort. Yeah ye. And maybe this has something to do with the you know shutting down the transport between resorts without ID. Oh Allright, there you go. D look at you, Jim That's fantastic. Great ide did. Yeah. You you want to get that out ahead of time? Yeahah, nice. All right, Jim. overver at Disneyland. We recently reported on the rumor that Disney's recently purchased a large number of electric car batteries, possibly for Disneyland's Autopia And then reporter Samy Roths, formerly of the Los Angeles Times, has additional background information on why this is happening and the timeline for doing so So the conversion was apparently triggered by an alleged air quality violation in early twenty twenty four, the California Air Resources Board sent Disney a notice of violation alleging that Atopia's gas engines were out of compliance with emissions rules. And then that's because five months earlier, Disney had voluntarily said that the engines were not properly certified And the source of that violation was allegedly Honda, who also notified Disney about the noncompliance and then Disney notified the state. I want to point in here that this is how you're supposed to handle things like this. You tell the people affected and you take responsibility. So everyone did exactly what they were supposed to once the once the issue came to light As part of the settlement, Disney agreed to retire gas powered engines no later than thirty months from the date of the settlement And there's a PowerPoint link in the show notes. The date of the settlement was august first, twenty twenty four thirty months from that is february first, twenty twenty seven So that's the last day on which Atopia has to either have electric motors or it can't operate. There we go. F february first, twenty twenty seven, either Atopia shuts down or it has electric cars by then. Okay. Well. All right. there we go. I have to admit, I kind of enjoy the fact that the system worked the way it was supposed to there. C of I know. And good researching there by Samy Roth. This included getting a Freedom of Information actct request in for the PowerPoint that describe the remediation process. All right, Jim. overver it's Universal Universal Celestial Good Night is the name of the new Epic Universe Fireworks show that starts july seventh. So a couple of weeks And this is going to be the thing in Celestial Park. Jim this is also, I think when Universal is going to allow guests to stay in Celestial Park even without tickets Yeah That seems like a fair bet, right? Yeah. And that supposedly was field tested with that hair stylist convention that was held at the Orange County Convention Center earlier this month. You know, the notion of just having people U bleed into the park, you know in the last hour or two of operations and seemeem to have worked okay. So going to be interesting to see this in actual operation with Celestial Good Night in operation. I mean, that's obviously going to be a bigger draw than hey, do you want to come in for two hours and walk around the center of a theme park but not go any rides. Right. Yeah. It's going to be interesting to see how many people this draws and what they do Like when they arrive and what they do between the time that they arrive, like their fireworks.. Also Jim Universal Orlandos announced another house for Halloween horror nights, which is Stranger Things. So this is the last year of the on Netflix, right? This is the final season that just aired earlier this year. It did There is, I just want to note, there is that animated Stranger Things series that's kind of a brand extension. but for all intents and purposes, the series has shut down with part two of the final season. I want to say dropped in December. was that it It was a two part drop, right? So Yeah ye. And the both parts dropped into seal So it was actually okay twenty twenty five, way twenty five. That was the end. Okay, fair All. I ono surveys. Our friend McKenzie sent in two Disney World surveys. onene from Boulder Ridgevillas and one from Disney's Animal Kingdom The one from Boulder Ridge asks this question What airline did you use to depart from the state of Florida? and it lists everything from Alaska all the way through United. Jim, I suspect, this is Disney checking which airlines the resort guests are using, which may be different than the general MCO passenger sets for resort airline check and expansion. Like if Disney was going to pick a new airline to serve in the resort airline check in. What would be the most popular one with resort guests? That's what I think they're doing there. No, that makes sense.. The other one this was really interesting. Did the Disney waterater Park admission benefit on the check in day replace a Disney water park ticket that you would have purchased Wow. Okay. you know did we get your money or did we not get your money? Please let us know. Exactly, Exactly. Okay. And then another one was, which of the following best describes you and your family's experience with the Bluey TV show It's one of m and my family's most watch shows. I watch it regularly, I watch it occasionally. I've seen a few episodes, and I've never watched Booy So this is them clearly