I hope everyone had a fantastic weekend. Mine was busy. Family stuff, more family stuff, then Coasting for Kids on Sunday at Knott’s. We had the second smallest team, but raised the second largest amount of money. I’m hoping that next year we might be able to put together a MiceChat team and show them how it’s done. What do you say? I warn you, I’m tired, sunburned and cranky. But I still love you. Here goes:

Disney and Hasbro Intro Playmation

First, yay, it’s a little girl. Second, the queue for this if you sell any ahead of time at the Hasbro booth at SDCC (San Diego Comic-Con) in 2016 is going to be a mess, because Hasbro does not know how to manage queues. My husband Noe had to spend one preview evening taking over running it, because Hasbro peeps did not know how. Seriously. Disney, please, please, teach them before then. Pretty please? Okay, here’s the poop:

The first set will be The Avengers Starter Pack. The second will be Star Wars. You wear the toy, in the first case an Iron Man arm piece, later Hulk Fists, etc. Not sure what they’ll do for disabled people. They haven’t said, yet. These work with smartphone apps and “base stations” with “smart figures”, similar to the ones in Infinity but very, very different. You’re welcome. I haven’t seen it, I’m going by what I’ve seen from the media stuff they sent me and what I’ve been told.  Everything I know, I’m telling you. Honest.

The play pieces have accelerometers, like gyro sensors, similar to Wiimotes. Kids won’t have to hook up to the Internet to use the devices nor to play the games. I’d love to see a Kingdom Hearts game with keyblades like this. What would you like to see?

Evangeline Lindes

The official announcement video:
https://youtu.be/SXFz5tUDY38

Disney Springs to Welcome NBA Experience

When the NBA shuttered NBA City at Universal Citywalk not too long ago and NBC Sports Grill was announced, pro basketball aficionados wondered if they’d still be able to have their own special place to celebrate their beloved sport. Worry no more,  and three times less: Disney announced that the NBA Experience would not only be a brand new part of Disney Springs, it would be three times as large as NBA City was over at Universal Citywalk. Disney has had a long and successful run with sports bars with ESPN Zone (A MiceChat.com favorite), so this should be a successful and popular addition to Disney Springs.

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Mr. Nelson Goes to Washington (Fab editorializes a bit)

Disney is one of many American corporations that have been taking advantage of the H-B1 Visa, which brings over tech workers from outside the US, ostensibly if no one in the USA could be found with those same skills. Legal loopholes abounded, and higher-paid technicians have been losing their jobs to lower-paid technicians and things have been pretty quiet, with the occasional skirmish.

It was started in the George H.W. Bush administration, strengthened during the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations and left untouched (so far) during this administration. Name an industry and it’s been affected. In 2004, a few dozen of my fellow Network Operations Center contractors were called in and let go, our jobs gone in a day, with empty promises of training and job search help. But this time, it happened to people who were able to afford to make significant congressional campaign contributions in the past, and who were able to organize, get to the media, get to their congressman, and get him to listen. He’s calling for a congressional investigation.

Disney’s gotten a black eye in the media as the news that they have been laying off Americans to bring in lower paid foreign workers. The stock hasn’t taken a hit yet. I don’t see anyone on the Disney fan boards canceling vacations, but that’s anecdotal. In the end, Disney answers to their stockholders first. Walt Disney was the one who decided to take the company public, right or wrong. I wish he hadn’t, but to do what he wanted to do, he needed the huge influx of cash going public would provide.

And it’s not just a bunch of greedy fat cats holding stock, either. it’s portfolios as well. It’s middle-class, middle-aged families getting a modest return on their investments. And if they work in tech, they might need those investments more than ever. It’s tragic, and it’s frustrating. It’s great for people in developing countries that globalism is taking them from unimaginable poverty into a better life. The growing divide between the classes is worrisome.  It can lead to civil unrest. I don’t think that’s the New America any of us want. I hope we can all figure out a way to make a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow like Walt wanted.

In all this, I keep in mind two things. That this is the man who gave us ‘it’s a small world”, and also that this is the man who said:  “Actually, if you could see close in my eyes, the American flag is waving in both of them and up my spine is glowing this red, white, and blue stripe.” and that it’s up to all of us to find the balance in between. What would you want Disney to do and what sort of corporate citizen would you expect them to be? I’d really like to hear your point of view on all of this in the comments below (but please be kind to each other and respect differing opinions).

On a Totally Unrelated Note, Buy one, get one 50% off T-shirts at the Disney Store:

Mickey Mouse Americana Tee for Men - Plus Size

I don’t get anything from the sale, I was just hoping to lighten the mood a little. Onward.

Happy 25th Anniversary to Universal Orlando

And the reason for Disney-MGM Studios. That’s a history lesson for another day! But I do sure miss the Ghostbusters Show.

, Fab News: Play, Ball, Trade and Futures

Wizarding World gets its (rough) date, Fantastic Beasts gets its Star

, Fab News: Play, Ball, Trade and Futures

Spring of 2016 is the opening season for The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios Hollywood. I am quite excited at this. I’m sorry that we won’t be getting a full-sized Hogwarts Castle, but I hear from a little bird that I used to be married to that they are doing plenty to make up for the difference.

Also, Academy Award winner Eddie Redmayne will be Newt Scamander in the movie version of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them, which will be set in Wizarding New York. This week, Harry Potter author J.K.Rowling revealed that we would learn, in the film, about at least one U.S. based wizarding school, and that the Salem Witches’ Academy is NOT a school. We won’t find out, however, until the film comes out in 2017.

Oswald Lost and Found and much more at LACO @ the Movies

Two Oswald shorts previously thought lost, “Poor Papa” and “Africa Before Dark” have been found and restored, and will be shown with a live orchestra with a slew of other shorts at LACO @ the Movies Saturday, June 13th. I’ll be there with bells off…because I want to hear the music!
Click here to buy tickets!

Mark Watters will be conducting. He ONLY has six Emmys under his belt, so you know he’s really, really good. Dustin Hoffman is the honorary chair. They’re also doing some sound cartoons, sans their sound, with Watters’ orchestra: Get a Horse! (Have you seen it? It was robbed! So good!) The Silly Symphony Music Land, Plane Crazy, The Band Concert, Lonesome Ghosts, Mickey’s Trailer, and best of all, a special 75th anniversary adaptation of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice by Mark Watters.

The event takes place at the gorgeous Ace Hotel, a Spanish Gothic theater built in 1927, and is a fundraiser for the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. Great music! Great mouse! Great cause! I hope to see you there!

Africa Before Dark (1928) © Disney Enterprises

That’s the news folks. Chime in below. And if you have news to share that you’d like to see in this column, please write me at [email protected].

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Shelly Valladolid
Shelly Valladolid, aka Fab, has been writing about Disney and theme parks for about two decades. She has written for various fan and pop culture sites, Disney Magazine and OCRegister.com and participated in several books, including Passporter's Disneyland and Southern California and Disney World Dreams. She was co-founder and president of the Orlando, Florida chapter of the NFFC (now Disneyana Fan Club). She taught a class on theme park history at a Southern California University. She is creator and co-owner of Jim Hill Media, one of the creators of MousePlanet and was a consultant on MSNBC, The Motley Fool and others about Disney and various media matters. She was a Heel wrestling manager on TV and a voice artist on the radio in Honolulu, HI, where she grew up. She has a blog and a podcast with her daughter, Mission:Breakout Obsessive Alice Hill. She and her husband, MiceChat columnist Noe Valladolid, live in Southern California with Alice.