A Mickey-themed ride idea I had (part two of two)

On my last post, I had mentioned a ride idea I had involving Mickey and the gang to be put into WDW's Magic Kingdom's Storybook Circus. And now I will get into the verbal tour for it: Mickey's House of Wonders.

I did it pretty much all by myself, with no help whatsoever. It took a long time because I had ideas which was argued did not "agree" with the circus setting. Given my argument about how the Madhouse concept could work here if it was to have worked in the Circusland concept of old (this was long before Toontown was ever thought of), I was inclined to disagree and prove the naysayers wrong. To do that, I changed the name from "Fun/Mad" to "Wonder".

It is set in the Storybook Circus section, replacing Pete's Silly Sideshow. Here is the basic location there:

There was produced an article from Passport 2 Dreams on ten of the Magic Kingdom's biggest blunders, with Mickey's Birthdayland/Starland/Toontown Fair coming in at #1. It singles out the tents in particular, which were retained from the transformation from Starland to Toontown Fair, and which were transformed into meet-n-greets and a shop, which were ostensibly retained for their alleged profitability. Here's what the article said (ellipses are to condense the article for clarity):

By 2001 the Toontown tent complex had become the single most profitable structure per square foot at Magic Kingdom. Mickey was the anchor, pulling crowds into Toontown, then dispersing them through a variety of shops and photograph locations. This profitability would ensure that the tents would survive yet another round of renovations - Storybook Circus.

[...]

Despite the fact that the reasons for the success of those tents were being scattered to the winds, it was proclaimed by fiat that the tents must remain due to their profitability. What had previously been the Princess Tent was transformed into Pete's Silly Sideshow, a permanent venue for Mickey, Donald, Minnie and Daisy with a nicely done circus theme. The crowds never quite returned to their original levels. What had previously been a bustling store where Princess dresses and Mickey dolls flew off the shelves now seems nearly abandoned after nightfall. The Sideshow meet and greet has started closing early.

[...]

Now that the power of the circus tents is on the wane, it really would be a nice gesture to finally lose them and build a permanent ride in that spot. The three Storybook Circus tents take up about as much room as the Mermaid ride next door. The basic problem is that the use of tents, no matter how nicely you build them or how intricately you theme them, still evoke temporary structures and, by extension, cheapness. Cheap ideas and cheap aesthetics are what Birthdayland initiated, yet it must be said that the new Magician Mickey and Fairytale Hall attractions are far above its standard, leaving just those three tents as symbols of Birthdayland's enduring legacy.

Thus, this whole area will be the new spot for this new dark ride. With that said, let's begin the verbal tour!

The ride lasts 3-4 minutes, about as long as the Peter Pan ride at the other end of Fantasyland.

As you enter the ride structure (based loosely on the Madhouse facade, which I previously displayed in the last post), you wind through a reduced queue, about half the space of the queue in the image above. The remaining space, along the exit path, will be home to an alternate meet-n-greet space known as the Silly Symphonic Sideshow (replacing Pete's Silly Sideshow), where you can meet with various lesser-known characters like Horace Horsecollar, Clarabelle Cow, Ludwig Von Drake, or the Three Little Pigs.

In the queue here, ringleader Mickey and his good friends Donald and Goofy perform acrobatics and stunts. And their most prized possession is the House of Wonders, where you board a colorful carriage-car-thing through a zany funhouse-like attraction, where anything can happen. And it is, apparently, as unbeknownst to our heroes, something is amiss here, as there is wear and tear and the occasional spectral laugh. The further you go, the louder the laughs become. On the walls you can see the occasional shadow of an odd-looking spook.

The queue winds back and forth on the right side and should be enough to hold a 35-minute wait before spilling out into Storybook Circus.

You then climb into your ride vehicles for your trip through the House of Wonders. They are themed as the aforementioned carriage-car-things which look like a cross between the non-cage cars of Casey Jr...