trying to gauge interest in the the property, right? Yeah. And again, you know, Disney remember has a vested interest. They are already committed to releasing that bluey feature film next August. But you know, obviously, again, you know we've talked about how popular the show has been at Disneyland out in California, too a lesser extent, Animal Kingdom. But I think a lot of that also is, you know what it takes to get back to Bluey. Yeah, this is still a Disney trying to engage what we do with Bluey, especially in Florida going forward. Right Fair. That's good point. The last question I want to highlight in this survey is one that is in response to the question, would you come back to the Disney World Resort in the next five years? And if you answered yes It asks you which of the following Walt Disney World hotel guest benefits and experiences? arere the reasons why you would come back and you get to check all that you apply. And I won't go over all of them because it's in the show notes in images, but it's things like the waterpark benefit compimentary standard parking at the parks, extended evening theme park hours, room configuration, my overall experience at Boulder Ridgevilleas last time I say. Things like early theme park entry, resort cleanliness and so on. but it also includes things like the ability to purchase lightningan in advance Disney Vacation cub points, an extended window for making dining reservations. The faction that The number of choices that you can make goes on for multiple pages or multiple screen scrolls if you're on a mobile device. It tells me that Disney's trying to figure out eith one of two things here. One, what benefits do we need to hype up? on the website to people who are planning or coming to the website to look at vacation options But then number two, I think it's like which of these things that we offer doesn't really move the needle for resort guests? That's probably wise 'cause that, you know just having that information allows you to take the dead wood out of the website. Simplify, ye. BeCcause you only have a few seconds, you know, when people click on a website to All right, do I want to do this? No, moving on to the next thing. and pushing the features that really catch people's eye or make them think, oh, I really do want to book a Disney World vacation. Again, know, right moving those to the top, that's a smart play. All right, another survey that was sent in by Lucy and Blake includes a couple of questions from a Disney survey that pops up after you research a trip but don't book. And the question is is which of the following are reasons why you ended up not? booking a trip with us. One of them, Jim was transportation to Orlando is too expensive which I thought was super interesting. And then there's a follow up question, and if we've seen this follow up question before It's thinking about your experience in planning in a Walt Disney World vacation, how much do you agree or disagree with each of the following statements and one of them is planning a Walt Disney World vacation is too complex requires too much research 's too time consuming, requires me to make too many decisions and so on. And the interesting thing is I've got three screen caps of this question. And everyone who sent it in either somewhat or strongly agreed with all of the questions that planning a mult to zero vacation is more complicated than planning a vacation to other destination That's telling Especially when you consider somebody who's listening to this podcast is is already a Disney fan? Yeah, exactly. Well, the interesting thing is this, Disney is rolling out AI trip planning features to its website. We've seen screen caps of certain parts of it that certain guests have got, I guess, as a test run Jim, I suspect the new AI features that Disney's rolling out to their website are designed to do a couple of things. One make the planning process easier But two, I suspect Disney might want to start cutting travel agents out of the booking process to save revenue. And so I did some numbers here because one of the people that saw the preview of these AI planning tools was a travel agent who emailed me with some of the screen caps and was like, do you think they're try to get rid of travel agents? So I looked at, you the screen caps about what the AI was trying to help with. But then I went and tried to do some back of napkin math on how much Disney pays travel agents and commissions. So just for kicks, Travel Wekly said in twenty twenty five that around one out of every five domestic trips used a travel agent So Disney Worlds Parks had around forty nine million guests in twenty twenty four the last year for which we have stats. Let's say that everyone went to all four parks just to be conservative and to make the numbers easier. That's twelve million guests give or take. And let's say three people per family, that's four million family trips So twenty percent of four million families Using travel agents would be eight hundred thousand family trips But that twenty percent would be biased towards longer or more expensive or more complicated stays because you don't need a travel agent if you're going for one night, right. So