Limited Posting

I am traveling out of the country and currently with limited internet connectivity.

Regular posting will resume Monday. Thanks for your patience.

Disney Teams Up With Gowalla

Does anyone use Gowalla? Is this enough to get you involved?

Mashable:

Disney has decided to partner with location service Gowalla — rather than Facebook or Foursquare — for an immersive location-based campaign to help people explore its flagship Disneyworld and Disneyland parks.

The Gowalla/Disney partnership focuses around custom Passport pages that not only show off Disney-branded stamps (Gowalla’s version of Badges), but also a photo and check-in stream. Gowalla’s Disney page also offers Disney-branded pins that users can earn by completing specific trips within Disneyworld and Disneyland.

This isn’t just a few stamps and a check-in stream, though; Gowalla and Disney have created literally hundreds of stamps for rides and locales within the two parks. Everything from the fireworks show to “Finding Nemo-The Music” offers a stamp or pin that can be earned by checking in.

What's the benefit for Disney? I wonder if they get cash money.

Disney Announces Conversion of Pleasure Island to Hyperion Wharf

Disney fans are complaining that it's not Pleasure Island. Do people not remember how terrible Pleasure Island was in it's last five painful years of life?

It'll be interesting to see what restaurant operators they get involved. Hopefully it's not more Landry restaurants, but don't be surprised.

UPDATE: Can we all agree that the most exciting part of the upgrades are an improved movie theater? My local megaplex offers a nicer experience than the Downtown Disney AMC.

WSJ: Disney Junior and Nick Jr. Square Off in the Fight for Preschoolers' TV Viewing

From the article (subscription required):

Executives at Walt Disney Co., preparing their latest push for this audience, say that some TV for tots favors curriculum over storytelling. They argue that it's sometimes too much work, not enough play.

They're offering themselves as an alternative to Nickelodeon's Nick Jr. channel, which emphasizes learning. Disney says that today's parents are ready for a change. In an age of video games and iPads, kids can learn their ABCs anywhere. What's missing are good, old-fashioned stories that kids can repeat to others, pretend to be the characters, and watch again and again.

Disney Junior replaces Playhouse Disney on the Disney Channel and in the theme parks in February and gets its own 24-hour channel in 2012 replacing SOAPnet.

As the article states, this is serious business for Disney. Last year advertisers spent more than $276 million during children's TV shows and merchandise sales can equal billions more.

But this is what really caught my eye:

Following the death of the broadcast networks' Saturday morning cartoon tradition, preschoolers have been watching at all hours. Forty percent more of them now watch Nick Jr. from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. than during the rest of the day, according to the network.

Making Mickey Mouse Act For the Talkies

via Cartoon Brew:

The article, by Gordon S. Mitchell of Universal’s sound department – who includes ample references to Lantz’s Oswald Rabbit – is a pretty poorly written explanation of how cartoons are produced. However, it does feature several unique behind-the-scenes photos and drawings, and well worth a look for how animation production was explained to the public in those long ago days before DVD bonus features.

Pyongyang Fun Fairs

The Theme Park Guy had a rare opportunity to visit the North Korean capital of Pyongyang and visit the local fun fairs.

North Korea is one of the most isolated countries in the world. Incredible photographs.

Photo Updates From the IAAPA 2010 Trade Show

The Theme Park Review forum has updates from the 2010 International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions expo happening now in Orlando, Florida.

Every year ride manufacturers, designers and vendors show off their new designs and try to solicit sales. It's an exciting place to be for a theme park enthusiast.

UPDATE: All of TPR's day one coverage in one place. If you want to follow along as the updates go live, the forum is the place.

Filming 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

A 1954 photo report from Life magazine, via Disney and More.

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea is one of my favorite Disney films of all time.

Cars 2 Teaser Trailer

Looks uninspired, but the Cars franchise is big business and I have no doubt this will do well at the box office.

World of Color Receives Thea Award

World of Color received the Thea award for Outstanding Achievement - Nighttime Spectacular.

Disney Imagineer Kim Irvine was also recognized with the Buzz Price Award, Thea's lifetime achievement honor.

From the press release:

To date, Walt Disney Imagineering has received a total of 34 awards throughout the Thea Awards’ 17-year history. Some of Disney’s past recipients of Awards for Outstanding Achievement include Toy Story Midway Mania! at Disney California Adventure and Disney’s Hollywood Studios, “Finding Nemo- The Musical” and Expedition Everest at Disney’s Animal Kingdom, Soarin’ Over California at Disney California Adventure, Indiana Jones Adventure at Disneyland Park, Space Mountain, From the Earth to the Moon at Disneyland Paris, CineMagique at Walt Disney Studios Park in Paris and ‘The Legend of Mythica’ at Tokyo DisneySea.

