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News Bob Iger Steps Down as Disney CEO

Honestly, I can see the logic behind rotating out older attractions in favour of new ones. Just from an engineering standpoint it's going to get increasingly difficult to maintain older machinery until you get to the point where you either have to do a full top to bottom renovation, or just pull the whole thing, at which point I'd imagine it comes down to a cost/benefit decision. Plus in terms of brand recognition, the primary demographic (ie: children) are going to be more attracted to what they know; the more recent and popular movie properties. Long time visitors may have a lot of affection for mascots and characters that have been exclusively at the park forever, but an 8 year old visiting for the first time is going to more drawn to a 'Frozen', 'Dory' or 'Moana' attraction. Which by of course supports the merchandise sales, which is of course where the real money is.

On top of that, there's an upper limit to the amount of space they have in the parks (and how much ground they can reasonably expect an average visitor to cover per visit) so in order to put in something new, something old has to go, and you need new things to keep attracting repeat visitors. What constitutes "classic and untouchable" old and "outdated a replaceable" old is no doubt a hotly debated topic among fans which I am in no way informed enough to have an intelligent opinion.

Honestly this kind of things feels like fairly tame compared to some of the other complaints I've heard levied at Chapek, not least of which being a supposed rather militant aversion to unionisation, actually paying his employees a reasonable wage and generally willing to cut corners to get as much foot traffic for that absolute least cost possible.
I just... there are things they do that bother me. Adding Disney characters to It's A Small World. Changing out Maelstrom for a Frozen ride. Removing the conservation story from Kilimanjaro Safari at Animal Kingdom. NOT FIXING THE YETI. I understand the business why's behind them, but that doesn't help my guest brain not see them as cash grabs and not really adding to the experience. What's next, Stitch guiding the glider in Soarin'?
 
I just... there are things they do that bother me. Adding Disney characters to It's A Small World. Changing out Maelstrom for a Frozen ride. Removing the conservation story from Kilimanjaro Safari at Animal Kingdom. NOT FIXING THE YETI. I understand the business why's behind them, but that doesn't help my guest brain not see them as cash grabs and not really adding to the experience. What's next, Stitch guiding the glider in Soarin'?
Disney is working on a live-action Lilo and Stitch, they’ll need some cross promotion.
 
Ugh. I don't know what the right answer to updating Epcot is, but I don't think adding a Guardians of the Galaxy roller coaster was it.
It really should be in Tomorrowland at the Magic Kingdom. I guess they didn’t want it, the Tron coaster and Space Mountain. But it would fit in the theming better there.
 
There is only so much space in each land. The options they have are replace attractions, revamp attractions, or expand into new lands, which they did for Galaxy's Edge, as well as sometimes opening new sub-parks nearby.
 
It’s really more emotional thing than anything else. A mix of nostalgia and being a fan of an attraction. It’s not like a show being cancelled. You can always see it by some means, but once a ride is gone you can never fully experience it again. It’s like if we lost all copies of Star Wars except for low quality cam footage or some sort of recreation.
 
I just... there are things they do that bother me. Adding Disney characters to It's A Small World. Changing out Maelstrom for a Frozen ride. Removing the conservation story from Kilimanjaro Safari at Animal Kingdom. NOT FIXING THE YETI. I understand the business why's behind them, but that doesn't help my guest brain not see them as cash grabs and not really adding to the experience. What's next, Stitch guiding the glider in Soarin'?
It's always been a cash grab though, hasn't it? Only before it was a cash grab banking on a certain degree of exclusivity, whereas now it's about brand recognition.
 
I don't mean to criticize, but this has been bugging me since the thread was started. @Campe, is there a specific reason you put this in the Star Wars section rather than a more general one? Iger stepping down effects a lot more than just Star Wars.
 
I don't mean to criticize, but this has been bugging me since the thread was started. @Campe, is there a specific reason you put this in the Star Wars section rather than a more general one? Iger stepping down effects a lot more than just Star Wars.

A fair question. Probably more because this is one area of the site that I frequent the most.
 
I don't mean to criticize, but this has been bugging me since the thread was started. @Campe, is there a specific reason you put this in the Star Wars section rather than a more general one? Iger stepping down effects a lot more than just Star Wars.
It can be discussed in many sections, but here we can discuss it's impact on Star Wars.
 
Honestly, I can see the logic behind rotating out older attractions in favour of new ones. Just from an engineering standpoint it's going to get increasingly difficult to maintain older machinery until you get to the point where you either have to do a full top to bottom renovation, or just pull the whole thing, at which point I'd imagine it comes down to a cost/benefit decision. Plus in terms of brand recognition, the primary demographic (ie: children) are going to be more attracted to what they know; the more recent and popular movie properties. Long time visitors may have a lot of affection for mascots and characters that have been exclusively at the park forever, but an 8 year old visiting for the first time is going to more drawn to a 'Frozen', 'Dory' or 'Moana' attraction. Which by of course supports the merchandise sales, which is of course where the real money is.

On top of that, there's an upper limit to the amount of space they have in the parks (and how much ground they can reasonably expect an average visitor to cover per visit) so in order to put in something new, something old has to go, and you need new things to keep attracting repeat visitors. What constitutes "classic and untouchable" old and "outdated a replaceable" old is no doubt a hotly debated topic among fans which I am in no way informed enough to have an intelligent opinion.

Honestly this kind of things feels like fairly tame compared to some of the other complaints I've heard levied at Chapek, not least of which being a supposed rather militant aversion to unionisation, actually paying his employees a reasonable wage and generally willing to cut corners to get as much foot traffic for that absolute least cost possible.
That's the thing, one hand I understand completely they do it. But on the other, it's a shame when it's a beloved ride. Some of the more classic rides have been upgraded with newer technology or elements of older rides are sort of incorporated into newer ones.

I broke Space Mountain....got stuck on it for an hour.

Apparently the new safety computers and the old rides don't always interface the way they should.
 
I broke Space Mountain....got stuck on it for an hour.

Apparently the new safety computers and the old rides don't always interface the way they should.
I think Disney is overly cautious with their safety systems but I can’t blame them since they want to protect their image.
 
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