The Dark Herald’s D23 Expo Report
D23 is Disney’s big annual dog and pony show, it’s where they make all their major announcements. Except they haven’t really had one for a while. The last two have been pretty stripped down and virtual affairs for a couple of years. The last time they held a real D23 Bob Iger was still running the company.
The timing as usual was a little problematic. It’s always a matter of who stuck his foot in his mouth and over what.
This time it was Josh D’Amaro the Chairman of Disney Parks and Experiences, who said the silent part out loud. Bob Chapek as I have repeatedly said, is not a good guy. He is an accountant with the soul of an accountant. And it’s hardly surprising that he wants to divide up the Disney Parks customers into neat little categories. The problem is that D’Amaro openly referred to the category they don’t like, meaning whites and Christians as “Legacy Fans.”
You’d think they’d be a little more careful about that kind of talk given how badly things went with Disney’s efforts to oppose the Florida Anti-Groomer Law. But the executives at Burbank are too deep in the bubble to not know what to say. Yes, it’s obvious that what Disney wants are infrequent rich guests who stay at the highend resorts and don’t complain at all. As opposed to the fans who went once or twice a year but didn’t spend enough to put a smile on Mickey’s face. I know for a fact that the Disney execs in Burbank privately refer to the Legacy Fans as “the pay pigs.”
The event began with the now annual Booing of Bob Chapek. He gave his speech with a grim smile and a glassy stare. And then the various factions within the company made their announcements.
The only thing of real interest for the parks was that the Tron Coaster won’t open until next year. That wasn’t a surprise because they want the closing of Splash Mountain to be buried by the hype for the new ride. More hilariously, they are closing (with bad grace and resentful embarrassment), the Harmonius show at Epcot. No word yet on whether they are getting rid of the Stargate and Death Taco too. I suspect Chapek will want the horrible things repurposed if at all possible.
Then came the many, many trailers.
Have a look for yourself. Although you won’t find anything unexpected.
That.
Was.
Sad, rather than awful.
Particularly the sequels to Enchanted and Hocus Pocus. Amy Adams was 33 when she did Enchanted and could pull off playing a younger woman. She can’t do that anymore. The youngest of the Hocus Pocus witches is now 57. People like those movies but the characters were static in their own eras they just don’t look like anything better than a Disney TV movie at this point.
The Marvel trailer for Secret Invasion looked okay but given Marvel’s track record, I see no reason to believe they’ve pulled out of their downhill slide.
Rogue One was the best of the Disney Star Wars movies, which is not to say it was actually good. And it doesn’t change the fact that Cassian Andor is still dead.
Doomcock’s fantasies to the contrary, Chapek has no intention of taking the Woke out of Disney. Why? Because he’s an accountant who has seen the financial models. He’s absolutely convinced that Woke is the audience he needs to get.
I’ll go into why in another post.
