Inside The Mouse Castle 03-02-2016 - Disney's Seasonal Ticket Pricing, Jack Lindquist and the IASW Movie

By Tim Callaway

There's nothing like a ticket price increase to get the Disney fan base stirred up. Make it "seasonal pricing" (or "tiered pricing" or "surge pricing"), however, and you'd better getting ready for major outrage. The price of single-day and multi-day tickets went up (for the most part) at all the Disney parks over the weekend, with single-day tickets now priced based on expected attendance. In a nutshell, you'll pay more to visit your favorite park on a busy day (say, summer or Christmastime) than you will during a quieter day (like an October weekday). What does it all mean and should you really be upset about it? Anthony and I sort it all out for you in this week's Inside The Mouse Castle.

Here's what else we've got going on:

• At the Academy Awards Sunday, Pixar's Inside Out was the unsurprising, but highly deserving winner of the Best Animated Feature Oscar. In their acceptance speech, director Pete Docter and producer Jonas Rivera had inspiring words about the importance of "making stuff" in the face of adversity.

Me and Disney Legend Jack Lindquist, January 2011.

• Rest in peace, Jack Lindquist, who passed away Sunday at the age of 88. Jack was a marketing genius who became Disneyland's first president and, later, a Disney Legend. His memoir, In Service to the Mouse, should be required reading for every Disney fan. Our condolences to Jack's friends and family. He will be greatly missed.
• Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters will officially open at Disney California Adventure on March 7. Annual Passholders can get an exclusive preview of the ride on March 4. This looks like a very fun ride--and hopefully a more reliable replacement for Luigi's Flying Tires.

• Guests attending the Food & Wine Festival at Disney California Adventure in April can take part in special Beverage Seminars at Sonoma Terrace. Fifteen dollars will get you admission and three samples of select beers, wine or spirits. To purchase tickets, visit https://disneyland.disney.go.com/dining/disney-california-adventure/food-and-wine-festival-beverage-seminars.
• Marvel superheroes and villains will take each other on in Marvel Battlegrounds, the new four-player play set for Disney Infinity 3.0. A modern-look Captain America comes with the set and new character figures Ant-Man, Vision and Black Panther will also be available. Purchase the set online or in stores on March 15.
  

• Today's parting question: Does the thought of an It's a Small World movie make you cringe as much as us? Thought so.

Enjoy!

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Christmas at Disneyland

If you listened to Monday's Inside The Mouse Castle, you know that until this past weekend, it had been a long time since I enjoyed the holiday season at Disneyland. You also know that it was the first Christmastime trip Anthony ever took to the Happiest Place on Earth. Yeah, we're slackers. We know.

Christmas is an especially crowded and hectic time at Disneyland, but it's also a beautiful and unique experience unlike any other yuletide celebration on Earth. Most importantly, it's an experience that needs to be shared. Please enjoy these holiday photos from Disneyland and Disney California Adventure. Click each photo to enlarge the image.

Disneyland

Sleeping Beauty Castle.

Sleeping Beauty Castle at night.

Sleeping Beauty Castle getting a magical holiday makeover.

Main Street, USA at night.

The Town Square Christmas tree.

Baymax balloons.

Disneyland Fire Department with Walt's apartment above.

Haunted Mansion Holiday.

Disney California Adventure

Paradise Pier at sunset.

Paradise Pier Christmas tree.

Cars Land.

Flo's V8 Cafe.

The Cozy Cone Motel.

Sarge's Surplus Hut.

Luigi's Flying Tires will go flat in January.

Carthay Circle

Carthay Circle and the Buena Vista Street Christmas tree.

Mickey Mouse on the Red Car Trolley.

Disney's Grand Californian Hotel & Spa

The gingerbread house in the Grand Cal's lobby is over 7 feet tall and is made
from 500 pounds of gingerbread.

Christmas tree in the Grand Californian Hotel lobby.

'Frozen Fun' and 'Freeze the Night'

Frozen Fun is everywhere at Disney California Adventure.

Wandering Oaken's Trading Post in Hollywood Land.

The entrance to DCA's nighttime entertainment venue, Freeze the Night,
opened for the first time on Saturday night.

Freeze the Night.

Marshmallow gets some screen time during Freeze the Night.

DJ Cool mixes the tunes at Freeze the Night.

Ice sculptures created live on stage with a chain saw.
What could possibly go wrong?

Marshmallow and me.

From Freeze the Night's icebox: the Blue Snowberry
Margarita (in a martini glass, go figure) is a dud. The
Rum Flurry is delicious.

The Summertime Pina Colada also disappointed, but
props to DCA for not skimping on the booze.

Meanwhile, back at Disneyland, Arendelle became the latest addition
to the Storybook Land Canal Boats.

Hoo hoo! Big summer blowout!

it's a small world holiday

Merry Christmas from The Mouse Castle!

It's Official: Cars Land Will Open June 15

Cars Land at Disney California Adventure

Yesterday, after months of speculation, Disney finally made it official.

Cars Land and Buena Vista Street will open at Disney California Adventure on June 15. They'll be the final additions of a 5-year expansion and re-theming of the once-maligned park. Disney has spent over a billion dollars to make DCA stand out on its own with new shows and attractions including World of Color, Ariel's Undersea Adventure, Silly Symphony Swings, Goofy's Sky School and a general face lift for the Paradise Pier area.

It's a series of improvements that even John Lasseter (wearing his Principal Creative Advisor for Walt Disney Imagineering hat) acknowledges was much needed. In an interview last year, he said "There's a magic to Disneyland, the original park. And, when California Adventure opened up (in 2001), it was not a Disney Park. It was a Disney park on a budget."

That is changing.

The faux-Southwest vistas of Cars Land take up 12 acres on the south end of DCA. Its E-ticket attraction, Radiator Springs Racers, a Test Track-like high-speed spin through Ornament Valley, will be one of the largest single rides Disney has ever built. Other attractions up the street include the kid-friendly tractor ride, Mater's Junkyard Jamboree, and the ride I'm looking forward to the most, Luigi's Flying Tires. It's patterned after Disneyland's iconic Flying Saucers of the early 1960s, the one attraction that as a child I was too small to go on. By the time I would've been big enough, the ride was torn down to make way for Tomorrowland 1967. To a four-year old who thought the Saucers were the coolest thing ever, it was devastating. I've waited over 45 years to finally get my turn. I can't wait.

A few months ago, Lasseter took Luigi's Flying Tires for a test run. He seemed pretty excited:

When the temporary walls that have been lining the entrance to DCA come down in June, they'll reveal a brand new Buena Vista Street, an entrance plaza that will capture the spirit and style of Los Angeles in the 1920s, the time when Walt Disney first came to Southern California to seek his fortune. The centerpiece of Buena Vista Street will be the Carthay Circle Theatre, patterned after the famed site where Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs premiered in 1937. The building will house the Carthay Circle Restaurant, a fancy restaurant and lounge.

Carthay Circle Theatre

Traversing Buena Vista Street will be two Red Car Trolleys, modeled after the transportation system that once serviced Southern California. Other additions that will round out DCA Redux are the Ghirardelli Soda Fountain and Chocolate Shop at Pacific Wharf and the Mad T Party, which will replace ElecTRONica as the Hollywood Pictures Backlot's hopping night spot.

Here's a sneak preview, courtesy of Disney, of all there is to see and do in Disney California Adventure starting June 15:

To make final preparations for the grand opening and to allow for a media preview, DCA will be closed on June 14.

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