So, Jungle Cruise and Splash Mountain are Apparently Getting Rebuilt and Replaced

[Winter]

I'm not sure how many theme park rides are included on this forum (I think I'm the only one who's even mentioned them when talking about going on Star Wars Rise of the Resistance) but this is something I thought would be interesting to talk about. So, two of Disney's classic rides, Jungle Cruise and Splash Mountain, are apparently getting rebuilt and replaced respectively. Haven't heard why the former is getting replaced but I suspect it's due to the rides decreasing popularity.

Back in 2017 I went to Disney World and JC was almost completely empty, it took almost no time to get on the ride and this was during Christmas when the Park was PACKED. To contrast, Pirates of the Caribbean, the Haunted Mansion, The Tiki Room, Carousel of Progress and Space Mountain all had an half and hour to an hour wait. But JC, was almost completely empty and it's not hard to see why. The animatronics haven't aged very well and that's in a literal sense and many of them weren't even working when I was there last. And the ride itself just isn't as thrilling as it use to be.

The Tiki Room is a ride that has aged well due to just how simple it is. It's a simple campfire type attraction with the Birds telling stories as they snark at one another and sing catchy songs. Single and straight forward and it's easy to see why Disney just brought it back instead of just rebuilding the Tiki Room Under New Management that was lost due to a fire. It helps that the animatronics have aged very well as they're birds, there's not much to be done with them.

But JC was originally suppose to be a relaxing ride that had a bit of thrill with state of the art animatronics but time marches on and the thrilling part of the ride just didn't age as well as other rides. So, I am up for the ride getting re-imagined instead of outright replaced with some random Disney film due to popularity at the time.

So, Splash Mountain is getting replaced by Princess and the Frog and... I'm not against this BUT I'm open to being disappointed.

Apparently Splash Mountain is getting replaced due to controversy of being connected to Songs of the South aka the film that comes off as rather pro-slavery and I get why that would rub a lot of people the wrong way. Though said film is barely known and the ride is only related to the film because of the cartoon characters that are featured in the film as a story told by Uncle Remus.

And, it should be noted, James Baskett who played Ramus is the first black man actor to win an Academy Award for said performance, something Walt Disney himself was pushed for. However, the film is still problematic and was protested as early as one month after its 1946 release, influential Harlem Congressman Adam Clayton Powell Jr. called it "an insult to American minorities," and it was fairly harshly panned by The New York Times.

So, I get why many want the ride that is associated with said film replaced and Princess and the Frog is not a bad idea. PATF is a overall enjoyable movie (overly complicated plot but balanced out by great characters) and so long as the ride is fun who cares.

And not all replacement rides are bad, Mickey's PhilharMagic is a MASSIVE improvement over the Lion King Puppet Show, Ellen's Universe of Energy remained popular for years as did Reflections of Earth, Soarin is vastly superior to Food Rocks and Rise of the Resistance is a lot better then Lights Motors Action.

But other times what comes after is just a downgrade. Space Ship Earth is the best example I can think of. The first half of the ride is still there and is still awesome but the AMAZING second half which showed the promise of the future and how communication can grow and change has been replaced with a video where you can to choose just how lazy you want to be in the future with tech that is mostly likely never going the exist as it has been tried with the super rich and even they stated it's not worth it.

So, I'm open to Princess and the Frog replacing Splash Mountain and if it's fun AWESOME!!! But Splash Mountain is still super popular and it's connection to a movie that has some rather MASSIVE issues is rather trivial as, again, it's connection is to characters who are based on characters from African Folklore. Hoping it goes well but I've had enough disappointing replacement rides to make me cautious with whatever comes in next and at least it's based on a movie most would agree is fun and ALSO avoids the issues of SOTS.

Thoughts?

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

I mean, this is no surprise to me since Disney's more or less spent years pretending Song of the South never existed, and this is a great time to do overhauls. At least, it would be if Disney actually closed properly, instead of pretending things were fine and treating its park employees as disposable virus fodder the way they always have.