Loaded Couch Potatoes

With the official announcement less than 24 hours away for the opening date of Wizarding World of Harry Potter, it looks like the information has already slipped out. A page on the Universal Orlando site accidentally leaked the official opening date. It was changed back fairly quickly, but here is what was posted:

Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey
On Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey – the marquee attraction of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter – guests will journey through iconic locations straight from the films, such as the Room of Requirement. This amazingly detailed scene is where guests board the groundbreaking ride and are drawn into the excitement and chaos of Harry’s life. The Wizarding World of Harry Potter – the only place in the world where the stories of Harry Potter will come to life – grand opening on June 18.

It seems like Universal can’t keep anything a secret anymore.  Even if the announcement is only a day away.  First the “tent pole” ride for the Harry Potter area had most of the information for it uncovered through patents filings, Kuka robotics contracts, or just actors talking about filming their 3D scenes for the ride.  Then a few days before the Super Bowl, their commercial somehow leaked to the internet a few days early.  Maybe this is Universal’s new advertising style?  Make a big deal about the announcement, and then leak the information early so everyone gets excited?  hmmm  That is the “grand opening date”, I’ m sure we can expect to see a soft opening start to happen in early June.

The official announcement will be made on Thursday, March 25th at 12:00pm eastern time.  Expect to see the original leaked page back online at www.UniversalOrlando.com/HarryPotter

This is probably the best video I’ve seen of Disney testing out their fountains for the World of Color.  Still no word on an opening date from Disney.

If you didn’t see the behind the scenes look video posted last month, click here.

Six Flags just announced on their website that they will cease operation of their Kentucky Kingdom theme park.  The announcement says that Six Flags rejected the lease agreements with the owner of the land, the Kentucky State Fairgrounds.

In recent weeks, Six Flags had proposed a new lease arrangement to the fair board that would have enhanced the viability and future of the park. Unfortunately, those proposals were not accepted and the park will cease operations and the company will move expeditiously to re-locate employees and several of the more than 40 rides and attractions to one of its 13 other markets.

In an interesting contrast with Six Flags’ statement, this article claims that all rides are property of the Kentucky Fair Board.  Harold Workman, president of the Ky Fair Board said that the removal of the Chang roller coaster in September of last year was approved by him after Six Flags presented him plans to expand the water park by removing Chang.  With the way the contracted is worded, the Chang roller coaster could have belonged to the Fair Board, since the ride was affixed to the ground.  He also claims that Six Flags proposed a deal to pay no rent for the remainder  of the nine year lease in exchange for some sort of profit-sharing deal.

update Feb. 10, 2010

The current rumor is that Compagnie des Alpes is in talks with the Kentucky State Fairgrounds about running the Kentucky Kingdom property.  CdA runs several theme parks in Europe including the Parc Asterix, Walibi parks, Bellewaerde, and Hellendoorn.  If the deal goes through, Kentucky Kingdom would be their first park in North America.

A few different websites out there are showing off what they claim is a preview of the new Harry Potter themed Superbowl ad for Universal Orlando. I’ve embedded the video being shown below.  View it before the copy-right overlords of the interwebs have it taken down.

I think they could have done a better job for a commercial that is going to cost them $2.5 billion to show during the Super Bowl.  At this point I’m sure they’re going for just more of an “oh I’m excited to see a commercial for it” factor than trying to compete with the usual creative commercials seen during the game.  I did however like the split second view of the coaster train on the dragon’s fire.

The Disney Parks Blog just released this video with a great look at all the effects that go into the new World of Color show at Disney’s California Adventure.

Universal Studios Singapore has released official video showing off the Battlestar Galactica dueling coaster making a test runs.  As expected, the trains are launched up the lift launch hill at 40mph.

This video focuses more on the inverted, Cylon track.

This one focuses more on the sit-down, Human track.

Universal Studios Singapore is still on schedule to open summer 2010.

Kings Island’s Halloween Haunt event kicked off over the weekend and they quickly received complaints over some displays that many considered offensive.  The displays featured dead celebrity skeletons, including Heath Ledger (with empty pill bottles at his feet), Billy Mays, Michael Jackson (with pet monkey Bubbles), and probably most disturbing, NFL quarter back Steven McNair (with his girlfriend who killed him).  A local Cincinnati news station posted their photos here.

I just don’t see how someone comes up with the idea, and gets it approved from the higher ups in the theme park to go ahead with it.  I’m sure they were just trying to be edgy this year and make some extra news coverage (nothing helps get attention like controversy) but I think they definitely stepped over the line with the McNair display.

Well when I got home from the event I was exhausted but ready to upload my photos and write a quick review.  I sat down at my computer and before my photos had even transferred to the computer I was asleep in my chair.  Not the most comfortable 6 hours of sleep, but I woke up and sorted through the photos, re-sized, and uploaded them.

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There’s just so much information here I gave up on trying to write a summary of all this.
Everything you need to know is in this video from the D23 Expo:

Just as I had speculated earlier, Jay Rasulo (chairman of Disney Parks and Resorts) announced during his keynote speech that Star Tours 2 will be coming to Disneyland in California and Disney Hollywood Studios at Disney World in Florida.  This project has been rumored to be on the back burner since 2002, and now it’s finally OFFICIAL

The current version of Star Tours will close down in October of 2010, and the new version will open sometime in 2011.  They’ve released piece of concept artwork and a short video.

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