a five night stay with discounts at Port Orleans, this july is around three thousand dollars for hotels and tickets. I think the Tvel aggent commission on that is ten percent for the hotel, eight percent for the tickets. so eight hundred thousand trips is around two hundred forty million dollars The Disney's Pen in commission to travel agents for Walt Disney World trips two hundred and forty million dollars. if Disney can use AI to save one third of that, that's eighty million dollars a year in expense savings And it gives them more control over things like upselling add ons, like Photopest. It also gives them a ton more of data collection so they know that they're They know the things that their guests are concerned about when they're planning trips, which helps them with marketing And so on. Wow. Okaykay. Wlcome to the future. Yeah for something. It is, it is. All right. ono listener questions, Jim. Our friend Alex pointed out in last week's show, where we said the story of Mstropolis that's coming up in Hollywood stududios is that it's a special day and we're invited. It's the same plot device used in other rides and we listed things like Zotopia, the upcoming andcontent ride ten is by addventure or Fuzver after. And Alex points out that we missed other examples of special days to which you're invited, including New Year's Eve at Pleasure Island, which we talked about last week, and celebrating Friendship Day every day at Crystal Palace. So two more examples of that. Okay, G, again, I think I said last week, you, I just I would love to be able to go to Mstropolis on an average Tuesday. Genner just second. Exactly. Our friend David Verdin with this question, he said why is this seven ounce Cinner cut fillet at Steakhouse seventy do one forty eight dollars with one side in one sauce, whereas the same seven ounce fillet with one side and one sauce is sixty five dollars att Gotsman Steakhouse. What explains the seventeen dollars difference for what appears to be the same meal So first thing I did, Jim, of course, is check the morning fararm report on the USDA website. For those of you that are interested in that, it's the booxed USDA Choice Tnderloin report and that is I put it a link in the show notes It's running four hundred eighty five to seventeen twenty four per pound. I'm assuming that Disney's not serving USDA select. They're going with choice or better. right? And then I asked our friend, Johnna Parker, our go to expert on all things food pricing and trends about this. And Joh has speculated that a large part of the pricing difference might be how much convention traffic the restaurant gets. So you'd expect Yachtsmen to get more of that than say Stake us seventy one sinces the contemporary resort is appealing to guests who want easy access to the magic kingdom And yeah, I know that Yacht Club is walking distance to Epcot and Hollywood stududios, but I think Yacht gets more convention traffic than Steakhouse seventy one So it could be Jim, that seventeen of thell seventy dollars of the sixty five dollars price is literally because you're in an expense account. O Wow. Wow. Okay.. Speaking of Disney and stake related news, I don't, you know, of course, one of the best places on property do get a stake is the boath house of Disney Springs Oh yeah, yeah, exactly. I don't know if you saw the news last week, but Stehven Slucer, the gentleman who developed the boathhouse, not to mention T Rex and rainforeorest Cfe U David outser making a movie of his life get. Yeah. Steve has a crazy origin story. you know, we don't have time to tell on today's show, but I was just so thrilled to see that because it's going to be a crazy film that that has will have to have a lot of Disney in it. Is this is this like a Netflix No, evidently you know, it's a really forair real film intended for a theatrical release. They they've there's a screenwriter and director assigned and, you know, and if if it's based on the book that Stehven wrote It's a jungle in here, which talks about the origins of rainforest. againain. Crazy, crazy crazy story. Oh, that's fantastic. All right,'ll we'll look for that. I'll add a link to the show not today. Okay. All right. Tw more emails. One from Kevin, who we advised when we were doing trip planning for him earlier in the year that he should use the express passet universal epic universe And Kevin writes in to say I want to thank you for your recommendation to spend the money on the Epic Universe Epress passes It allow us to get on all the rides and be done well before park closing. This was our first trip as a family to Universal and we found Epic to be the prettiest and best laid out of the parks. What I was surprised was was how clear of a winner Islands of adventure was for our family and how insubstantial Universal Studios Florida felt We really did love the nighttime show there, however. So ye good. it's like Kv had fun and he found something fun to do at all three parks. So good for us. even better. Last emails from Aby who says I recently found the best week for my family's schedule this fall is to take a trip to Walt Disney World, the end of October through the first week of November Since booking it, I've seen