 | New Year, New Updates! |
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| DisneyDan
Sunday, January 5, 2014 12:34:32 PM |
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Hello everyone,
First off, I'd like to wish you all a Happy 2014! Last year was a turbulent, but exciting year for Jon and I, and we hope to have many more amazing adventures in the coming months, which we look forward to sharing with you all. In case you missed it, you can check out my blog post, '2013 - A Year in Review'. Be warned, there are literally hundreds of photos (nearly all character ones!), so it might take a while to load, and a while to look through!
Anyway, it's a new year, which means there is always news from the parks to report. We'll start at Walt Disney World in Florida, and work our way around the world.
Tomorrow, January 6th is the final day for Disney's Animal Kingdom's Camp Minnie-Mickey. The small, forested trails of this cute corner of the park will close permanently to make way for the controversial Avatar Land, currently being developed by Walt Disney Imagineering. This means that Timon and his pals at the long-running Festival of the Lion King will be relocated to a new theatre later in the year, elsewhere in the park. It also means of course that the Greetings Trails will close forever. The characters will be moved to new locations around the park. At the moment, what I've heard is that Baloo and King Louie will greet up on the trail between Africa and Asia (a place they have frequented in the past anyway), Chip and Dale (as well as Gi-Tar Dan) will move to Rafiki's Planet Watch, Pocahontas can be found in the Discovery Island Trails, and Donald Duck will move to Dinoland. Mickey and Minnie already moved early last year from the Greeting Trails to their new home on Discovery Island (at the Adventurer's Outpost).
At Disney's Hollywood Studios' character dining location, Disney Junior Play 'N Dine at Hollywood & Vine, June and Agent Oso are being replaced with Princess Sofia and Doc McStuffins. I have tried to find what date this will happen, but nobody knows for sure, although one friend did tell me perhaps the 26th January. This will mean that June and Agent Oso will no longer appear regularly at any Disney Park around the world. It does also mean that for the first time ever, Doc McStuffins will be available daily, for greetings, for all guests (albeit at a meal). Also for Hollywood Studios, dates for the mega popular Star Wars Weekends were released for 2014. This year they will run every Friday, Saturday and Sunday from 16th May until 8th June inclusive.
At the Magic Kingdom, yesterday the epically long running Celebrate a Dream Come True Parade had its final curtain call. Running twice, the parade was given a neat final send-off, with a few old props returning, and fans lining the parade route with signs of support for the cast and characters. Many people have very fond memories of this parade, since its debut back in 2001 as Share a Dream Come True Parade, for Walt's 100th birthday. Although it was loved by many, I for one, and I know many others feel the same too, very much welcome a brand new day parade after 12 long years! The new parade, Festival of Fantasy is currently slated for a spring debut, and will feature a mixture of brand new floats and some that have been imported from Tokyo Disneyland's beautiful, and much missed, Jubilation parade. The new parade is confirmed to have floats representing Peter Pan, The Little Mermaid, Tangled, Brave, and of course Mickey and Friends. Two of the floats brought from Tokyo used to be the Pinocchio float (it's Monstro) and the Princess one, and therefore fuels speculation they'll be used for the same purpose again, but official images of them/concept art are yet to be released.
As a reminder, today and tomorrow are the final days for the full Christmas season offerings at both the Disneyland Resort and Disneyland Paris. If you're in the area, be sure to stop by and catch their parades and shows again before they bid farewell for another 10 months! Brand new offerings this year included the Viva Navidad event and World of Color Winter Dreams at Disney California Adventure and Disney Dreams! of Christmas and the revamped Christmas Cavalcade at Disneyland Paris.
Speaking of Disneyland Paris, we were there for Christmas and New Year, which was amazing as usual! They always put a huge effort into their special entertainment offerings, and this year did not disappoint! The highlight was the "plussed" version of the Disney's Stars 'n' Cars parade at the Walt Disney Studios, which featured awesome characters just for New Year such as Darkwing Duck, Yzma and Kronk, the Cheshire Cat and many more!
