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averagecuppajoe
10-15-2003, 03:41 PM
That infamous, touted as ELP's replacement attraction, bomb, ...thud! The year it opened, we drove to DL extremely excited about the new attraction.
It had opened @ 2-3 months prior. "Gone!" "Gone?" "Uhhh, What do you mean, Gone!?" ....so we were told.
The CM told us that it was a huge disappointment, people demanding thier money back and all, so it was quickly pulled.
Of course the good news is that ELP came back and that's truly wonderful.
My curiosity still persists, what was it all about? Was it that bad? Was it just a case of backlash over the homicide of ELP?
If you remember or saw it, please fill me in. Thanks!

(I was floored. This was the first time I realized that Disney was fallible. Ignorance is bliss.)

Ghoulish Delight
10-15-2003, 03:48 PM
It was calle "Light Magic." It didn't use lasers, it used fiber optics.

I never saw it myslef, but from all accounts, it failed because it was a little too abstract and a lot too hard to see. It was not a parade, rather a series of fixed vignettes. I guess there was some story about fairies or something. But if you weren't in the right place to see one of the five (I think that's the number) stages, you were out of luck.

Its failure was a combination of the fact that attempting anything with lights was going to draw direct comparisons to one of the most beloved of all parades and the fact that it was not particularly well executed.

Morrigoon
10-15-2003, 03:48 PM
Light Magic was odd, and not remotely special enough to replace MSEP. There was some strange theme involving characters in their nightclothes and hideous pixies doing Irish step dancing. I never really got it. Neither did most of the audience. Oh, and rather than being a parade, it would stop twice on the route, do a performance, then move on. Even less fun for those who were not in a performance stop on the route.

Fiber optics are cool, but should have been integrated into the existing context of MSEP in the form of new floats or improvements to old ones.

RStar
10-16-2003, 10:15 PM
I remember it being touted as a "spectacular". I expected Fantasmic! and instead got a luliby. It was about a childs' nightime dream, hence the PJs on the characters. It was sleepytime, not at all exciting. But in my opinion it's still better than the current parade.

Tigertail777
10-17-2003, 12:42 AM
Well and a big part of why it flopped as well is they didnt follow through with the original concept. They were going to embed fibre-optics throughout main st, almost up to the hub which would turn on and flash multicolors and interact with the little "stages". That would have been spectacular, but I am guessing they didnt like the cost of having to reinforce the buildings enough to install the fiber-optics.

kawfeadikt
10-17-2003, 02:38 AM
Actually, they did do the fibre on Main Street. Didn't go further than that.

I loved ELP at Disneyland, it was a key part of my younger Disney experience, so I expected that its replacement must be a worthy replacement. That said, I think I hoped LM would be worthy. It's been a while since I saw the show, but I had two visceral reactions:

1) Those pixies or elves or whatever really freaked me out. To my tastes, their look somehow wasn't right and I never really made the connection between them and the Disney characters. Why were Pluto and Minnie teaming up with pixies? Never made sense.

2) The whole idea of Disney characters doing this bed/dream sequence thing or whatever was just. . .weeellll. . . strange. I think the idea was lost on me.

In its favor, I thought that the fiber optics on Main Street were pretty nifty. In fact, that is the sort of "plussing" you expect from a Disney op.

Perhaps if LM stayed around longer it may have grown on me; I know that if I grew up with it, my reactions might have been different.

On the plus side of the ledger, they redid the Small World Promenade for it and it looks swell now.

JenGood008
10-17-2003, 07:37 AM
If I remember right, LM shot off a massive amount of confetti type stuff at the end which created a rather huge mess. You'd still see it in the flowerbeds the next morning sometimes. That seemed like a bad idea to me. Also, the pixie things were just plain frightening. I remember thinking, 'Please don't tell me they took away the electrical parade for this...'

MammaSilva
10-17-2003, 07:45 AM
My personal major issues with the show:

1) only 4/5 select spots were worth a darn for viewing...the show stopped, then moved then stopped then moved, if you weren't in one of the key places, you got to see the 'tail end' but couldn't see the screens on the floats and therefore you lost the point.

2) the key places that the show stopped made for the WORST traffic flow/control ever, people ONLY THINK that Fantasmic creates a gridlock. We were there with a rather large group of special needs people, several wheelchairs and we were trying to get past the hub on the Plaza Inn side, the crowd was as bad as it is on New Years eve, I'm not exageratting. The crush was unreal and very very frightening for many of our group. We got gridlocked and seperated, if not for a group of very large and very helpful college football players who litterally picked up 3 wheelchairs (with their occupants) and lifted them into the air then did a 'block/move folks out of the way' I shudder to think of what might have happend.... needless to say we avoided Main Street during the scheduled show times after that.

3) the confetti mess was unreal......they had CM's with leaf blowers out as soon as the show ended which made for 'bad show' IMHO and of course they couldn't get all of it so there was more mess in the flower beds/shrubbery that just looked 'bad'

4)The storyline was very very hard to follow...I'm still not 'sure' what it was... my guess was something about dreams but I wouldn't want to swear to it, and I agree, pixies and people in PJ's and Irish step dancing ...replacing the Electrical parade just didn't cut it.

kawfeadikt
10-17-2003, 09:22 AM
"Disney Does Riverdance at Night"

Demigod121
10-17-2003, 10:45 AM
Nothing in my opinion could ever top MSEP.

Nothing.

Ever.

-Demigod

genenpet
10-17-2003, 12:24 PM
I SO want to see the big turkey that was LM. I've read all this stuff about it and listened to the soundtrack quite a bit (the orchestral version of MSEP/EH at the end is SO cool).

Someone out there must have some decent video of this parade. Share it with the internet community please!!! Or I'll pay you to mail me a copy....