Subsonic Radio

here's an interesting article on something new they're going to be trying out. i'm not sure if i'm for or against them fastpassing character photo-op's, we'll see what the actual visitors say. what i found more interesting, is that it sounds like any hope of saving mickey and minnie's houses (and i believe the rumor was... moving them to the front of the park) is out the window. welcome to the new mickey theater on main st usa.... http://www.disunplugged.com/2011/02/24/ ... c-kingdom/

nicklesm17 wrote:here's an interesting article on something new they're going to be trying out. i'm not sure if i'm for or against them fastpassing character photo-op's, we'll see what the actual visitors say. what i found more interesting, is that it sounds like any hope of saving mickey and minnie's houses (and i believe the rumor was... moving them to the front of the park) is out the window. welcome to the new mickey theater on main st usa.... http://www.disunplugged.com/2011/02/24/ ... c-kingdom/

That is interesting indeed. I don't know how I feel about fastpasses for characters either. I might be more inclined to try to get a FP to take a picture of Mickey Mouse than I am to stand in a line currently. I am not a big character person anyhow. I like to snap a photo of a character if I see them walking around, but I don't have any interest in waiting to have a photo taken with them. I like that they will have an interactive queue. If the line is going to be inside, you might as well have something to keep the guests entertained.

As someone who spends half of his quality Disney time in lines for characters (when I'm with the whole family, of course), I think this is a GREAT idea. We have waited about 45 minutes for Mickey at the Judge's Tent, 45 minutes for the Princesses and about an hour at the character spot in EPCOT. If there was a way to FastPASS these, it would greatly improve our chances of seeing more in the parks. I'm not a big fan of re-theming Town Square and making it as glamorous as the concept art and description. Main Street should be kept as close to Walt's vision as possible, I think.

I think it would have been a bad idea of trying to move Mickey and Minnie houses to main street. Wrong mixing of themes. As for re-do of the Town Hall building - that building has changed purposes so many times over the year it really doesn't matter what they do with. As long as the exterior still fits in MS, what's done with the interior I don't care. I still miss it from being WDW Imagineering Exhibition from way back when....

If you had younger kids I could see FP for meet-n-greets as being something worth it. But if it is something that could take away from you getting FP for other attractions I don't see it working all that well. But that's me talking...without any kids.

theBIGyowski wrote:If you had younger kids I could see FP for meet-n-greets as being something worth it. But if it is something that could take away from you getting FP for other attractions I don't see it working all that well. But that's me talking...without any kids.

For a family with kids you spend as much time (if not more) in a queue for meet & greets as you do a ride. So for a family, it's not taking any time away and could hopefully help them cut down on the time in the meet & greet queues.

A colleague of mine waited in line for nearly two hours last summer to take a picture with Tink, so I know she'll be thrilled with this enhancement.

I think it's a pretty good idea too especially since the queue will be indoors. I look forward to trying it. The only character pictures I have taken over the years are the ones at the Disney Visa area or at D23/hard ticket events because other than once running into Stitch at EPCOT when he was by himself, the lines can be endless!

Speaking as a mom, I hate standing in line for characters. We usually do a character meal for our Mickey fix. Besides that my overly cautious son does not understand why i want him to hug the "strangers in Disney costumes", so a meal gives him the opportunity to hide behind his plate while my little princess soaks up some Mickey time.

The only thing I find a little odd about this fast pass thing is: When we get a fast pass for a ride we usually do whatever else is in the area until our time is up. Since there are no other rides on Main Street are they hoping this will increase the shopping?

theBIGyowski wrote:But if it is something that could take away from you getting FP for other attractions I don't see it working all that well.

I actually see that as a big positive. If it counts the same as an attraction fast pass, then it will increase the availability of fast passes for the major attractions. I'm not a big character person - I'll only go see Aladdin and/or if the line is short (3 families or less) and I have on my Agrabah shirt. This actually increases the chance that I'll go see Mickey or at least make it easier when I have kids.

Polynesian Princess wrote:

theBIGyowski wrote:But if it is something that could take away from you getting FP for other attractions I don't see it working all that well.

I actually see that as a big positive. If it counts the same as an attraction fast pass, then it will increase the availability of fast passes for the major attractions. I'm not a big character person - I'll only go see Aladdin and/or if the line is short (3 families or less) and I have on my Agrabah shirt. This actually increases the chance that I'll go see Mickey or at least make it easier when I have kids.

Good point about it having a positive impact on the availability of other FP's if they did FP's for character meet & greets.

mindflipper wrote:

Polynesian Princess wrote:

theBIGyowski wrote:But if it is something that could take away from you getting FP for other attractions I don't see it working all that well.

I actually see that as a big positive. If it counts the same as an attraction fast pass, then it will increase the availability of fast passes for the major attractions. I'm not a big character person - I'll only go see Aladdin and/or if the line is short (3 families or less) and I have on my Agrabah shirt. This actually increases the chance that I'll go see Mickey or at least make it easier when I have kids.

Good point about it having a positive impact on the availability of other FP's if they did FP's for character meet & greets.

My only fear is they'll change the rule so you can have one character and one attraction fastpass. But I'm really hoping it's one fastpass regardless of what it's for. Mickey is most popular at the MK, so it will probably help all attractions there. In the other parks, it probably will have the biggest impact on attractions that kids can ride and like, so it would probably be most useful at HS to help with TSMM.

From what I've heard on Podcasts, etc... they have said that the Meet N' Greet with Mickey fastpass will be its own system and NOT associated with the other fastpass systems. So, it sounds like you can grab a FP for Mickey and still get one for Space Mountain.

I wonder if that means that they will stick to the one hour allotted time on the FP and not accept late FP??? Also, it's been speculated that there will not be a standby line for meeting Mickey, only FP. How does everyone feel about that???

NaCler wrote:From what I've heard on Podcasts, etc... they have said that the Meet N' Greet with Mickey fastpass will be its own system and NOT associated with the other fastpass systems. So, it sounds like you can grab a FP for Mickey and still get one for Space Mountain.

I wonder if that means that they will stick to the one hour allotted time on the FP and not accept late FP??? Also, it's been speculated that there will not be a standby line for meeting Mickey, only FP. How does everyone feel about that???

It would make sense that the character FP system would be different than the attraction FP. I think if given the possibility of only being able to have one FP at a time, most guests would take the attraction FP over the character FP.
I don't know that I agree with Mickey only being accessible via FP. How many years has FP been around? I still hear people that don't understand the FP system and wonder how much you have to pay for a FP. It would be sad if someone missed out on seeing Mickey because they didn't understand the system...Plus, what happens for the folks who are only in the park for one day, and the FP are all gone by a certain point

mindflipper wrote:

theBIGyowski wrote:If you had younger kids I could see FP for meet-n-greets as being something worth it. But if it is something that could take away from you getting FP for other attractions I don't see it working all that well. But that's me talking...without any kids.

For a family with kids you spend as much time (if not more) in a queue for meet & greets as you do a ride. So for a family, it's not taking any time away and could hopefully help them cut down on the time in the meet & greet queues.

Let's not forget all the character dining experiences with little kids. There should be a Fastpass for the waffle line at Crystal Palace!

Brian845 wrote:Let's not forget all the character dining experiences with little kids. There should be a Fastpass for the waffle line at Crystal Palace!

Don't they already have ADR's for the character dining experiences?