D23 Expo Day Report

slotofkit · Post by **slotofkit** » Sep Fri 11, 2009 10:26 pm

Just went to the Expo today. Sadly, I could only go today and wish I was able to go multiple days. Here's a report of what I did:

The booths area all amazingly put together. The Disney parks one featured models direct from Imagineering of Cars Land and prototype Audio-Animatronics. There were also previews of the lands going into Hong Kong Disneyland, including the best Haunted Mansion ever done, and a model of the Vacation Club being built in Oahu. The live, life-sized Wall-E was available for photos (and he's usually only available at VIP events). Even the way to get in was spectacular which was like the Disney Quest elevator on steroids.

Outside of that on the main floor was Push the trash can around all the time, a real Electrical Parade float to get your picture taken next to. Upstairs were the many presentations going on including behind the scenes of World of Color, theme park music, the evolution of the look of Mickey Mouse, and many others. Unfortunately I didn't make it to these, especially any theme park ones because the lines started an hour before and filled up incredibly fast. I did get to see two preview screenings of new ABC shows and give my opinion on them. The two were The Middle and Modern Family.

SWAG was great including stickers, tote bags, autographs, pictures, mouse ears, postcards and more. Disney was actually not cheap when it came to it. Kind of surprising of them.

Then, of course, was the Walt Disney Studios keynote presentation. The beginning would have been worth going to in itself: A ten minute medley/montage of Disney films (animated and live-action including Touchstone) from the beginning to now...all with a live orchestra that timed every note perfectly. Once that was done there was the list and exclusive clips of the following movies coming out:
Alice in Wonderland
Tron: Legacy
Old Dogs
Prince of Persia: Sands of Time
Sorceror's Apprentice
The Cheapest Muppet Movie Ever (no clip)
The Yellow Submarine (no clip)
A Christmas Carol
A new label called Disney's Double Dare You (sort of fun, horror one started by the guy that did Pan's Labyrinth)
And announced, but not shown: The Lone Ranger and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

Yep. The 4th Pirates movie is now reality, and set to premier in 2011.

But, during and in between all these announcements were various stars to be interviewed about the movies they're doing...
Robert Zemeckis for A Christmas Carol
Jerry Bruckheimer for his various projects.
Tim Burton for Alice
Nicholas Cage for Sorceror's Apprentice
Miley Cyrus for The Last Song (and she even performed a song)
The Muppets (and I do mean all of them on a Mark Twain stage prop doing 2 songs)
John Travolta, Kelly Preston and their daughter who are all starring in Old Dogs

And then, of course, the highlight was Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow at the end. He asked if we saw a talking frog (referring to Kermit) and which way he went. Then he replied with saying "I like frogs, they taste like chicken." He played with Dick Cook, the chairman of the studios who did all of the presentation.

disneylizzy · Post by **disneylizzy** » Sep Mon 14, 2009 3:49 pm

That sounds AWESOME! I didn't know what all the D23 Expo entailed, but it's just amazing. Lucky you to have gone to even one day!

Anyone else get to go? I'd love to hear more.

MmeLeota · Post by **MmeLeota** » Sep Fri 18, 2009 6:23 pm

I know it's been a week, but we went for 3 days...I plan on doing a trip report...it's just been crazy busy since coming home. Hopefully I'll get some time this weekend to put something together.