 | Meet Mickey Mouse! |
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| DisneyDan
Sunday, July 22, 2012 7:14:33 AM |
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Hi all,
On our most recent trip to Disneyland Paris we got to meet Mickey Mouse in his new home, in Fantasyland.
The Fantasyland Theatre finally closed its doors last year to make way for the brand new meet 'n' greet experience, after nearly 20 years of service to the fans.
Fantasyland Theatre had previously showcased such shows as Winnie the Pooh and Friends (and it's Christmas version), as well as the Magic Music Days.
Mickey had never really had a real permanent position in the parks, and had spent many years at the Boarding House on Main Street USA (and even further back in time at Casey's Corner).
Of course, the parks are his home, and anywhere is good for Mickey, but he really needed somewhere warm and dry.
With Fantasyland Theatre so infrequently occupied in recent years, it became the obvious choice.
DLP had released a picture long before the new theatre opened, that depicted something that, without using too much away, looked a lot like the recent Town Square Theater make over in the Magic Kingdom.
When we visited last month we were suitably impressed with the transition.
The building still retains the feel of a theatre, and the concept is similar to the Magic Kingdom, with the idea of going backstage to Mickey's dressing room.
The difference though is that the queue line is much more interesting and builds the atmosphere up more into actually being a real theatre! (unlike the Magic Kingdom).
Building into the existing theatre does end the years of speculation that any future expansion may be accomplished by going under the tracks of the railroad by taking the theatre out.
It does also make me wonder what will happen at seasonal times of the year. Will Mickey continue to have seasonal clothing like he has in the past? I guess this Halloween and Christmas we'll know that for sure.
Instead of describing in intricate detail every nook and cranny, let's now take a photographic tour of Mickey's new place!
The tour begins as you approach the building at the back of Fantasyland. [ Read More... ] |
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Hi all!
Sorry that it has been a few days since a proper update.
I have been very busy with getting ready to move house, preparing for our trip to Disneyland this week, and a whole lot of other things that basically get in the way!
We do actually try to keep up to date on our forums, and our members there often post news before I get chance to blog about it; so be sure to join our friendly forum to get the most out of Character Central!
Ok so to the news!
Tokyo Disneyland have finally added Rapunzel and Flynn as meet 'n' greet characters, which means that Rapunzel can now be met at all five resorts worldwide!
Disneyland celebrated it's 57th birthday last week, and there was a small ceremony in Town Square. Here's a link to a video of the occasion.
Hong Kong Disneyland's newest land opened last week. Grizzly Gulch features a new take on the Frontierland concept, with a new attraction that is a unique take on Big Thunder.
Of course characters now meet there, and guests can meet Mickey, Minnie, Chip and Dale in brand new Western outfits. Koda and Kenai also meet there.
Over in Disneyland Paris they released their press information for Halloween Season this year.
I had already said previously here on the blog that people should expect the Mickey's Trick or Treat in the Street to return, and I was right!
Goofy will have a new Halloween location in Town Square, and will be themed around the Goody Candy Co concept which they have in the US.
The Villains will of course be back, but in Fantasyland, and Jack and Sally will return as usual, this year near Phantom Manor.
The Soirée sadly will not be getting a replacement show because of the loss of Central Plaza Stage, but Disney Dreams! will be run instead (which can of course be seen any night of the year).
I haven't heard of any more changes to the Soirée, so hopefully all the other weird French entertainment, performers and characters will return as usual.
There is one last thing for Halloween, but it is linked with a recent event too.
We all know that Duffy the Disney Bear has never been popular at any park except Tokyo, despite the fact that he continues to be pushed everywhere. Well, despite the US pushing him ever forward, Paris actually decided last week (unofficially I guess) to drop him!
Now, instead of Duffy at the Boarding House in Town Square, any other main character (usually a Big 8 or Pooh pals) appears if they decide to do that, at any given point (Duffy might still appear, but it is less likely now).
What we have heard though is that Duffy will be back full time for the Halloween Season in a Halloween outfit. I wonder if it will be the same as the US Parks outfit?
I think that's everything for the news today!
A couple of things here at Character Central before I go.
