Cursed image
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Honestly y’all should check out the Defunctland episode about Superstar Limo. It captures the essence of the ride perfectly.
I showed a friend over on the Discord a POV video about it and just watching their reaction was priceless.
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So recently, I had a meeting with a client who wants a promotional video for their haunted house attraction, which led me to watch other promotional videos for haunted houses and then I just started watching video walkthroughs of different haunts.
One observation that outside of Universal Studios Florida’s Halloween Horror Nights, Knott’s Berry Farm also goes all out for Halloween with several haunted house attractions.It also reminds me of how much most haunts bug me when they stick to the tired themes of haunted asylums. Although Knott’s Berry Farm did had a tooth fair themed one that took place in a haunted dentist’s office, while it took some inspiration from silent hill, it does have some incredibly creative imagery reflecting on the childhood horrors of visiting the Dentist.
Little hesitant to post the video because of some scary imagery and, obviously, the setting. But if you’re up for it google Knott’s Scary Farm Tooth Fairy Scary Maze. CW’s for teeth, gore, and loud sounds.
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I’m from Florida so I grew up going to theme parks on family vacations and school field trips. In college when I got really interested in anthropology of tourism I took a more academic interest in Disney World. Theme parks offer so much to think about and chow down on be it work culture, aesthetics and design, history, or marketing.
I regularly watch disney park videos (I also find them relaxing) but one of my favorite fall time activities is looking up haunted house videos on youtube. It’s fun to see what the folks at universal, knott’s berry, and busch gardens come up with. I agree the haunted asylum theme is very tired. I was really into the retro-1950s alien scare zone at the orlando horror nights last year. I always enjoy when they get creative.
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Yeah, when folks get creative and do cool things, it’s worth taking a look. It does seem that Universal is more interested in taking horror movie properties, like the Purge.
New Defunctland
The production quality has gone up since the series first started.
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This is a good thread. I haven’t been to many amusement parks in my life time, not even Disneyland/Disneyworld, but I do like hearing about the history and making of the different rides, parks, and other attractions.
Since y’all like Defunctland a lot, I’d also recommend both the YouTube channel Bright Sun Films a few of his Abandoned/Cancelled episodes deal with theme parks and the podcast Podcast: The Ride that delve into the same subjects Defunctland does.
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Bright Sun Films is great. They have done some really good videos about some old parks. I think Mowgli’s Palace was the first video I watched on their channel.
I grew up going to Astroworld and drive past the empty lot where it used to be almost every day, and the thing that still boggles my mind is the empty lot simply doesn’t look big enough. Visual density is so strange.
Disney is already in full Halloween mode. They started Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party on the 17th this month.
I think having live actors in Pirates of the Caribbean is a really cool idea. Makes that moment special plus having a neat interactive portion of the ride that’s not some touch screen.
Jenny Nicholson posted an almost an hour long video about Pandora The World Of Avatar section in DIsneyland and it’s a real fascinating look at a land that pretty much no one real wanted or cared for but they did it anyway.
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I’m gonna have to watch it later. But also, the Pandora area has always confused me.
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I’m gonna check out the video too!
I visited Pandora last December. Despite having zero investment in the Avatar franchise I found the area to be well-themed and enjoyable. I feel like they did the best they could with an IP no one cares about and though I was initially confused by the choice to add it to Animal Kingdom they do try to highlight the environmental conservation theme of the film.
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Dollywood rules and Bush Gardens Williamsburg is good too. Disney World is overrated and basically robs people but Universal Studios is alright.
Back around the beginning of May 2017, I went to Universal Orlando. Hadn’t been there since well before the Harry Potter stuff went up, and as someone who lived Harry Potter growing up, that place is pretty damn cool.
After watching some of those Defunctland videos, man Disney Quest would’ve blown my mind as a kid. This is really fascinating stuff. Theme parks are disgusting exploitative wastes of space that are somehow more sickening than golf parks, and also utterly bizzare and interesting.
EDIT: GOD this Disney’s America stuff! How awful that would have been!
I have been a fan of Jenny’s for a while and this video is like precisely everything she’s great at, her mind for little specific details and her delivery of those little details (like her segment on how the people working at the park have to stay in a sense of character that differs from anyone else at the park) are so illustrative. Weird decision by Disney to spend so much time and effort and money into making a theme park around a film that seems to have mostly died in public consciousness.
The fact that they followed through on the Avatar park and didn’t end up getting around to making a real-life MYST island frustrates me. Why couldn’t they have made that mistake and lost money while letting me and my little niche group of fans have fun in a pretend version of a work I liked instead of making a mistake and probably losing money while letting a different group of fans have fun in a pretend version of a work they liked? Life is unfair sometimes.
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So I watched this video expecting another kind of abandoned video where these people break into Horizons while It’s closed to go exploring. What I didn’t expect was the adventure of two very close friends as they literally turn the ride into their own secret club house.
(NSFW at the 7:45 mark for nudity)
Defunctland’s seaons finale just went live and it’s about Hong Kong Disneyland and the end of Michael Eisner’s run as CEO of the Walt Disney Corporation.
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Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opens this week in Disneyland!
For anyone interested, the dedication ceremony is going to be streamed live tomorrow May 28, 2019 at 8:20pm PST here.
As expected the merch is incredibly expensive but I hear the $200 custom lightsabers are actually very nice quality, hefty collectibles. Are any of y’all planning a visit soon?
