Thought I was gone for good, huh?
Hello, Everyone.
Sorry for the absence. There have been a series of unfortunate events which led to an unexpected hiatus. Nothing requiring a stay with Witness Protection, I assure you.
I know it's a little late in the season, but I'm sure no one would hate a stroll through the Disneyland Resort at Halloween.
Mickey's Halloween Party
This post will mostly cover DCA. My family and I went to Mickey's Halloween Party early on in September, but I didn't get many pictures. Disneyland's holiday offerings haven't changed much, and I was there mostly to heard cats....cats being my aunt's three kids. We had the teenager in a wheelchair as Rey, a magpie of a Snowtrooper, and a little Leia who refused to say her line....I went to keep the ratio of adults to children even.
Like I said, the decor in Disneyland was typical, always nice. It seems the attempt to step things up mostly went to DCA. And with the Halloween party moving there next year, it was smart to get prepared early.
And if you think you're getting me on Space Mountain: Ghost Galaxy, y'all are crazy.
It's scary.
And the 7 year old threatened to ask me to take her on it......
But I did get half decent pictures of the parade!
Seriously, when it comes to parades, I don't do so well. Partially because I'm short and people have NO worries standing in front of me.
Now, the Headless Horseman isn't new, but not pictured (because I'm short) was an added Ichabod Crane himself coming down the street just ahead of the Horseman, seemingly unaware of his nightmare following behind. This was accompanied by a nice little narration.
Now, I'm going to pause a quick second because I want to talk about Disney using less well known IPs (intellectual properties) in the parks. In this day and age, when you can just open up your phone and find out what something is, if you're unfamiliar, using Ichabod Crane in the parks (because the Horseman will pop up again later in the post) is a smart idea, and I encourage Disney to continue.
I think there should be a quota, for every Guardians or Frozen thing you permanently (or semi-permanently) put in the parks, you need to incorporate something like this, or the Three Caballeros, etc. Hopefully, on a similar scale, but let's take this step by step....
The Frightfully Fun Parade is a neat little parade.
Gotta love these vampires.
The man himself, good old Jack Skellington!
The Party did have, as its only offering for Annual Passholders, a special meet and greet with Jack and Sally, which is nice, but so much less than previous years. Kind of a disappointment.
Baroque Thriller.
Again, couldn't get a good shot, but the gravediggers making sparks with their shovels, just awesome.
I think one of the strengths of the ...Halloween people in Disney, is their ability to look at what Disney World is doing and incorporate it in a way that works for us. You're not just copying and pasting a parade, but taking some of the show stopper elements (i.e. the gravediggers and the Horseman) and making them seem organic to the west coast celebrations.
One thing I love about Halloween is the use of Dr. Facilier from The Princess and the Frog. He might be my favorite villain. He's got an interesting motivation, he's smart, and doesn't have dumb minions working for him. Plus, he'd voiced by Keith David, so, that makes him perfect right there.
And the "Friends of Dr. Facilier" are always SO talented!
Another new addition is Ursula.
Halloween is also fun because it gets the Villains together. There is just such a range in personalities with the Villains, it's an interesting mixed bag.
(Hey, Imagineering, when y'all gonna get on that Villains Village thing in Magic Kingdom? Or a Villains park? Get on that, you have my blessing.)
OK, I'm not a fan of Hercules. I've seen it several times and i just can't get into it. If y'all want, I'll do an entire blog post on it, but let's not get off the subject too much.
However, Hades is kind of cool. I won't deny that.
This large Maleficent dragon is...imposing.
Look, it's my grandmother!
(Yes, my grandmother looks like the Wicked Queen. And that's the look she's going for...)
With Gaston as a nice little piece of eye candy for the end of the parade.
Cadaver Dans
I won't talk too much about the party (logistics, etc.) since it's kind of late in the season, but the party was fun as always. My aunt's kids loved it. For the two little ones (Olivia, 7, and Reuben, 9), it was their first time and while they ran out of gas after the parade and fireworks, we figured it would be a one time thing and they're planning next year amongst themselves!One other thing I'll add, the Cadaver Dans (usually the Dapper Dans) usually perform on the Rivers of America during the show. They were on a Tom Sawyer Island raft as usual, but were closer to the water. As we were in line for the Treat Trail, the two little ones were absolutely entranced. Olivia asked my mother "How do they have such beautiful voices?!". Olivia is...hard to impress.
So, that's kind of it. Let's move over to DCA and look at their Halloween festivities.
Buena Vista Screams
Ok, moving onto the main event...ish.
Wait wait....this is Downtown Disney.
OK, this is kind of a prelude. Even outside the parks, there were nice pumpkin displays like this. I often do, but we should all continuously sing the praises of Disney Horticulture.
Mickey, Minnie and the gang have adopted a semi-Dia de los Muertos theme this year in their Halloween dress and merch all reflect this cute as heck look.
Btw...is this cultural appropriation? What, they don't have a Mice culture costume? I'm outraged!
Kidding!
Here is the Oogie Boogie marquee, as shown in the concept art Disney shared at the D23 Expo. And he talks too, which is awesome.
(It's a miracle I got this shot, it was so sunny!)
I kept hearing some mechanical whirring sound though, and not getting the opportunity to see things at night, I was wondering if it was some kind of fog machine. But...no fog. So why noise?
Me confused.... 😖
I wonder what Halloween offerings they have.....