First off, and I hate to write this sort of thing but needs must, I have seen on a number of occasions again recently people copying our work. Whether that be pictures and even my blog posts. Please do not do this. We work hard - and unpaid! - at this to bring you the best character website on the Internet, and it is so disappointing that people can't even be bothered to link back to us or credit us. Groan over!
Second, we have been working really hard to get some great new content up on the site ready for our relaunch, and we are really pleased with how it is all going! I know some of you have asked us on the forums when you can expect to see the new version of the site, and at the moment all I can say is, just be patient and it'll come soon enough!
Thirdly, we are off to Disneyland in California on Wednesday, and as always - where possible - we will be updating throughout our trip with pictures and more on our Facebook page and Twitter. So be sure to follow us there!
Finally, we are still trying to reach our goal of 2000 Likes on our Facebook page, and when we do, we'll be running another great prize giveaway! So get sharing our page with all your friends!
All the best,
Dan. |
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 | Happy 57th Birthday Disneyland! | |
| DisneyDan
Tuesday, July 17, 2012 9:22:16 AM |
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Hi all,
On this day in 1955, Walt Disney's original Magic Kingdom of Disneyland opened its doors to the world!
Let's celebrate with some pictures from our own trips to the park. Here's to another 57 years of Disney magic in California!
Happy 57th Birthday Disneyland!
Dan. |
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 | Happy Bastille Day! | |
| DisneyDan
Saturday, July 14, 2012 10:51:18 AM |
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To all our French fans, and fans in France alike who might be celebrating today, Happy Bastille Day!
Mickey, Minnie and Duffy are at the Disneyland Hotel (Paris) this evening celebrating with their fans, so be sure to drop by!
Dan. |
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 | Happy Anniversary Walt and Lillian! | |
| DisneyDan
Friday, July 13, 2012 10:25:26 AM |
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On this day in 1925, Walt Disney and Lillian Bounds married in Lewiston, Idaho.
Lillian was one of Walt's first employees, and actually did some of the ink work for one of the very first Mickey Mouse cartoons, Plane Crazy.
She was also responsible for Mickey's name, after she told Walt Mickey sounded better than Mortimer!
Let's pay tribute to them both now with some "pictures of pictures" of them enjoying life, from Disneyland Paris.
Dan. |
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Hi all,
Just a few small updates this evening for you.
Starting in Disneyland Paris, and the Summer Season has officially begun. In the past this would mean longer hours, the start of Fantillusion, the Tarzan show and nightly fireworks. this year is a bit different. Disney Dreams! runs every night of the year - it has since April and will until at least next April - cancelling out the need for fireworks, the Tarzan show started back in June, and due to the 20th, the Parks are open quite late now anyway - 11pm being fairly normal these days. So "Summer Season" has been somewhat reduced in its value to being just being the start of Fantillusion's run.
On saying that, it does mean though of course that the park has now got a full schedule for the summer season, with a nighttime spectacular and the night parade. It is an awesome time to be at DLP! The 20th Anniversary certainly has done it wonders!
We have also been getting reports from friends who are at the parks daily, that more and more random characters are starting to show up again - something that until recently DLP really did well, and prided itself on. Sadly in recent months character numbers had dwindled, but I am happy to report that it appears to be back to normal! We have seen friends post pictures of Snow White, The Prince and all the Dwarfs, the Villains and some other randoms out and about. Rapunzel also seems to be back appearing outside again, making an additional princess meet 'n' greet on top of the Pavillion. As well as all that characters have been showing up in more unusual outfits at the Hotel morning meets too. As DLP fans, we LOVE the fact that they always have characters at the hotels throughout the day, but it appears since the start of July, they have really been having some fun with them, with different characters and costumes showing up randomly (Summer outfits and beachwear at the New York for example, and Mickey in sports shirts at the Sequoia for the Euro football games).
As an additional note, Minnie Mouse appears to have a brand new permanent outfit at the Sequoia Lodge. It is now yellow, replacing the old green one.
Jumping across the pond to WDW, and July 4th saw Patriot Mickey, Goofy, Donald, Chip and Dale appear at EPCOT. At Mickey's Backyard BBQ dinner Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Donald wore special outfits, and were joined by Phineas and Ferb - they NEVER appear there! - as well as Chip and Dale in their regular BBQ attire.
