Disney’s Technological Wonders

Over the past couple days, my wife and I and our kids had the opportunity to travel to Walt Disney World on a short Disney vacation. Thanks to our friends at Disney Canada, we were able to secure some anytime use Lightning Lane passes, which allowed us to check out some of the more popular attractions at Magic Kingdom and Epcot. What we witnessed was Disney at its finest, with some of the best technologies currently in use for theme park attractions.

At Magic Kingdom, I had the chance of riding Seven Dwarves Mine Train for the first time. Not only is it a smooth ride throughout, but the animatronics are outstanding. The dwarves in the mine moved more realistically than other animatronics I was use to seeing, although they still are not the best at the resort (more on that later). What I loved about Disney here is that even as the ride comes to a close and you are slowly moving towards the boarding zone, there is a cottage scene depicting the dwarves dancing with Snow White. Even here, where Disney probably didn’t need to go as over the top as they did, the attention to detail is outstanding.

Staying at Magic Kingdom is a great way to show how far Disney has come in there animatronics department. We also got to ride The Jungle Cruise, and while the animatronics here are great as well, you definitely can see the limited movement employed. Most of these animatronics either have North-South movement (they bob in and out of water, maybe with a mouth moving up and down), or East-West movement. It’s still great to see, but it’s a far cry from what has come since.

Moving over to Epcot, I think I can pinpoint one of the WORST Disney animatronics, which belongs to the monkey in Living With the Land. This animatronic can be found in the rainforest area of the ride, and gives the monkey a moving arm, almost like the “dead arm” dance move you might see people employ. The monkey arm is obviously on a spring, which makes the monkey arm move in a karate chop like fashion, instead of anything that looks remotely natural.

From the worst we head to the best. I can see how the Frozen ride at the Norway Pavilion might not be everyone’s favourite, but the animatronic work on this ride is Disney at its best. The characters have a ton of free flowing movement – I was especially impressed each time I saw the Sven character. Sure, he was always sitting, but his head and eye movement was amazing, and I found myself mesmerized by how it all came together to really portray Sven as we know him from the films.

All of the other animatronics on the ride were phenomenal as well, notably the Olaf figure you see right at the beginning of the ride. Not only does he have a dozen + articulating spots, but he moves as well. Although I know he’s on a track, the movements are fluid and natural, which again is a testimony to Disney engineering.

It’s not all fun a games with Disney, however, as we saw a few (and apparently common) technological blunders. But we’ll explore that, and the BEST ride at Walt Disney World, and potentially anywhere, in a future article!