Buena Vista Street looks really nice with plenty of bats and purple banners that coordinated with the bats. I mean, I think it coordinates with the bats. Prove me wrong.
It's nice, I'm just not sure how period accurate it is.
Mortimer's Market even got some pumpkins.
And this is my usual call to Disney Merchandise. Can I have these little stain glass banners?
I'll pay! That's a good $30-40 set.
Now, this has to be the smartest thing.....
BATS in the BELFRY.
Whoever said this in a meeting, Mr. Iger, give them a gosh darn raise.
And, they got the Headless Horseman in the plaza.
Again, it's nice to see Disney utilizing their older IPs. And this fits kind of closely into the time period of Buena Vista Street (like the cartoons in the windows of Elias & Company, but it was hard to get pictures of them).
It's a really nicely put together piece. Is that fiberglass or what?
Can we get an engineer to comment?
Carsland Haul-O-Ween
Now, the big deal since it was announced at the Expo, was Carland's Haul-O-Ween.And they did NOT disappoint.
First of all, new holiday themed marquee with a scare-car witch. Cute.
Now...how do hippies feel about Halloween? Because it appears Filmore is down with it.
He's even got demons on his own sign at the Taste-In.
A lot of the barrels had these nice demonic disintegration barrels.
Even the tops of the light poles have traffic cone/witches hats. I mean, who's looking up there?
Oh, right...me...
Sarge has a nice crop of scary pumpkins.
By the way, I love that Sarge's lawn is just so tidy.
First, wasn't the Hall supposed to open at some point to show Mater's Tall Tales? Or just the Tall Tale that discusses Stanley's founding of Radiator Springs? What happened to that? With the outbreak of heat, that would be a great little AC moment.
Anyway, while I'm rambling, they had these great movie posters.
Deep cut with Escape to Hitch Mountain there...
Got some Hocus Pocus in there.
I don't know what this reference is. Help.
Love the little scary faces up here.
The not-so-Cozy Cone Motel.
Flo's went with a spider theme. So....I'm steppin' away from that.
Dracula Mater. Lookin' fly...
Dude...Mater...your rust is showin'.
Also, because of the white wall tires, I'm picturing mater as a human, dressed as Dracula with sneakers.....is that wrong or hilarious?
Even Luigi's got in the spirit. He's got orange reverse jack o'lanterns on his leaning tower....
...and pumpkins in his window....
Nice banners in harvest colors.....
And a lovely little Horn-O-Plenty. Or Car-nucopia.
Is there a pun department at Disney?
Tin Lizzy got herself a willow and creepy claws on her shop...
Got to catch Lightning McQueen in his super hero costume.
Now, what I really think of as the triumph of Haul-O-Ween is Ramone's House of Body Art.
Full disclosure, I'm Hispanic.
I know, shocker!
Anyway, between this and the Coco display (which is getting its own separate post), Dia de los Muertos is getting such a great representation in the park. Not to mention, they have a display in Frontierland as well!
And Ramone is hooked UP for the holiday!
He's got great little flag thingies (I don't know what they're called. I'm not that Mexican, I guess...)
And this cute as heck car-davera (pun on cadavera) out front was a popular picture spot. Disney even designated a PhotoPass person.
The car hoods in the windows were changed to reflect the holiday. I seriously would use each one on my own car. The best might have been either this or the Magnolia pattern, but that one was REALLY hard to get a shot with no glare.
Ramone apparently made an ofrenda (altar) to Doc Hudson in his shop. During the holiday, people build little altars like this to their deceased loved ones, and Ramone did an awesome job.
Again, with the nice custom Cars themed flags.
The details of Doc's life portrayed here are simply astounding.
John Lasseter (or most likely LasseTIRE) signed Doc's degree to practice...medicine? mechanics?
I know it's a Cars themed alter, but it really touched my heart to see the detail and care taken by Imagineering.
Good job, Disney. Good job.
Even Stanley got into the spirit!
OK, the Cozy Cone Motel. I didn't get to try any of the treats (also, there's only so much pumpkin in the world....let's try to keep it special, people), but the area is also pretty well detailed.
Inside the motel lobby there's an additional little surprise, if you're smart enough to go look...
An homage to Psycho! In a motel! LOVE IT!
Norman Brakes up there in the house...
Janet...no, it wouldn't be Janet Leigh, Marion Crane.....hmm, how do we pun that up? I'll take suggestions.
And, over at Mater's Junkyard Jamboree, the waiting tractor/cow is now a Mummy cow.
Look into those soulful, murderous eyes...
Both Mater's and Luigi's have additional music tailored to the holiday.
And back in the pass towards A Bug's Land, Red is hiding taking meet and greets as a clown!
Though, I imagine, if you're scared of clowns, a HUGE ass firetruck clown isn't your cup of tea.
Last few notes...
Again, I just had to give another shoutout to Horticulture. Just look at these flowers!
Look at 'em!
Getting ahead of yourself
Ok, I love Christmas. I really do....but walking through Redwood Creek down towards Soarin', I spy Christmas decorations...
Reportin' for work early, huh there, little paddle?
The lovely bottles are up in the trees.
Now, don't get me wrong, I love these decorations....but I love them AFTER Halloween.
And I get why they start Christmas early. People have Christmas cards to do, sometimes they use the park as a canvas. Some people can't come in December, so it works.
But this? c'mon, y'all!!!
In Conclusion...
Thanks for hangin' in with me while I work out some stuff. I promise to have more content for you in the coming weeks.
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