that this coincides with quote, Jersey Week for this year. So here's my question A the purported crowds of Jersey Week, an urban legend or an actual bump in crowds and wait times. All right, what's the scoop? she says. All right. So Jersey Week for our listeners who aren't familiar with the term is this period in usually in the first two weeks of November, where New Jersey public schools are closed for teacher workshops. And it used to be many many days of the week to the point where parents would just pull their kids out of school for the entire week and go to Walt Disneew World. Now, it's down to two days. So the New York, New Jersey area contributes around six percent of guests to the Walt Disneew World Parks. and I believe it's the largest single market outside of Florida But the impact of Jersey week has been muted ever since the district cut the holiday to two school days. So if you look at the actual crowd level in for twenty twenty five The Magic Kingdom crowd level on a scale from one to ten was a three For EpCotT was a four for Harollywood studios was a four and the same thing for EpCot. So those are slightly above average crowds from Educ Kingdum and EpCOot for twenty twenty five, but still historically low Animal king was below average The thing is the Magic Kingdom is the most visited at theme park in the world, so you can see how school skeleites impact that more than anything else. But to answer the question about whether we should go, Jim reminded of the saying a bad day out fishing beats a good day at work. Yes, Yes, abbsolutely. And of one of the things that I pointed out to Abby was like, okay, so you know, the magic Kingdom is slightly above average crowds for you know certain parts of that. But we're going to look back, Jim At these wait times once piston peak and villains laid open and think man, we had it so good. Absolutely, abbsolutely. So yeah. Abby go. J go. Exactly.. All right, folks, we're gonna to take a quick commercial break when we come back. Jim looks at imaginari's work on living creatures in the parks Like look at the dinosaur and Muppet moobile Labs, we'll be right back Ready to launch your business? Get started with the commerce platform made for entrepreneurs. Shopify is specially designed to help you start, run, and grow your business with easy customizable themes that let you build your brand, markarketing tools that get your products out there. Integrated shipping solutions that actually save you time From startups to scale ups, online, in person, and on the go. Shopify is made for entrepreneurs like you. Sign up for your one dollar a month trial at Shopify dot com slash setup And we're back. All right, Jim. correct me if I'm wrong, we came up with this idea after seeing the Muppets moobile Labs rocket ship in the eue for Rck and rollercoaster Rck. We did, you know, because you know, for a lot of us that brought back a fond memory of This effort in the Disney theme Parks, the liiving character initiative, would sometimes by the way, call the liiving creature initiative. And L if we're being honest, this arguably started Back in February of ninety five with the debut of Push The talalking trash Can at the Magic Kingdom. Push would roll around New tomorrowland interacting people there Great guest satisfier. I mean, people just love push. And obviously imaginary noticed. Only problem here is that the technology that powered push was owned by an outside contractor. And if Disney was going to expand the park's efforts in this direction, it would have to come up with something on its own So late nineteen nineties, early two thousands, the company imaginers began exploring the idea of doing things in real time in the parks that involve screens firstirst of these things that get developed, Ben was Mickey's Tune Elevator. And we know about this because it was showcased At a WDI open house that was held back in two thousand. Wait it's an open house and we're invited. Okay Well, sometimes they leave a side door. All right,. But this is a project that R and D chose to show to imagineing friends and family. And the way this worked is Mickey's Tunon elevator was a physical environment surrounded by computer screens. There was even a screen on the floor that then allowed visitors to interact with Mickey while supposedly riding in a magic elevator. U justust to sort of layout, you know, and again, this is a prototype again, R and D is put together for the open house. So The set that powers the Mickey's Tune elevator experience is mounted on motion base their wind effects and you know, the cartoon world seems to zoom past open windows that we have in this elevator. Okay, okay. Hogwarts expxpress, but vertical instead of horizontal. Okay. There we go. But obviously the most important aspect of the Mickey's Tune elevator experience It allowed the guest in real time to have interactivity with Micy. A, whoever walked into that elevator thenen had a personalized, unique encounter with the world's most recognizable mouse. Oh So you you could talk to Mickey? You could talk to Mickey. Really? And this was when the late nineties, early two thousands. Yep. So this predates things like toorttal talk with Crush Oh, no, no. this