EPCOT Forever: A New Beginning

    Today is a bit of a surprise blog that I tossed around typing versus not typing. Before continuing I am calling this a massive SPOILER WARNING IF YOU HAVE NOT SEE EPCOT FOREVER. At the end of the day I decided to share my feeling on EPCOT's new show, EPCOT Forever. To sum up my thoughts on the show very quickly, I'd call it good. Why I call it good is a loaded question though and just because I think it is a good show doesn't mean I don't have any issues with it. I'm throwing it out there now that this show is not the same quality show as Happily Ever After or even Illuminations: Reflections of Earth. Personally, I never expected it to be of that quality so I am not disappointed that this show does not hit that mark.

    The show, for the first three quarters anyway, is a celebration of EPCOT. The show's soundtrack features bits from all different EPCOT attractions past and present. It's chock full of nostalgia throughout a good portion of the show and Walt Disney even has several lines at both the beginning and end of the show. Then the last quarter or so of the show starts up and I became kind of, I don't know, confused? To this point we've had an amazing nostalgic show highlighted by great fireworks, music, and even kites. Then a familiar tune starts up and A Whole New World from Aladdin plays for essentially the duration of the show. I have mixed feelings on this.

    On one hand the song actually fits what is about to happen to EPCOT fairly well. Future World is going to be leaving and we will have EPCOT as a whole new world to explore. While it fits that, it doesn't fit at all with what EPCOT is and has been since opening. It also highlighted many people's fear of the IP invasion coming to EPCOT. In a weird way I also feel like the ending of the show was a strange wave goodbye to everything that came before. It kind of reminded me of the scene in The Emperor's New Groove where Yzma hosts Kuzco's funeral. At the end of that scene she simply goes "Well he's not getting any deader". The majority of the show celebrated what EPCOT has been, but ends it with well not nostalgia about EPCOT, but an attempt at hyping what's next.

    So does it work for me? In a way yes. It's hard not to get hyped about what is coming to EPCOT. I did a few blogs about these changes already so I'm not going into it here, but the changes are all exciting and some of them even sound incredible. Having the show go out with something new isn't a terrible thing. Out of all the popular Disney songs, A Whole New World fits the bill best for what is to come, but what if we got something entirely new. What if we got some never before heard music that later gets unveiled as part of one of the new attractions, or even the redone Spaceship Earth? On another page, having music from an existing EPCOT attraction or even Illuminations itself to close out the show over A Whole New World would probably had the World Showcase freaking out in the best of ways last night.

    Enough about those choices though, back to the show itself. The pyrotechnics of the show are really good. There is a large amount of fireworks shot off through the show and the times that fireworks aren't going off, something else is happening. That always was my biggest issue was Illuminations that while the soundtrack is still possibly my favorite of any attraction, there was a large part of the show where the globe was just showing video. Here we have jet skis towing lit up kites that even become huge sparklers later in the show. The kite segments are perfectly planned out too as music from Soarin and The American Adventure highlight those sections.

    The biggest thing to remember about EPCOT Forever is that it is a place holder. Next year there will be a new show at EPCOT and EPCOT Forever will end. It's not meant to be the spectacular that Illuminations was and it's certainly not built to be Happily Ever After or even Fantasmic! for that matter. It is an eleven minute celebration of what EPCOT is and a look to the future. I think the show overall is good for what it is and my only real question mark, though it does make sense, is the inclusion of A Whole New World to close out the show. As a placeholder show, I think it will be great for a year or so. By no means is it designed to be a nighttime spectacular like the other shows and that is okay. If you haven't gotten a chance to watch EPCOT Forever yet, check it out here!

Disney's Art of Animation Mini Review September 2019

    This past trip to Disney featured many firsts. The first of those was arriving at not Disney's All Star Movies Resort or Pop Century or Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge: Kidani Village. No, this time around I arrived at the Art of Animation Resort. This blog is going to be a quick overview on my feeling about this resort, whether or not I would stay there again, and if I feel that it was worth the money. I did not spend a ton of time at the resort during my trip so outside of looking at the pools, I really can't say how fun the pools themselves are.