Guillermo Del Toro and David Eick to Create ABC's New Hulk

Deadline.com:

Del Toro and Eick will break the story for the pilot script together, sharing story and created by credit. Eick will write the script, with del Toro attached to direct subject to his availability. Del Toro will also oversee the designing of the Hulk character...

Seriously cool news for fans of the Hulk.

Only Three Animated Features to Receive Oscar Nominations

Cartoon Brew:

Under Academy rules, “in any year when 8 to 15 animated features are released in Los Angeles County, a maximum of 3 motion pictures may be nominated.” Had one more feature qualified, the number of nominees would have expanded to five features.

The biggest losers in this scenario are the indies like Bill Plympton’s Idiots and Angels, Sylvain Chomet’s The Illusionist and Paul and Sandra Fierlinger’s My Dog Tulip, as well as the sleeper anime hit, Mamoru Hosoda’s Summer Wars. A field of five nominees would virtually guarantee one or two of them a nomination, but they face an uphill battle now.

Disney is pushing hard for a Best Picture nomination for Toy Story 3. With the Academy expanding the Best Picture nominations to ten films beginning last year, there's a good chance they'll get it.

But they'll have to settle for, at most, a Best Animated Feature win. The Academy would be loathe to deliver Best Picture to an animated film.

Growing Backlash Against TSA Body Scanners, Pat-Downs

"We certainly understand the challenges that DHS confronts, but the question remains, 'where do we draw the line'? Our country desperately needs a long-term vision for aviation security screening, rather than an endless reaction to yesterday's threat," the statement said. "At the same time, fundamental American values must be protected."

If you're planning on flying this holiday, might I direct you here.

UPDATE: Also, here.

Disneyland Fantasmic! Dragon Returns

"Murphy" returned to the show last Friday.

Glad to see him back.

Bob Iger on the Health and Future of the Disney Store

I promised highlights from the Fourth Quarter Earnings Call that happened yesterday, but truth be told nothing new came out of it.

What I found most interesting was CEO Bob Iger's take on the Disney Store:

Well we're pretty excited about the new design. We just opened the new store which you should see in Times Square, but we'll proceed with real caution. We're using the design as a platform to greatly improve the quality of the merchandise and the presentation and we're also using it to improve location which we've done quite well. Times Square, I think, is a good example of that. But we look at specialty retail as a relatively challenging business and with that in mind we're going to be really careful and watch these results quite carefully. We've redesigned in the 18-19 store range, I think maybe it was around 20, and we don't see going significantly higher fast. We're going to wait and see how these stores do before we make any decisions about rollout. It cost us slightly above a million dollars a store for this new design. We think it's closer to probably $1.4 for the initial stores, and that will trend down as we bring this design to more, but we're going to be careful about this.

Emphasis added.

The Disney Store was hugely successful when introduced but was completely decimated by over-expansion. The truth is, there's no need for a Disney Store in every mall in America.

Iger has talked about modeling the segment after the Apple Stores. There's a lot of Apple Stores, but they aren't over exposed. The location for each one is carefully selected and the stores are individually designed. They work equally well as brand showcases and retail outlets.

It will be interesting to see how they proceed.

Disney Character Voices International

Terrific interview with French Creative Director Boualem Lamhene.

The division is charged with creating parity between the voice acting for Disney characters worldwide.

Disney Profits Down 7% in Fourth Quarter

Dramatic gains at Walt Disney Studios hampered by poor theme park and media network performance.

Highlights from the earnings call coming later tonight or tomorrow.

Sally Corporation Factory Tour

Theme Park Review member moinab recently toured the Jacksonville, FL headquarters of Sally Corporation and was able to document her experience.

Sally Corp designs and constructs dark rides, including animatronic figures, for various theme park companies including Legoland, Six Flags and many regional amusement parks.

I always like seeing the behind-the-scenes aspect of attraction creation.

First Trailer for New Winnie the Pooh Film

I've never really sparked to Winnie the Pooh, so I'll probably sit this one out.

D23 Armchair Archivist

The first episode of D23's new video series Armchair Archivist.

It's nice, but the highlight is definitely seeing the last footage Walt shot before his death.