is what lay to interter loogue with Gush. Tot again. Okay,kay, o. Anyw People actually got to experiences Mickey's Toon ten elevator again at this Wuty open house walked away, wd Downside is thing had extremely low capacity because face it, your ride vehicle an elevator. Yeah, four people per ride for one minute. Yeah. Yeah. two hundred forty people an hour. Okay, yeah. All right. It required a lot of computer power to run all of those screens and more to the point you needed a live performer backstage who could then Help Mickey talk, you know, interact Yess. So Jim did this was this was computer screens This is this is in the space of an elevator. That it is. Did the floor rotate so that you could actually feel more like a rotisserie chicken at Costco as you were Because I'm thinking the if you've been in an elevator with computer screens recently, right? becauseuse they're on comp shhips Th those get warm after a while. does get a touch warm. It does get a touch. Okay. Yeah, so that yeah, you get in the elevator and then you pop out and Costco can sell you for one dollar fiftyents. That's fantastic. Okay. All. All right. Anyway, long story short U Mickey's tuned elevator is a good proof of concept, but not practical for the parks. Not yet. Now a weird side note You also have to remember that the first ships for the Disney Cruise line, the Magic, which set sail July of ' ninety eight and then the Wonder. that go sets to sea following year, December of ' ninety nine. Dbuted basically in the same window, late nineties, early two thousands As Mickey's Te elevator does at this WI open house. And so the imagineers, they approach the cruise line and go, well, look, you have on the magic in the wonder A full capacity, you carry what? two thousand seven hundred guests. If the cruise line were to seed over a quiet corner on each boat. You know, give WI sufficient space to build two Mickey'sun elevators. They could then operate this guest experience on a reservation based system And you know, it could become a cruise line exclusive and compel even more people to book vacation packages and And the crewise line to their credit took the idea seriously, but they came back and said, lookook This is the early early days of what we're doing here. and ye the Magic and the Wonder were expensive to build. They arrived late. you know, we started behind schedule with the cruises that we book people on. So we're kind of behind the eight ball here I mean we'd love to try to do this, but we can't necessarily poull these ships out you know to so you can then go build this thing. So the answer wasn't exactly now it was along the lines of not now. Okay. but still but everyone likes the idea. it's capacity and cost. Absolutely. And by the way, if we jump ahead to January of twenty eleven, this is when the next ship h's in the line The Disney Dream, far bigger ship carries four thousand or four capacity rather than seven hundred twenty seven hundred And this is where they debut the Aquadark. And then fourteen months after that we get the fantasy, which also has the Aquadark. The funny thing is is like the waterers slides probably don't have a much larger capacity than the magic elevator? No,s still a few hundred p. But it looks really good at a commercial. It does, it does. you know That's a great kinetic element. Yeah. Anyway, having the cruise line be where Disney's character living character Creature initiative debut wasn't going to work, at least not in the late nineties, early two thousands. So the imaginers pivot back to the parks And then begin looking for different source material after they table Mickeys Ton elevator Now What intrigues the imagineers is that ABC had recently acquired the movie rights to James Gurney's Dinatopia books. Do you remember these one? They were No, I don't. B selling series of fantasy picture books that depicted a world where dinosaurs and humans peacefully coexisted. And all right So ABC takes the two Dyinatopia books, the original published in ' ninety two and then its sequel, Dinnatopia the World Beneath that hit store shelves in nineteen ninety five and turned them into fodder For a minieries U really Okay ye That debut' on ABC may twelfth through the fourteenth, two thousand two under the magical worldld of Disney banner It gets great ratings, actually then goes on to win that year's Emmy for outstanding Visual effects in a minieries movie or TV And thinking that they now had a potential hit series on their hands ABC executives immediately order a spinoff, Dyatopia, the series Which deb was on on ABC in November that same year, two thousand two Meanwhile, over on fourteen hundred one Flowower Street, the imaginers are looking what ABC has been up to and now wonder could Dyinatopia Be our way of bringing the Living character initiative tech into the park. I mean, wouldn't certainly hurt to tie this program's introduction into the parks to a hit TV series. so Now please not the key phrase I used there, Lyenn hit TV series, which isn't exact exactly what happened when ABC took Dynatobia the mini series and quickly transformed it into Dynatobia the weekly series. But we'll get to what happened there In a secondc. But