...and the motor cars from Mr. Toad's Wild Ride:

In short, they will look like the Mr. Toad cars with the circus-like filigrees from Casey Jr. The cars seat six passengers per seat, and it will actually be a milder version of the EMVs found at Disneyland's Indiana Jones ride and the Animal Kingdom's Dinosaur ride. As such, there will be some jerking, lurching side-to-side motions, so it's going to be a little rough, but not as rough as Dinosaur. Incidentally, there is a moment in the Winnie the Pooh ride that also gets a little jerky as the honey pot vehicles there "bounce" with Tigger, but that's only for one scene, however.

As you climb aboard, you hear Mickey providing the typical bilingual safety spiel, and once the lap bars are down, you are on your way.

Scene 1 - Meet Mickey and pals
Mickey, Donald and Goofy all greet you and then Mickey sends you on your way into the House of Wonders by pulling on a rope attached to a group of steam whistles (themed to Steamboat Willie) that opens a door to usher you in.

Scene 2 - Mirror Hall

Inside your vehicles meander around odd shaped mirrors as 2.5D projections (tech used in Mickey/Minnie's Runaway Railway) adapts the surroundings to different shaped mirrors and settings as you circle around. Inside the mirrors are various images as a homage to Thru the Mirror, including a globe, giant playing cards and a radio, which plays the lively music from that short here:

At the end of the hall, however, a group of specters, the Lonesome Ghosts...

...appear in the hallway reflection, laughing. As you go through a rotating barrel that spins faster or slower seemingly at random, but actually caused by the ghosts.

Scene 3 - Donald and Goofy's Acts

The Astounding Duke Donaldo (AKA Donald Duck) is performing a stunt with three seals, a homage to Mickey's Circus...

...although the seals themselves more resemble those in Mickey and the Seal:

A young pup (Salty) is on some horns and two others in a water tank, where the Great Goofini (AKA Goofy) is also performing his newest stunt, a whale rodeo, the whale resembling that from The Whalers:

Suddenly, the ghostly laughter rings out again, startling all in the room, causing the seals to run loose and cause them, your vehicle and the whale to crash into the tank, smashing it open and spilling water everywhere. The flow of water forces your vehicle to crash through a barricade and you exit the room. As you leave, you see Goofy in a bathing suit, surfing the wave, a nod to Hawaiian Holiday, with the shadow of a ghost surfing along behind it:

For a brief moment, you're in darkness as the laughter rings out again, and you hear Mickey and pals exclaiming the presence of ghosts and has you turn on your car's headlights, which are powerful enough to get rid of them. After all, as another classic attraction with ghosts intones: "Spirits are frightfully sensitive to bright lights." The lights activate.

Scene 4 - Cars 'n' Clocks
Reemerging from darkness, you see things have gone crazy thanks to the Lonesome Ghosts, who have turned the House of Wonders into something really cartoon-like and less funhouse-like. From this point on, you can shine your light around the room to point out the ghosts, who now appear frequently, as do Mickey's group who are spooked, so to speak, by spectral pranks.

One corner shows a garage of sorts, paying homage to Mickey's Service Station. Here, a jalopy and a taxicab (based on "Traffic Troubles") rise and lower comically on hydraulic lifts. On the wall behind the cars, tires spin wildly, with one being a flat that flaps around, while license plates hanging on the wall sway back and forth. These are similar to the Roger Rabbit ride's queue with various letters and numbers jumbled to form references to all things Disney (i.e., "CAP 10 HK", "101 DALMN", "L MERM8", etc.). On the ground, an engine block, chained to the wall, lashes out like a vicious dog at you. Mickey is seen here struggling against one of the Lonesome Ghosts, but your car's headlights make it disappear. The scene with the cars is similar to this one level in Epic Mickey 2:

The opposite corner shows the inner workings of a giant clock, a homage to Clock Cleaners, the face of which is outside, so the numbers are backwards as the clock hands spin wildly counterclockwise. Gears spin wildly, a pendulum swings back and forth, almost hitting you, and Goofy is hiding from a ghost (fooling around with the mechanisms) under a bell (with his head sticking out) while trying not to get shook up from a mechanized bell ringer hitting the bell. Again, it's similar to a level in Epic Mickey:

Scene 5 - Animal Antics
Now things get more dangerous as various animals (either taxidermied or allegedly animatronics) are brought to life by the ghosts and are terrorizing Mickey and, in this case, Donald. Mickey has his hands full with a lion, a homage to Jungle Rhythm...

