Mike here. So if you have watched our first episode of the Theme Park Nerds video blog (and I know you have, because you're awesome) you know Parker and I got off on a bit of a tangent while we were discussing the moving of The Festival of the Lion King theater in preparation for Avatar Land.
If for some reason you haven't yet seen episode one, here's the link. It's required viewing before continuing the blog :)
Theme Park Nerds, Episode 1
So here's the thing...
As I said in the video, I have my doubts that Avatar Land will ever see the light of day. My personal hunch is Disney announced Avatar Land to combat Universal Orlando's announcement of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter expansion and Transformers at Universal Studios Florida. Universal one upped the mouse, and they needed to announce something big to make it look like Disney wasn't sitting on their hands while Universal was being awesome.
I don't think Disney has the confidence in the Avatar film (or franchise, if you believe in telling the future) to get behind a $500mil+ expansion to Disney's Animal Kingdom. If they truly were going full force with the expansion, I think the internet world would know MUCH more about what's happening because Disney would be "leaking" random details to build excitement for the anticipated 2015 opening. That isn't happening. Not only are random details and generic hype not seeping into the world, but Disney is doing nothing to prepare their theme park guests to Animal Kingdom for the eventual arrival of Pandora and the Na'vi. If we use the construction of Cars Land at Disney California Adventure as a template for what Disney does when they ARE building a $500mil + expansion to one of their parks, we should at the very least be seeing the characters from the movie doing meet n' greets around Animal Kingdom. Years before Cars Land was a reality, we saw Mater and Lightning McQueen out and about in California Adventure, not necessarily to directly hype the new land, but to get guests accustomed to those characters having a presence in the park (and because little boys LOVE Cars and will do anything for their true god, Mater). Why are the Na'vi not wondering around DAK? Their story fits in fine with the concept of Animal Kingdom. Sure, they can't hang out in Dinoland, Asia, or Africa, but there are plenty of trails between the lands of the park that have no theme where a Pandora backdrop could be set up for photo ops. Despite Disney's insistence that Avatar Land is happening, we are seeing no evidence to support this.
As we discussed in the TPN video blog, Disney is in the process of moving The Festival of the Lion King theater to Africa. I do not take this as ANY indication that Avatar Land is happening. Festival of the Lion King should be in Africa. It does not belong in Camp Minnie Mickey, which is a area themed to american summer camps and shoehorned into Animal Kingdom at the last minute during construction because the park's budget was way out of whack prior to opening. It was conceived as a temporary land that would be demolished as soon as the park got off it's feed and something better could be constructed. The problem was, Festival of the Lion King, a show built on the cheap from old Disneyland parade floats, became a HUGE hit. It's possibly the best daytime show on Disney's Orlando property. It won't be closing anytime soon, but ANYTHING is going to eventually take the place of Camp Minnie Mickey, Lion King has to move. And where better to move the show to where it rightfully belongs, in Africa.
Once Festival of the Lion King is moved, I imagine Camp Minnie Mickey will disappear from Animal Kingdom guide maps, the path to the area will disappear, and Disney will pretend the land never existed. Eventually, something will be built there. Something with the staying power and broad audience appeal to warrant a multi-million dollar expansion to the park. I do not believe, however, it will have anything to do with Avatar.
Parker, of course, has his own opinions on what will be built on top of Camp Minnie Mickey. He got into what he thinks is coming in one of the out takes from our video blog. Check it out here.
Until Next Time,
Mike
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