first, this get the new fix and fall tariff from British gas Prices can only slide down If energy prices climb up, no worries, you'll be fixed for two years, but if later the market falls, so will your tariff. A win win, sorted automatically by us Price cap Taken care of. Fix your prices today. seearch British Gas fix and fall. Ts andC's elligibility and Limitations supply Price review based on the offGM price cap after twelve months See Britishgast. co dot uk slash verify for more And we're back. Okay, Len. So again, we're talking about the early days of Disney's character Initiative program. It's now the summer of two thousand two. The Dinatopia miniseries has just aired on ABC and been a big hit during May sweeps So this is why that very same television network has just ordered a dynatopia TV series which is supposed to debut on ABC later that same year in the middle of November sweeps. To be fair, J, this is the same time where ABC is running Regis fill in twenty four hours a day, seven days a week on who wants to be a millionaire, rightight? Yeah That is interesting. So this is this is the time when when the TV networks are seeing declining ratings from things like the internet you know and whatnot. And they and they're desperate to to milk anything they can out of any hit show they've got Aolutely. Absolutely. So can you confirm or deny the fact that at some point they said, what if we had Regis Philbin battling dinosaurs five nightes a week? Yeah Let me make a call. I might have been an active concept. It might have been, okay, All right. Might have bit, might have been. All right. Mewhile, over in imagineering Well, look, they flat out see Dinnotopia as the perfect vehicle to use to introduce the Living Character initiative program to the parks. and speaking of vehicles You got to remember at this point in the Living chararacter Initiative program in order to power an autonomous walking figure. you need enormous computer power, know not to mention batteries. So you know, like an entire cart full of PC's and batteries. So this is another reason the imaginers just loved the world that James Gurney had dreamed up for his dynatopia book because If you cracked open these coffee table books, there were all sorts of images of four legged dinosaurs and two legged dinosaurs hauling carts. Oh, there you go. So you know, it meant that it would be very much on brand to then build a living creature from Dyatopia that could be seen hauling a cart directly behind it. Wow. Okay. Yeah, I get the vision from imagineering here. Okay. There we go. And again, it gives them the means to power you and program this living character, living creature but hide tech in plain sight. All right, so this is a plan. Imaginers would hard charge through the development of a walking dynatopia character and have it ready to debut in the Disney theme parks for the summer of two thousand three, which is just before season two of that new hit ABC television series, Dyatopia, debuts on that network for the fall of that same year, two thousand three. Okay, But here's the thing Len. is snow season two of Dynotopia the series. Oh Dynatopia goes extinct after one season. There we go. you know again, season one debuts November of two thousand two, but for whatever reason the audience that that in enthusiastically for the original television event back in May of that same year just did not turn out for Dinatopy the series. So look, in hindsight Len, the producers of Dyinotopia of the TV series took a calculated risk that in the end just did not pay off U Look, making a weekly TV series that then has to regularly feature full size CG dinosaurs is going to be expensive. Oh yeah, yeah. this is back when yeah, back when computer time was expensive. Oh, no. abbsolutely. So what they decided to do is take the bulk of the money that they were gearing up to spin off Dynastopia the mini series, the Dynoppia the TV series They put it in the CG aspect of the show, which meant there was no money left bring over the live human actors who had starred in the mini series. Let me point out that at this point, the most expensive Muppet movie ever made had already shown what happens when you blow your budget on CG, right? Yeah Okay, all right. those who do not study history are condemned to repeatest mistakes. And that's it exactly. So none of the actors from the minieries came over to Dinnatopia, the weekly series. Be they probably could't even get paid scale at this point. Like there's not a for scale. Okay And they were already doing this on a budget. I mean, for example, Len, this didn't shoot in L.A. hell this is a' shoot in Toronto. They shot it in Budapest. All right? Budapest? Oh that's right.'s's where dinosaurs lives. way we go. All right. Yeah. Okaykay. wait, wait, Budapest what's in Budapest? Budapest actually has a thriving you know a film setup over there. They have some amazing sound stages and sets And this was what these folks were taking advantage of, plus, of course, you know, how far the dollar would go as compared to LA or Toronto when it came to film production. Do you ever think that this is why you and I don't understand calculus because our heads are filled with facts like