It has been strongly rumoured across the internet that Disneyland Paris will also be bringing back a very old festival of theirs from some years back, called the Festival of Flowers. The Festival of Flowers was like a DLP version of EPCOT's Flower and Garden Festival. It is rumoured that the festival will return for a three month long spring event that will also incorporate a special happening (involving characters) as well as meet 'n' greets. There is nothing confirmed yet, but we all hope that this is true!
Finally, we have been aware that many of you have been searching the website for Princess Anna and Queen Elsa from Disney's Frozen. It took a while to get them up, but I have finally done it! (Click their names to go to their pages)
Ok, that's everything for today. Have a good week everyone,
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
There is breaking news today from the Disney Parks Blog. They just announced that Marvel's Captain America will appear starting in October aboard the re-imagined Disney Magic cruise ship!
He will feature at Marvel’s Avengers Academy in Disney’s Oceaneer Club, aboard the ship.
The really annoying thing about this is that the Oceaneer Club is just for kids. Regular guests are not normally allowed to go down there unless it's an open house (at which time things like the Marvel Academy would not normally be running).
The biggest thing we can take out of this is that, besides the expected appearances at D23 this week, this is the first official confirmation from Disney that any Marvel character will appear to regular guests on a Disney owned property.
I wonder how long it is now until we can expect them in the parks? Time will tell.
In other news, yesterday the Disney Parks Blog also announced that Holiday Time at the Disneyland Resort is returning once again from 12th November through 6th January.
This will be a relief for anyone who has been hearing the strong rumours across the internet that Christmas this year would be very different, and would even perhaps have ticketed events for the bulk of the seasonal offerings, like at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom.
I was busy last week, and didn't get chance to post about the latest Long Lost Friends Week for Limited Time Magic.
Disneyland had a vote on the Disney Parks Blog (now closed), which featured pretty much the same characters as before, with a few more thrown into the mix.
From what I recall characters included the Robin Hood gang, Hunchback friends (still no Quasimodo though), the Three Good Fairies, Merlin (he was a new one), Flik and Atta (Atta was also a new option), and Chicken Little (Abby wasn't listed, oddly enough, even though she was for WDW).
There is no official date for this event yet, but it is expected by most to be in the next two weeks.
Disneyland Paris fans have been hearing rumours across the internet for a few weeks now that Jack Sparrow would be setting sail from the parks after a long running stint there, in October this year. Pirate fans need not despair though as rumour has it that Jake from the Neverland Pirates will start appearing, as well as Sofia the First, over at Walt Disney Studios around the same time Jack goes away.
It'll be nice to get some new characters at the park. The last new characters from any new movie or TV show that DLP got were Rapunzel and Flynn.
Staying with DLP, and Timon has decided to sport his new look in DLP as of yesterday. This now brings him in line with the other parks.
Finally, although we (sadly) aren't attending, D23 takes place this week and is expected to star some brand new characters. We'll of course keep you all posted.
Ok, I think that's all for now,
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
There really hasn't been a lot of news surrounding Disney Characters for some time, but finally today, I have a few small things to tell you.
In the last couple of weeks Sofia the First from the Disney Channel show of the same name has began making regular appearances at Disney California Adventure. I don't think she has started appearing in WDW yet, but I could be wrong. I haven't seen anything saying she has.
In a random piece of "news", Disney's ever popular Vinylmation series released a new Beauty and the Beast set. The chaser was Beast in human form. Now, as some of you may be aware the fan community usually refer, unofficially, to him as Prince Adam. This stems from a really old, rather random, PC-CD ROM trivia game that mentioned his name. Well, guess what? Some 20 years later and the bottom of the new Vinyl says the character's name is Prince Adam! I guess we can now all breathe a sigh of relief and live content in the knowledge that he is indeed Prince Adam!
Of course the biggest news is the latest Limited Time Magic offerings.
Disneyland doesn't really have anything exciting lined up. More of the Dapper Dans singing out-of-character songs, and musicians on the side of the Matterhorn.
