(Disney Animated Movie Review #13) The Good Dinosaur 2015 6 out of 10

The Good Dinosaur  2015  6 out of 10

It had to happened eventually.  Brave was my least favorite Pixar film before this movie came out.   Pixar has made it's first movie that wasn't a huge box office dominating success.   The Good Dinosaur limped into movie theaters in November and made the least amount of money of any previous Pixar film.  I questioned if this could be Pixar's first flop when I saw the sneak peek at DCA before the film came out.  The blog on that sneak peek is here...The sneak peek was good --but not amazing like most of the other sneak peeks.  In fact most of the other sneak peeks sent me to the theaters to see the movies ---The Good Dinosaur I waited for on DVD.

http://braddisneylandblog.blogspot.com/search?q=Good+dinosaur

The Good Dinosaur wasn't bad..... in fact the visuals were amazing. The movie featured stunning vistas showing the beautiful world that waslike something straight out of the Disney Nature film "Bears".  The movie just seemed to be missing something.  

I liked the characters.....

I liked the story of Arlo the Dinosaur and the friendship he forms with the little dog like human Spot.  

The action sequences were good especially some of the storm footage that sweeps Arlo away from his family.  

Everything about the film was good......but not great.  

Pixar films are generally Great and The Good Dinosaur just Good. Despite its top notch visuals the story just wasn't a high concept idea like Inside Out or Toy Story.  It seemed like the kind of story you would expect from one of the other animation studios.  

I also found myself comparing it to Disney's own Dinosaur from 2000 which also featured a Dinosaur separated from his family that makes a long journey.   Dinosaur was 15 years ago and also had photo realistic backgrounds and I personally thought Dinosaur was a much better film and I kind of want to revisit it now as a comparison.

I can't really put my finger on The Good Dinosaur's failing. I know that the film had many production issues and was reworked several times.  I guess they just couldn't get the tone of the film right. Maybe the failing was that the concept for the film just wasn't that strong to begin with.   My verdict:  It is worth a rental---but this one isn't a keeper.

Here is the Good Dinosaur Trailer

Here is the Dinosaur Trailer.

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The Good Dinosaur: A Sneak Peek at the Disneyland Resort

The latest Disney Parks Movie Sneak Peek is The Good Dinosaur currently in the Bug’s Life Theater.

I’m a huge fan of these movie sneak peeks that use the 4-D in theater effects to enhance the movie experience.   The Good Dinosaur sneak wasn’t presented in 3-D –but did effectively include the theater effects such as in theater lighting,  water effects and an incredible scene which included the seat effects.

Here is a cool picture of some of the characters outside the theater.

This movie wasn’t really on my radar to see in the theaters—but as usual they may have changed after seeing this cool sneak peek.  
I was surprised at the cool visuals in the film,  since I hadn’t seen anything that cool from the film’s first trailer.  It looks great and the 2 main characters are adorable and the sneak peek into the movies story makes it look like a lot of fun.  The story is basically a what if the asteroid hadn't killed all the Dinosaurs and follows a boy named Spot and a Dinosaur named Arlo.

Could this be Pixar’s First Flop?

Despite how good the sneak peek was this film had issues during production and was reworked by Pixar that didn’t feel it was good enough at first…..I think Pixar has solved whatever initial issues the film had because it looks like another great Pixar film now.   Pixar basically has the best movie batting average ever… They don’t seem to make bad movies---so I’m sure it will be great.   My only concern is for the box office future of the flick –between the Ice Age films and Land Before Time and Disney’s own Dinosaur.  It just seems like this ground has been stomped on too many times before.  The one thing this film lacks that the other Pixar films has is an original story.   As a result this particular film may get lost in the shuffle.    (Of course I've been wrong before)

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Sometimes a Ride Breaking Down can be a Good Thing: 3 Times on Everest in 25 Minutes

When we went to Animal Kingdom on our recent trip we had of course gone online ahead of time to secure a Fast pass time for Expedition Everest.   This was my most anticipated ride of the trip, since they were still building it over 10 years ago,  the last time I was in Orlando.   So when our Fast pass time was approaching --my stepson and I headed over to make sure we got on this beast of a ride.  The ride time was already showing at about an hour online so we were happy we had a Fast pass.  Well as luck would have it we arrived just in time for the ride to be shutdown and we were told that our fast pass would be good for the rest of the day if the attraction started up again.

Thwarted in our attempts to scale the peaks of this thrill ride we headed of to do something else.   We headed over to Kali Rapids which was already building up into a long line as well.  We tried our Magic Bands and it worked for this ride so we headed up to the front of the line.   Then minutes before we were on the ride ---It broke as well.  It was about a 7 minute shut down and then we were back in business,  but I began to worry that since our Fast pass worked for a ride that we didn't have a pass on that it wouldn't later work on Everest.