this There we go. I gota be. Okay. I have no practical info left anymore. All right, go ahead. Anyway, TV series of dyotobia abuse November of two thousand two Audience tunes in for the first couple of episodes, doesn't recognize any of the characters of performers on screen. Ratings quickly tank. And by the way, they shot thirteen episodes Only six of them aired here in the States. The very last of these, an episode called The Matriarch airred on december twenty sixth, two thousand two and with that ABC yanks the show off the air effectively canceling Dinnatopia, the weeekly series. And this is the end of two thousand two, but imagining wants to debut something in the park in two thousand three. The summer of two thousand three. so So this wave of panic goes through WI. they had pinned their hopes obviously again on The Living Chacter Initiative program debuting on the back of the assumed success of Dinot Topia the Weekly series and they' already they're already well into the build of lucky the dinosaur. I mean, hundreds of thousands of dollars have already been spent on development fabrication. And now ABC has cancellled the show that this character is supposed to be from So what are you doing? There are meetings, lots and lots of meetings because this is all just gone sideways. You know, I mean, for example, they just said, well, well, how are we now supposed to promote this? becausecause the assumption was we're not going to have to spend any money, You know, people are going to love this TV series and when they hear that something from it is in the Disney parks, they're going to come. Right because because that's how that's how TV and film stuff gets promoted in the parks. the marketing teams from TV and studios did exactly They spend pays the parks for that. Yeah. they spend their money. And then and speaking. there is now the whole question of theme park rights to Dynatopia, which by the way, Disney didn't have. Oh, that's unusual.' usually really good about that stuff. This is the thing that ABC had made the deal to the TV series. and you know, Disney looked at it and went, o, you know we'll have to sit down with Gertie at some point and get the theme park right Like twenty minutes before the dinosaur iss gonna to go on stage in Animal Kingdom. first phone call, yeah, o. Yeah. But again, things had moved so fast in two thousand two that Dizy had never quite gotten around to this. And then ABC cancels the show in late December of two thousand two And and again, only six episodes had aired and now Gurney, the author of the original books, is Pote He actually believes that the sudden cancellation of Dynatopia of the Weekly series has now hurt the entire Dynatopia brand. So what Disney's lawyers after the fact now in early two thousand three reach out like We'd like to talk with you about the theme partark right? Yeah. James begins to toggle back and forth between possible outcome. So that are N going to award the theme park rights to Dinatopia to Disney just out of spite O he's of a mind to make it so expensive you know, for the company to acquire the theme park Rs that the mouse will rule the day that ABC ever cancel Dynotopy of the weeekly series. All right. Disney's not getting a sweetheart deal here. No, if anything, right, you know, and in fact, the negotiations Stop And Disney's lawyers go back to WI in the spring of two thousand three and effectively tell the imaginers From this point forward You're not allowed to mention the name dinotopia in association with Lucky the dinosaur. He and his cart are a wholly original character that were developed here in house and have absolutely nothing to do with anything that James Gardney has ever written or dreamed up. and you know, anyone who says otherwise opens the company up to a potentially massive lawsuit So all right. This is why Lland when Lucky the dinosaur actually finally does debut in August of two thousand three, Mind you, he's as far away from a Disney theme park as he can be. the where this Living Creature initiative thing made its debut Natural History Museum of LA, Len. A private event. A private event. But he's deliberately and repeatedly described as an entirely new character, a breakthrough in tech a Disney Imaginering, and certainly nothing that was ever tied to a recently cancellled ABC show. I can't believe I can't believe Jim that anyone would even entertain the idea of a mere suggestion of somehow some sort of coincidental likeness or appearance. What But even so, Disney's lawyers were terrified So much so, Lenn, it would be almost two years before Lucky the dinosaur, you know follows up Thisappearance at the National History Museum in L.A. when he starts appearing in the Disney Parks. Spring of two thousand five, he spends a few weeks hauling his cter around Disney's animal kingdom rem Chester and Hester's Smmer of that same year, Lucky's out in Anheim. interestnteresting though. he's not on display in Disneyland, which in the middle of its fiftieth anniversary celebration, but he's across New Zealand Plaza In DCA. Oh, but yeah, DCA DCA' in the we're in the valley of DCA popularity here, right? Oh yeah, they need attractions. And actually that was what was