...while Donald has to contend with a gorilla, resembling Ajax from Donald and the Gorilla...

...and they both have to contend with a bear, referencing The Pointer and Donald's Vacation.

As always, as the ghosts appear, but your headlights swerves to shine on them, allowing our heroes to escape from the animals as they are slowed considerably by the disappearance of the spooks.

Scene 6 - Prop Warehouse
You go through a prop warehouse (similar to the Gag Warehouse in the Roger Rabbit ride), full of various circus props, such as cream pies, squirting flowers, giant balls, etc. You hear Mickey and pals coming up with a way to stop the Lonesome Ghosts and (hopefully) save the circus. At the end, you see Mickey and Goofy bringing out a wind machine to work out a plan, but Donald brings out a flare gun, a homage to the climax of Magician Mickey, impatient to get them gone quickly. Mickey warns not to rush things, but Donald doesn't listen. He fires the gun, startling Goofy, who accidentally turns the wind machine on, which leads to...

Scene 7 - A Whirling, Explosive Climax!
The William Tell Storm from The Band Concert, sounding like the Silly Symphony Swings version, plays here (until about 0:28)…

...as the intrepid trio, plus the Lonesome Ghosts and yourself, all caught up in a whirling twister of pandemonium. Donald tries to fire the flare gun at the ghosts, hoping to get the light to scare them, but unfortunately, his aim is off and the flare strikes a crate of very obviously displayed fireworks instead! Leaving, you are treated to an explosion scene (a la Mr. Toad or Roger Rabbit), which blows things up, but also scares off the Lonesome Ghosts for good! Also, this music is heard during this scene (at 10:43, which is the climax music from Magician Mickey):

Scene 8 - Goodbye
Mickey, Donald and Goofy are united again. Mickey, echoing Kermit the Frog at the end of Muppet-Vision 3D, apologizes for any technical difficulties, but they are relieved that no one was hurt and the House of Wonders only suffered "minor" damage (even though the area is in tatters). But they are glad that the Lonesome Ghosts are gone (as a gag, in the background, they are hitchhiking, just like another group of ghosts at the end of another attraction!), and that they will try to repair the damage for your next trip.

Scene 8.5 - Unload
You reappear near the load area, disembark and head back through the main queue building structure and to the Big Top Souvenirs. However, on the exit path over to the gift shop, there's a meet and greet with circus-themed characters (the aforementioned Silly Symphonic Sideshow).

And there you have it, Mickey's House of Wonders, a dark ride for Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom (and hopefully, other parks, too). I hope you liked reading about it. And of course, happy birthday, Mickey and Minnie!

A Mickey-themed ride idea I had (part one of two)

This is a two-parter...

One of my personal little hobbies of mine is coming up with ideas for Disney attractions being added to Disney parks. I've done this a lot on various Disney theme park forums, although I haven't been nearly as active as I once was. I have even done it once here, in the form of ideas for how I would improve Disneyland. This was back in 2015.

One of my most recent ideas for an attraction is this one that I would put in WDW's Magic Kingdom, in the Storybook Circus subsection of Fantasyland. It is called "Mickey's House of Wonders". I thought of this in honor of Mickey's 90th(!) birthday.