Hours went by as we meet back up with the rest of the family for Festival of the Lion King and dinner at the Rainforest.  We figured we would have to try Everest at the end of the day.   Hopefully the line would be shorter.  After diner we hit Dinosaur which we did twice in a row since the line was really short --then off we went to finally get our ride on the mountain that hung in the distance.

We arrived right before park closing using our fast passes.  (They didn't work).  We were told you only get to use them once  (I guess Kali Rapids used up our Everest Fast pass).   We told them we hadn't ridden it--because it had broken down and away we went into the Fast Pass line.  By the time we did this great ride (Review to come in a different blog) the line had pretty disappeared --so we were able to do it two more times before closing.  (We could have done it  times --but the girls were waiting for us).  So sometimes a ride breaking down can be a good thing.   If the ride hadn't broken down we may have only rode it once in the middle of the day,  but since we had to change plans and try it later --we ended up getting 3 rides instead of one.

This also begs the question....was it worth getting a Fast Pass for Everest in the first place?  Was it just a fluke or is the end of the day at Animal Kingdom always the best time for the big rides?

After all we were able to get 2 rides on Dinosaur and could have done 4 times on Everest.

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Avatarland at Disney's Animal Kingdom could be something special

Here is a new video Released by Disney with John Cameron talking about what we can expect with Avatar

Below is an old article I wrote awhile back for Miceage about the possibilities that an Avatarland might have

I decided to revisit Pandora over the weekend in search of clues as to what the announced land in Animal Kingdom could consist of. What rides and or attractions could come from this visually stunning yet not totally satisfying movie? It is after all the most successful movie of all time box office wise. I thought the movie was pretty good when it came out though not outstanding since I felt it the plot wasn't that great. It was driven by the stunning nature of its visual appeal. (An 8+ out of 10). So I sat down and watched it again from the perspective of looking at what kind of attractions could come out of it.

Welcome to Pandora:
Pandora is a world filled with giant cascading waterfalls (like Naboo) and rocky mountain ranges that look like they are from the Wonders of China (as seen in the Fantasy movie Willow) and Mountains that float in the sky. I'm trying to picture this but unless they have figured out how to shrink people like in Adventures through Innerspace I kept wondering how this scale could be achieved.

The trees of Pandora make the Tree of Life in Animal kingdom look small in comparison. The world is filled with colorful creatures.There are multi-limbed Blue Lemurs.....(.I guess they could throw some paint on some lemurs and glue a few extra arms on them). The land also is filled with giant horse like Dinosaurs and things that look like Rhinos with Hammerheads. I hope the plan isn't to just switch out the Dinosaurs from Dinosaur with blue painted Pandora animatronic creatures.



They could create an indoor environment that is made to look like the lower levels of the forest all black lit with fake plants and animatronics to like the bio luminescent areas of Pandora but that just makes me think of the line and ride for ET that used to be in Universal Studios (and we don't want that).

And then there are the strange looking Na'vi (which I could really never get used to or connect with in the movie)
Are they going to have really tall people watching around for photo ops and scaring the children? Are kids going to get caught up in their tails like a bad memory from a trip to Chuck E Cheese?

Having re watched the film I'm more confused then i was when I first heard the announcement about Avatar land. I mean despite the visual wonder of the film upon a second viewing it really doesn't hold the magic or repeatability of a Star Wars movie or Harry Potter. The plot is a re thread of Pocahontas with weird Blue Aliens. How do you make a new land out of a movie where humans are the villains? Is the land just going to be a big bio luminescent dome filled with environmental messages? Are people dressed like the Na'vi going to be sitting around the telling stories about nature and the importance of protecting the earth and the need to recycle? I know that fits with the theme of Animal Kingdom but other than that it doesn't sound fun.
The plot of the movie doesn't really lend itself to an attraction. I mean the Lorax the ride doesn't sound fun.

I only thing I can think of is that they have some kind of flying lizard ride in mind for Animal Kingdom. A major element of the film is the Na'vi riding around on giant flying lizards. It is the most dramatic and thrilling portion of the movie. But how can this be achieved in a high capacity ride? A coaster would be a cheesy way to do this (too Universal for my tastes). It could be done with a kid ride....a Peter Pan type thing.....but that is too rinky dink an idea. The only thing that makes sense to me would be a Soaring type ride modified to fit the theme of course. It would allow for the visual scale of the film and be able to take you past the flying mountains and giant waterfalls and flying lizards.....and then dip you down into the lower portions of the planet to see the other creatures that live there. [B]Basically take Soaring and kick it up a notch to the next level[/B]. We shall have to wait and see....


I still would prefer someone to make Star Wars Land..

http://bradgeekness.blogspot.com/2011/05/star-wars-hotel-casino-and-theme-park_25.html