Over in WDW though they have had a few interesting weeks, with more lined up.
The 4th July celebrations saw Mickey and Friends appear at EPCOT and some WDW Resort Hotels in patriotic costumes. Sadly we weren't there, but it looked like fun.
Then, this week Mickey and friends have been rocking out the America Gardens Theater in an energetic show featuring hip-hop, acrobatics and more.
Then there is the latest news... The next Long Lost Friends Week vote is in, and dates are revealed!
From 15th July through the 21st, guests can meet the following at the Magic Kingdom:
- Louis and Dr Faciilier
- Chicken Little and Abby Mallard
- Robin Hood and Friends
- and Br'er Rabbit, Br'er Bear and Br'er Fox.
What is interesting is that on the official Disney Parks Blog they fail to mention Br'er Rabbit, or Louis and Facilier, yet they are mentioned on the in the blurb on the Limited Time Magic page.
Hopefully all four sets will turn up, and there aren't any oddities.
Anyway, that is everything for today. If I hear anything else, I'll be sure to post it, as always.
Have a great weekend,
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
There's a few things of interest this week that I thought I'd share. Sadly I haven't really had time to catch up properly recently after the big around the world trip, so you'll have to just go with it!
Anyway, Disney's Monstrous Summer at both US resorts has now started, and brings with it some new characters and greeting opportunities.
At Walt Disney's World's Disney's Hollywood Studios, Mike and Sulley can be met in their new MU dorm setting (same place as their old location), in their new MU outfits.
At the Big Hat they perform in the homecoming show, which is basically a large pop/rock dance party.
At Disney California Adventure, Mike and Sulley can be met, again at a new MU dorm setting, down in Hollywood Land.
The PIXAR Play Parade has been refreshed too, and stars Mike, Sulley and some brand new Monsters friends! Art, Scott "Squishy" Squibbles, Terry and Terri, and Archie the Scare Pig all join them! We'll be there in August and really look forward to seeing them!
Art was out for meets during the most recent 24 hour event back in May. Sadly we were not there to meet him (we were in DLP at the time!).
From the 1st to the 7th of July at both US resorts, Independence Day will be celebrated for a whole week, and will feature special character opportunities.
At Disneyland you will be able to meet Mickey Mouse in patriotic clothes, in Town Square every evening.
At Walt Disney World Goofy, Donald and Pluto will feature in patriotic clothes in a special pre-parade at the Magic Kingdom, which will also feature EPCOT's Fife and Drum Corps, as well as the much loved Citizens of Main Street (just how WDW use them in other pre-parades).
Interestingly, WDW have not yet said whether there will be character greetings at the American Adventure in EPCOT this year. Every year, for the last few years at least, WDW have featured Mickey and friends in patriotic clothes, as well as appearances by historical figures such Betty Ross and Benjamin Franklin.
I hope that the pre-parade is not a replacement for those greetings. That would be quite sad indeed to cut those.
You can read more about what is happening during Independence Week at the US Parks on the Disney Parks Blog which I linked to above (includes details of 4th July fireworks and more)
Probably the biggest news this week is that for the first time ever Disney will feature Marvel characters! Of course, they will be for limited sets at this years D23 Expo event in August, but it is a huge step nonetheless.
It is expected that Spider-Man and Iron Man will appear for limited sets on one of the days.
D23 will also feature Sofia the First (who debuted in the Christmas Day Parade at WDW last year, but not seen since), and for the first time Doc McStuffins!
The programme of events also listed characters from Jake and the Neverland Pirates, but of course we already have Jake at the parks, sparking speculation that maybe Izzy or Cubby might be coming!
Our friends at Inside the Magic have a complete breakdown of the entire event, with the greeting times, so be sure to check out their post here.
Here at Character Central we have been working hard to update the website and add more new content, including characters, autographs and movies. Be sure to check them all out! (You'll have to look for them - I don't want to make it too easy for you!)
Ok, I think that's everything for today.
Dan. |
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