Finally for the park news, I saw pictures earlier in the week of Angel meeting outside Space Mountain in Tokyo Disneyland. I have no idea if this is a permanent arrangement, but it did make me wonder something. We had heard that Angel is going to start appearing in DLP soon, and so maybe this is the start of Angel appearing in a number of the parks regularly? Will she appear in DLP in the near future? It seems more likely if she is now also in Tokyo. But I guess we'll see what happens.
A few updates from us here at Character Central now.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, we have had to scale back our summer adventures some, but will still be visiting both Disneyland CA and WDW during the summer. We also will be visiting Tokyo Disney Resort and Hong Kong Disneyland - just later in the year now. At WDW we are attending the first Mickey's Not So Scary of the season on the 11th September.
Finally tonight, just a reminder that we are trying to get to 2000 Likes on our Facebook page so that we can run another big giveaway like we did in April! So go to the page and share it with your friends so we can run another awesome competition!
Ok, that's all for now,
Dan. |
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 | Happy 4th of July!! | |
| PeterPanFan
Wednesday, July 4, 2012 5:57:53 AM |
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To all our American fans happy 4th of July aka Independence Day, the day we celebrate the adoption of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 and the founding of our country.
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Hi all!
First off, yes I know we have been quiet on here for a while, but to be honest there hasn't been TOO much going on in the Character world as late (except a few small things which I'll mention below), and we have also been very busy ourselves.
I myself am in the process of moving house, and on top of that we are went to DLP again, are preparing for our AMAZING summer of round the world craziness (!), AND we have been desperately trying to catch up on all our pictures from previous trips. That is on top of maintaining this site and making sure everything runs smoothly. LOL!
So yes, you could say we have been busy!
As I mentioned, we have been working on pictures, and across the site there are many new photos showing up on location and character pages. When you're on a page be sure to scroll down to the "Recent" tab to see the latest images.
I have also updated the calendar to reflect some changes to our plans this year, for those of you who like to keep track of us around the globe!
If we're nearby, be sure to drop us a line!
We have now run two competitions with great success, one was exclusively on Facebook just last week, which one of our regular fans won just for "Liking" and "Sharing" a post on there! We do plan to run more competitions, and have some fun ideas planned for how you can interact with us to win prizes! At the moment we are looking to reach the magic number of 2000 Likes/Fans on our Facebook page, and if we achieve that, we will run another amazing prize giveaway at the end of this month! So head over to our Facebook page and get sharing with your friends so we can get to 2000 and run the competition!
Ok, so to the Character news...
Disneyland last week announced the dates for it's popular Mickey's Halloween Party, which can be found here.
We were able to attend last year twice, and we had a LOT of fun! This year we'll be in BOTH Asian Resorts for Halloween, AND the Halloween Soiree in Paris!
Disney On Ice also launched a new show, titled Rockin' Ever After, which will be a musical revue of some of the newest and classic Disney Fairytales - including Princess Merida from Disney-PIXAR's Brave! We have already booked our tickets for January, and look forward to seeing it! Speaking of Disney On Ice, sadly we had to cancel our trip to see Passport to Adventure, as it conflicted with dates for something else. This is an old show now - which we still haven't seen - I just hope we get chance to FINALLY see it sometime before it gets retied.
Finally, we have heard strong rumours that SpectroMagic will return next spring (most likely March) to the Magic Kingdom after its long hiatus! Of course they are still ONLY rumours, but everything we have heard so far seems to confirm this will happen. As always, when we know more, we'll post it here.
Ok, I think that's it for now. Remember to look out for great new content across the site, and check out our Facebook page for exclusive updates, as well as all the latest information regarding our competition - remember to share our page with your friends so that we can run the BIG giveaway at the end of July!
Dan. |
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Hi all,
So Summer has finally arrived, and with it I am sure lots of Disney fun for all our fans and friends out there!
So, to celebrate the end of school and the start of a long summer break, we'll take a look at what some of our favourite Disney Pals get up to when they're on vacation!
Hit the discuss button at the bottom of this article and tell us where you'll be spending your summer, and if it's at Disney! What characters are you most looking forward to giving a big hug to this summer?
What better way to start the picture cavalcade than with the two kids that know more about summer fun than anyone? Phineas and Ferb are going to do it ALL! [ Read More... ] |
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