I was watching an old TV special from the 20th Anniversary of WDW and they announced several projects that never came to be. They mentioned the "Mount Fuji" Matterhorn-type ride for the Japan pavilion at EPCOT, a Russian pavilion at EPCOT and a Roger Rabbit themed trolley car ride for MGM. Any idea why NONE of these ideas came to fruition?
Also, I'd heard about an abandoned Muppet ride - where did that one go??
the urban legend goes on saying: spielburg and Disney had a falling out, not allowing them to make any new attractions based on Roger rabbit.
maybe in the future some of it will come out.
At one time there was consideration of a RR attraction
for the Disney-MGM Studios, where Roger would have
his own area. The main attraction would have incorporated
the same technology that is being used for the Spiderman
attraction at Universal Studios in Orlando. No doubt Eisner
screwed up the whole thing up, not wanting to pay for the
technology, and messing up negotiations, just like he did
with so many others.
No doubt $$$'s came into play with the Mt Fuji attraction,
but thankfully, WDW did finally get their own Mt attraction
in Expedition Everest.
Muppets negotiations got screwed up too, in the early
90's. At one point Eisner and Henson announce their
intended merger, and Muppet Vision 3D got the go ahead
by Henson, and started working on additional projects,
including a Dark Ride featuring a Muppet take of
Hollywood Classic Movies. However, Henson passed
away before all the "t's" were crossed and the "i's" dotted.
The Henson family couldn't come to agreement with
Eisner on finalizing the details, and the whole buyout
fell apart. Not until Eisner was grasping for his last
breath of life as part of the Disney organization, did
he finally reach an agreement for rights to the Muppet
Show Characters and Bear in the Big Blue House, which
was just a small part of the Henson Co, at the Time.
Um... the technology that ended up in the Amazing Adventures of Spiderman was going to be used for a Dick Tracy attraction.
The technology in question is called "squinching".
There were many rides/attractions themed to my fave Rabbit back in the Disney Decade.
Most were for Disney-MGM, with some possibly for DL too.
The Baby Herman Runaway Buggy ride comes to mind, which would have been a darkride. There was also a RR ride using Star Tours technology as well as in cabin effects (like at TDS's Stormrider).
One great concept was Toon Tower (a toon themed wild Tower of Terror type) ride. Jim Hill did a nice piece on it a few years back.
The Disney Decade is littered with the greatest attractions, shows and even parks that Disney never built.
about the epcot rides, i think that EPCOT mainly uses sponsors in this theme park, and i am guessing that no sponsor took up a contract for it, or not much funding went into it. i can see about the russia pavillion, bc of the fact that we weren't really good buddies with russia for so long, and it may be a bad idea to honor russia at epcot, bc ppl who lived through some of the wars with russia may not like the fact that now it has its own pavillion at EPCOT. I hope this clears up some questions about the rides that never wereOriginally Posted by theaterbear
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I remember hearing the Fuji film company wanted to sponsor the Mt Fuji ride in Japan, but that didn't sit well with Kodak, who is the official film of WDW. They supposedly threatened to pull out out of their deal so negotiations with Fuji never came to frutation.
Yeah and also it was planned for the James Bond ride & the Villians ride. Too many MGM rumors have "used" the Spiderman style system.
The ones WDW1974 listed are the ones Disney announced.
The lawsuit from Disney against Universal concerned a Dick Tracy attraction, and the squinching technology.
Oh yeah. I remember that one very well. The company was so confident it was a "done deal" that they even attended New York's annual Toy Fair and were touting the impending merger with these (now rare) postcards:
i wonder how much of the muppet stuff is still in the vault... waiting to be developed again and used.
actually, it's a little known fact that they DID build a Roger Rabbit ride....only, it's in toontown....they thought it better to build it in Roger's hometown so his main following could enjoy the ride.
I happened to be in Anaheim the day Disney announcedOh yeah. I remember that one very well. The company was so confident it was a "done deal" that they even attended New York's annual Toy Fair and were touting the impending merger with these (now rare) postcards:
this. I picked up a copy of USA Today at the store
that used to be located by the Hotel's Monorail Station.
On the front page of USA today, It had a Picture of
Mickey, Piggy, Kermit and Minnie, (Piggy and Kermit
had wedding clothes on) the caption of the picture
said something about the marriage of Disney and Henson
companies.
Wow, I would have LOVED that.
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