fascinating. There were people who would plant themselves in that park all day waiting for Lucky to come on stage just to get the chance to say this.. Anyway. And then if we jump ahead to September of that same year, two thousand five, Lucky has now been flown over to Asia where he is shown off two guests who are exploring the then just opened Hong Kong Disneyland. There we go. Okay. All right. after that, lucky gets shipped back to Glendale where well, look, if you booked the the backstage magic tour of Walt Disney Imagineering that adventures that Disney sometimes offered As you were touring the halls of fourteen o one Flower Street, if you were lucky You sometimes got to see Lucky the dinosaur in action over the next decade. and that's again, two thousand five to twenty fifteen, but but finally Len Disney's lawyers put their foot down becausecause James Gurney is now trying to revive the Dyatopia franchise. In fact, this is when there's talk of a theatrical film. So this is when the lawyers go to imaginein ring and say, look Every time you fire that thing up, you are exposing the company to a potential lawsuit. If Gurney ever decides to take Disney to court and a jury gets to see lucky the dinosaur in action And he then lays out the timeline, you know of the creation of this thing. It's going to be an uphill defense is what I'm hearing Yeah. Yeah, we're going to lose. And you know, I mean, this thing is obviously based on what Gurney did in his dynatopia books. You need to pull the plug on this thing permanently.'m guessing I'm guessing that Disney's lawyers did not want to recite in front of a jury, the line, whoo are you going to believe me or your lion eyes, right? Like pretty much. Okay. And that's where we are today. with Lucky the dinosaur. The last time this thing was sighted backstage and imagining partartially disassembled, supposingly making it impossible to operate again So to be fair here by this point, lucky the dinosaur is over twenty three years old whichich compared to the teact that the imaginates are using, like for example, you know, for state of the art animatronic figures like the Walt in the main Street Oper House right now inteay show. Yeah, completely different tech Yeahah. Yeah, you, out of date downright agent. I hope that imagineering has preserved the floppy discs that Lucky was Thereere we go. There we go. All right. so anyway, lucky that Dinisur returns to WI in fall of two thousand five and never visits another Disney theme park The liiving character initiative leaves on and was hugely impacted by something that would happen just a few months later, which was Disney's acquisition Pixar animation studio in Janary of two thousand six, which cost the company a cool seven point four billion dollars. And as Disney went to get some of that money back, well, that then begins to impact the direction of Disney's Living chararacter initiative. and we'll we'll talk about the Pixar ification of that program in the next ensemment of the series. Well, you know that, you know that After they acquired Pixar, someone in imagineering said, you know what toys have batteries. We could put battery packs with all of these things and that's what it's supposed to have. Oh. Okay, I didn't know I didn't know that lucky that dinosaur came from the dinatopia. D sorry learned something today, Jim. goodood job. Well again, you didn't hear that from me.egly. allegedly. Okay, there we go going we're going to need to title the show allegedly. Okay. And I did put a link in the show notes to the YouTube videos of the series of Denotope the minieries. So. we' all'll go back and watch that.. All right, folks, that's gonna to do for the show today. You can help support our show by subscribing over to patreonot com slash gymhill media For our latest exclusive show is walk around on Disneyland in ninety nine degree heat There's a link in the show notes F of the show Jim Schul is on the road again in his video all about the Florida where Walt Disney Walked Disney Wor was built on flatlands, rolling hills and wetlands And a little bit of it remains except for the Tibet Butler Nature presreserve It's very close to the Magic Kingdom and this public space offers a look into the Florida where Walt Walked himself Jim takes a tour in this episode of Disneyourney click on link in the show notes to see it. O next week's show, Jim continues the history of Disney's Living chararacter Initiative And you can find more of Jim at jimmhillmedia. com and more of me Len at Touringplans. com Also check out The Case four with Chris Cox, a podcast where Chris Jim and I debate one theme park topic at a time, and you get to vote on who's right were produced spectacularly by Eric Kersey and David Gray. honorary sauce Sam helping you choose the right St. Louis, Memphis, Texas, and North Carolina condiments at the thirty fourth annual Giant Barbecue Battle Running june twenty seventh and twenty eighth, twenty twenty six on Pennsylvania Avenue in beautiful downtown, Washington, DC. While Eric and David are doing that, please go into iTunes in a radar show and tell us what you'd like to hear next. For Lightning H hallway, Jim, this is Len. We will see you on the next show