Before I delve into the verbal tour of the ride itself, a little bit of background: This ride concept is based (loosely, in my opinion) on this one attraction concept dating back to the 1970s, as part of a land for Disneyland that never was: Dumbo's Circusland, which was to have been built where Toontown is today. Here is a scale model of the land in question:

As you can see, it was to have had a relocated Dumbo ride (on an elevated platform, rather like Tomorrowland's rocket ride at that time). Casey Jr. would have a stop here as well (likely a second one, to go with the one in Storybook Land).

Anyway, one of the new concepts for this land was to have been something called "Mickey's Madhouse", a dark ride/roller coaster hybrid themed around old Mickey cartoons, where Mickey and the gang perform antics set to frenetic ragtime music. Here is how the exterior of the ride would have looked:

(Other attractions to be added would include two more dark rides, one called Circus Disney, where Disney characters of every stripe perform circus acts, and the other a Pinocchio ride, which ultimately did open in 1983 as part of the new Fantasyland.)

Although Dumbo's Circusland never came to fruition as envisioned, I feel as though that Storybook Circus is a heavily-modified version of that; it does feature a relocated Dumbo (actually, two sets of Dumbos) and one of the concepts for "Circus Disney", the Flying Goofys, was rethemed as a kiddie coaster, known as "The Great Goofini's Barnstormer".

The fact remains, however, that Storybook Circus' location, ironically, is something that happened in reverse of Disneyland: it goes where Mickey's Birthdayland/Starland/Toontown Fair once stood. Although the land was really only meant to be temporary, I'm a little disappointed with the park now being without a land devoted to Mickey and the gang. On the other hand, however, there still is a ride themed to Goofy here (which was held over from Toontown Fair), so...

This ride concept of mine, "Mickey's House of Wonders", is something like a variation of the Roger Rabbit ride at Disneyland in terms of frenetic pace and attitude. The coaster aspect of "Madhouse" is dropped, and so is the name "Madhouse", which doesn't really fit Mickey.

Originally, my ride idea was called "Mickey's Fun House". My main difficulty with this is that I really don't have a lot of information to go on in terms of the attraction concept. I can't find any information on "Madhouse", no concept art (aside from the exterior artwork) or longer descriptions (short of "A trip through old Mickey cartoons") or anything. When I brought up this concept on various theme park forums, they couldn't find anything either, so they thought it would just be better to just do a new ride from scratch (hence why I said it was loosely based on an old concept). My main concern with doing things from scratch is I have nothing to go on to help me out here.

I tried to replicate the concept as best I could, with actual vignettes of old cartoons, but the forum members' argument (not an unreasonable one, either) was that the concept of this attraction as envisioned for Circusland apparently doesn't really fit the circus motif; it seems more suited to something like Toontown. But of course, there is no Toontown at WDW anymore. There is a Toontown at Disneyland, but there is not that much space for it, and besides, rumor has it that a copy of Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway, based on the 2010s Mickey cartoons and being added to Disney's Hollywood Studios, replacing the Great Movie Ride, is being added to that Toontown. In fact, an announcement should be made any day now. My concept and the rumored Runway Railway concept are the same thing, just based around different time periods. But I digress...

The forum people's argument was that, as it is going in a circus setting, my ride should have reflect that. They came up with an idea for the ride in question, but I was not entirely happy with it based primarily around the circus; I wanted to include classic shorts elements, too (not just black-and-white, but color cartoons, too). However, they seemed pretty adamant that it should be about the circus first and everything else second. As I said, my idea was more "shorts vignettes" than "circus", which they insisted was out of place here and, again, seemed to fit in Toontown better. The fact is, I have a habit of overthinking my ideas because I want everything to be just right and be realistic (probably ultra-realistic). I like to do things as if they could happen, even if they don't.

So I tried, all alone with no help at all, to tie shorts elements into these people's circus concept as best I could. To help loosen the theme, I even dispensed with "Fun House" and renamed it "Mickey's House of Wonders". But still, I can't help but feel that the concept of old cartoons in a circus setting could work if I only had enough information to go on.

Next time, we'll go into the ride itself. Stay tuned...