    The Art of Animation Resort is considered a Value Resort, though it is often times priced closely or right along side some of the Moderate Resorts. For example. when I booked it was only $10 cheaper per night than the Caribbean Beach Resort. The resort itself is themed around The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, Finding Nemo, and Cars. The resort has a ton of suites with  the Lion King section, Cars section, and Finding Nemo section being dedicated to them. That means the only standard rooms at the resort are themed to The Little Mermaid. The resort layout has the lobby and bus stations in the front. On the other side of the lobby building is The Big Blue Pool which is... Big and Blue... It really is big! The biggest of any resort and it's a good thing because the pool is near by all of the suite buildings, but of course is right in the middle of the Finding Nemo section. To get to the standard rooms of the Little Mermaid, you walk roughly a quarter mile to the far end of the resort. The good news is there is another pool over there. It is significantly smaller however, and lacks the bar the Big Blue Pool has. Before I go more into this I want to talk about the room real quick.

    The room is the size of a small hotel room. It's pretty much the same size room that you would see at one of the All Star Resorts and is laid out in a similar fashion. There is either a king sized or two twin sized beds. They are not as comfortable as the new beds at Pop Century though. The room theme is incredible. You really feel like you are under the sea with bubble carpet, coral bed backs, and a bathroom that is themed to the shipwreck in The Little Mermaid. In the room is a mini fridge so any foods that you want to store can be stored to your liking. Otherwise that's about it as far as the room goes. Nothing really fancy about it which is a point I want to bring up. The individual rooms for Art of Animation are normally way more expensive than say All Star Movies, but they now offer less. Since their remodels, All Star Movies and Pop Century offer more in room amenities such as a coffee maker, and much higher quality shower systems. When Art of Animation opened a few years ago these rooms fit in fine and with it being the new resort and what not it wasn't surprising the price of the individual rooms were so much. Now with Pop Century and other resorts getting upgraded rooms, the price for a non suite at Art of Animation seems steep. Tack onto that the significantly longer walk to the bus, especially if you are in the Ariel building like I was and it makes it hard to justify picking this resort based on individual rooms alone.

    Really the individual rooms is where the biggest issue that Art of Animation has lies I think. The rest of the resort knocks it out of the park though and now a brand new addition is set to open. Art of Animation and Pop Century share the Hourglass Lake Disney Skyline Station. This makes it super  easy for guests of either resort to get to EPCOT or Hollywood Studios.The location of the station is literally on the bridge across hourglass lake that separates the two resorts. Once again though, the individual rooms are by far the farthest from this location whereas you can easily see the Pop Century rooms just on the other side of the lake. 

    The themeing around the resort is so good. It is similar to that of say All Star Movies with larger than life character statues and photo ops all over the place. The lobby is amazing as is the exterior of the lobby. All over the place you can see huge concept arts of characters from Finding Nemo, Cars, The Lion King, and the Little Mermaid. It is really, really cool to see original concepts for characters like Simba and Floatsam whom we are all so used to seeing in just one way. Along hourglass lake you can also find fun trivia facts about some of your favorite Disney characters from the movies the resort is themed around. 

    As far as the food and shopping at the resort go, it's what you would expect from a value resort. The gift shop is pretty large and connects into the food court where you can buy all kinds of goodies to eat. The arcade is stocked with fun video games from classics to new games, but I did not have time to check any of it out. I didn't have any issues with the buses at this resort either. Though I have heard stories of times where Pop Century and Art of Animation shared buses which causes all kinds of problems since both resorts are super popular (Pop with individual rooms and the sheer number of suites here). Personally I did not see it on this trip, but I did see it on my last trip.

    So overall what are my impressions on Art of Animation. I think it is an awesome looking resort that is perfect for families and groups looking to spend time in a hotel suite themed to their favorite Disney movies. From what I can find online the suites are all incredibly themed and look super comfortable. I love all the old concept arts that can be found throughout the resort and the themeing from Finding Nemo to The Lion King to The Little Mermaid is very well done as you walk through the resort. So would I stay here again? Not unless I was staying in a suite with a group of people. 

    The individual rooms were far away from the central hub of the resort, buses, and now skyliner. That along with the rooms just not being on the level of Pop Century or All Star Movies makes those two resorts better options in my opinion for the price that you pay. As I said in the beginning, individual rooms at Art of Animation rival that of some of the moderate resorts. I'll add onto that that they rival those room rates, but offer less comfort and convince than some of the other value resorts. That said, I cannot take away from the great job that Disney did to make you feel like you were a part of The Little Mermaid. The in room themeing is great, but not enough for me to spend the money there again. 

    Thank you all for reading as always. Next up will begin the difficult task of putting blogs together for Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. What is first up? Stay tuned!