Given how all these stories about how Disney’s California Adventure theme park is supposed to be getting its own version of “Western River Expedition” just refuse to die … I am reminded of an episode from the 12th season of “The Simpsons.” A show that was entitled (You Disneyana fans will love this) “The Computer Wore Menace Shoes.”
In this episode, Homer has started up his very own web page. The trouble is — he has absolutely nothing to write about. Understandably, Homer is down in the dumps. Until Bart tells his Dad a particularly juicy story about Mayor Quimby …
Homer: Get out! Who told you that?
Bart: Nelson.
Homer: Hmm. That’s the kind of dirt that belongs on my web page.
Lisa: You can’t post that on the Internet. You don’t even know if it’s true!
Homer: Nelson has never steered me wrong, honey. Nelson is gold!
Bart: You know, it might have been Jimbo …
Homer: Beautiful! We have confirmation.
This brief exchange between Bart, Homer & Lisa — I think — sums up just what’s wrong with the Internet. That irresponsible people sometimes try to pass things that they’ve just heard in passing as established fact. Without fear that this perhaps-false information will eventually come back and bite them in the ass.
Now, I know, I know. It must seem strange — and more than a touch hypocritical — for a website that regularly traffics in rumors about the Walt Disney Company to be bitching & moaning about how some other website supposedly got a story wrong. But give me a moment to make my case here, okay? Hear me out.
You see, here at JimHillMedia.com, we always make a point to try & get things right. Of always confirming our source material with at least a few informed sources within the Mouse House. So that we can be certain that we’ve crossed our i’s and dotted all of our T’s.
Wait. Strike that. I got that cliché wrong. Make that “dotted our i’s and crossed all of our T’s.”
Anyway … As the above error illustrates, we do sometimes make mistakes here at JimHillMedia.com. But that’s where “Jim, You Ignorant ***” comes in. So that we actually have a place where we can own up to our errors. Where we can be held accountable for all the mistakes that myself and all the other writers who work for JimHillMedia.com make.
Whereas the folks at Screamscape …
Look, I’m not really here to start a p*ssing contest with another website. After all, I can’t pretend that I have intimate knowledge of Lance Hart’s reporting methods or that I know who all his sources within the Walt Disney Company are.
But — that said … I have to admit that I’m troubled by the fact that — out of the dozen or so people I spoke with last week who work for Walt Disney Imagineering — not a one of them knew anything about this new version of “Western River Expedition” that was supposedly being prepped for Disney’s California Adventure.
More importantly, the only place that I’ve ever read or heard anything about WRE possibly being under consideration for construction at DCA has been here. On the Internet.
Which makes me think that what we’re really dealing with here, folks, is an echo.
An echo –for those of you who aren’t familiar with the way this word is used in Internet parlance — is a story that’s been bouncing around the Internet for long enough that it actually becomes its own confirmation. By taking on a somewhat mutated form, it now becomes the proof that people offer up when they’re trying to convince friends & co-workers that the original version of the story was true.
I mean … Do you really think that it’s a coincidence that — back on April 6th — Al Lutz runs a story that says that Disneyland President Matt Ouimet ” … feels what DCA needs is the 21st century equivalent of Pirates of the Caribbean; something that everyone enjoys and that impresses practically anyone who experiences it”? And then — six weeks later — a rumor pops up on the Internet about the Imagineers are now supposedly thinking about unearthing Marc Davis’ plans for “Western River Expedition” and using them as the basis for a new DCA attraction?
Now Disney history buffs know that “Western River Expedition” was the ride that Davis had designed for Disney World. Deliberately with the hope that this Magic Kingdom attraction would then be able to top everything that Marc & his fellow Imagineers had achieved with Disneyland’s “Pirates of the Caribbean.” (For even more information on this stuff-of-legend attraction, be sure to check out my “How ‘Western River’ Went South” series).
Me personally? I can’t help but think that these two stories are somehow connected. In fact, I’ll bet that some devious Disney dweeb out there — just as a lark — actually concocted this whole DCA WRE story, then posted it on the Web. So that they’d then have “proof” that Al’s “Matt-Ouimet-wants-a-‘Pirates’-type-ride-for-California-Adventure” rumor was — in fact — true.
Now don’t get me wrong, folks. I’m not saying that the news item that appeared in Lutz’s April 6th “MiceAge” column was false. For I’ve heard this very same story from multiple sources within the Team Disney Anaheim building.
But what most people don’t seem to understand about Al’s original story was that … Well .. It DIDN’T actually mean that Ouimet wanted the Imagineers to build a ride that was just like “Pirates of the Caribbean” for California Adventure. You know, with boats & water & lots of AA figures, etc.
But — rather — what Matt wanted for this troubled theme park was an attraction that the whole family could ride on together. Something that would eat a whole lot of people per hour (The current specs — as I understand them — call for an attraction that can handle 2400 guests per hour that can be safely operated by a minimal crew for 16 hours a day ) which contains lots of “Big Wows!” for DCA visitors.
This is reportedly why DCA’s “Monsters, Inc.” coaster project has been put on hold. Because the ride system that was originally proposed for this attraction wouldn’t meet Ouimet’s hourly capacity requirements. More importantly, because it wouldn’t allow children under under 48 inches in height to actually ride the thing. Thereby blowing Matt’s “the whole family can ride this attraction together” requirement.
Now — as for the folks at Screamscape … Look, as regular JHM readers know, I too have been taken in by more than my share of bogus Disney-related stories. Just look at how I have to keep waffling on the “Superstar Limo WILL re-open / Superstar Limo WON’T reopen” issue. I mean, that whole aspect of DCA’s Hollywood Pictures Backlot saga has been making me feel like Jake Gittes in “Chinatown.” “She’s my sister (slap) my daughter (slap) my sister AND my daughter.”
*Sigh*
So — believe me, folks — I have nothing but sympathy for Lance Hart and the folks over at Screamscape. For possibly being on the wrong side of this WRE DCA story.
Now please note that I used the term “possibly” in that last sentence. For there is always the possibility that I’M the one who actually got this story wrong. After all, in yesterday’s update at Screamscape, Lance claimed that the source that gave him this DCA “Western River” story had previously provided him with info on California Adventure’s “Tower of Terror” & “a bug’s land” as well as Disneyland’s new “Buzz Lightyear” attraction. In addition to clueing Hart in on the fact that the Disney Cruise Line would soon be coming to California.
So — given that Screamscape’s inside source was right about all these other Disney-related stories — maybe I’m the one who’s really wrong here.
Well, if that eventually proves to be the case … Then I guess I’ll owe Lance Hart and the crew over at Screamscape a public apology. And — from here on in — I’ll know better than to accuse someone of screwing up a Disney-related story in a public forum.
Or — as Homer so eloquently put it in that “Simpsons” episode that spoofed the Internet: ” Don’t worry, head. The computer will do our thinking now.”
But — that said — there are just aspects of this whole WRE at DCA story that don’t add up. Which is why I think — rather than heading off for a “Western River Expedition” — that all us Disney dweebs are stuck in Echo Canyon.
Your thoughts?