Summary

Today on the show we do all Highly Suspect Headlines. Tune in to see if the following headlines are true or not:

• Bob Chapek Meet and Greet at Magic Kingdom
• Dinoland USA to be replaced with Zootopia and Moana attractions
• Mickey and Minnie to be married to celebrate the Disney companies 100th anniversary. https://jimhillmedia.com/the-year-that-mickey-minnie-almost-got-married/
• Hatbox Ghost Coming to Haunted Mansion in Walt DIsney World https://hauntedmansion.fandom.com/wiki/Unproduced_Haunted_Mansion_Film_(Guillermo_del_Toro)
• New Restaurant. Tiana’s Palace iis coming soon to Fronteirland in Disney World.
• Tron Lightcycle Run to open in Spring of 2024
• Plans revealed to expand Magic Kingdom with an entire land devoted to Villains

Next we talk to Tommy about Universal Studios, especially his favorite, Volcano Bay! We talk Tapu Tapu, VelociCoaster, Hagrid’s Motor Bike and more! Check out Tommy here:

Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/pg/Unlocking-The-Magic-Travel-with-Tommy-Shaw-100419839242217

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/unlockingthemagictravel_shaw/

The Cheesy Mouse Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-cheesy-mouse-podcast/id1610897031

__________________________________________

Website: easydizit.com

Email: easydizitpodcast@gmail.com

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Transcription

Cold Open

[00:00:00]

Justin: I don’t wanna admit this. I feel like it, it speaks to my character poorly. Uh, I feel like I’m gonna let down a lot of,

friends or maybe some listeners as well. Mm. You ready?

Autumn: Mm-hmm

Justin: I’m gonna say it. I’m I’ve been holding this back for a while. I’m just gonna say it.

Autumn: I’m I’m excited. This sounds, sounds juicy.

Justin: I don’t give a diagonally.

about Harry Potter.

Autumn: Oh, that’s right. You were let down. Justin was very let down.

Justin: I’ve been fighting this for years. Yeah. I tried reading the novels like three times. Couldn’t get past the first chapter. I’m like, well, maybe it’s just let me watch the movies. I. Struggled through the first and the second and halfway through the third movie, uh, the Gobblet of Fire

Autumn: you were done.

Justin: I’m just like this. There was just a plot hole. Drove me crazy. And I’m done.

Autumn: You literally walked, shut it off, walked into the bedroom. I couldn’t do

Justin: it. I’m like, what’s wrong with me? I love fantasy. Yeah. And magic and stuff. But these movies, I can’t do it.

Am I broken? [00:01:00] Is there something wrong with me?

Autumn: Not there are people that like the genre, but don’t love Harry Potter. I also think it is so long. I mean, it’s been so long since those books and since the movies came out, that there is a part of like, The cultural context of that time, and we are removed from that and you are removed from that.

And I also feel like that has impact . I do. It was meant for a certain age group during a certain time. Right. And so that’s missed. Yeah, just like there are gonna be things that we love that we are like, this is great. And it might be objectively decent, not awful, but like, everyone’s not gonna love it 20 years from now.

Yeah. And that’s okay. This is removed from the context of the time.

Justin: I’m not gonna stop watching the movies, but I am admitting to myself,

Autumn: You did stop watching the movies.

Justin: I am, I’m not gonna stop. I’m gonna keep watching them. I’m admitting to myself, I’m admitting to the listeners here and, um, and, and friends that I do not give a diagonally.

about this franchise [00:02:00] but I’m going to Universal.

And I feel like I need some kind of Harry Potter Fandom yeah.

Autumn: Well, quite you might honestly, you’ll probably love the parks. I think I’ve heard that.

Justin: Yeah.

Autumn: From a lot of people that have never seen don’t know anything about Harry Potter. Yeah. That’s a, that’s different.

Justin: Yeah. And it’s probably different. Well, there it is.

It’s out there

D23 Highly Suspect Headlines

Justin: [00:00:00] Welcome back and welcome new friends to the Easy Diz It podcast. I’m Justin, a hyper nerd travel planner and a behavior analyst,

Autumn: and I’m Autumn, a new Disney enthusiast as well as a clinical social worker.

Justin: And here on Easy Diz It, we love to share ideas on how to stay happy and healthy in the parks. Mm-hmm Disney parks, universal parks, your local park.

They can be places where challenges are presented where you can be less happy and less healthy. So we try and give tips on try to stay happy and healthy.

Autumn: Happy and healthy.

Justin: All right, autumn. This week. We’re not gonna do trivia. Why is that? Why aren’t we doing trivia?

Autumn: We’re not doing trivia this week because we have a lot of headlines to talk about.

Justin: So many

Autumn: that come from, come to us from the Disney or the D 23, excuse me. expo. Which was this weekend.

Justin: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We, we spent some time watching it Friday, Saturday.

It

Autumn: was great. Yeah. When I first tuned into it, I was kinda like, yeah. And, you know, our little daughter was running around and so it was something in the [00:01:00] background. And then just about before I was getting ready to put it bed, put it to bed, it got really, really good. It was really awesome. Just the different all the different aspects and people in different roles that you got to see and hear from, I thought was really unique.

Yeah. And I enjoyed it a lot,

Justin: you know, what blew my mind. They had a drag queen host the the costume thing.

Autumn: So, and that, that was when it got good. Yeah. That was when I was like, oh yeah, that was. Wow, this is great. So I stayed up much later than I was planning to. And it was long. Yeah. They had a lot of different I think that was categories

Justin: Friday night, right?

That was Friday. And I think after a whole day of like watching, it seemed like college kids act like do really bad acting. Yeah. I forgot who the MC what her name was, the drag queen, but she killed it. She was great. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I gotta tell you kind of, it struck me, I’m like, wait, wait, this is Disney.

How do they have a drag queen up there? Like, like, how is this is like, what if this is for families and stuff? Yeah. And I checked myself pretty quick. I’m like, wait a. There’s probably a million, little boys who wanna dress like girls watching that [00:02:00] and being like, oh, it’s cool. Yes. I don’t have to hate myself or I don’t have this.

Isn’t that weird to like, look at she’s hilarious, you know? Or he’s hilarious. I’m actually not sure how they, how they identify. Yeah. But so yeah, and then I’m like, oh, alright, no, like who’s gonna have a problem with this. And if they do. I mean, they’re probably not.

Autumn: Yeah. There will be people that have a problem with it.

Yeah. They’re probably not gonna watch it or they’ll probably just be angry about it, but , that was always gonna be people angry about something. Yeah. I mean, I

Justin: was never angry about it, but I was, you know, I did, I was born in 1984, you know, so I was raised in a time where that wasn’t on TV regularly. You did not.

Yeah. So I was, I was taken aback. I’m like, oh my gosh, Oh, my on Disney, like, like I’ve been to drag shows. I, I love drag. Don’t get me wrong. Yes. But for Disney to

Autumn: do, I was surprised specifically. Yes, yes. I had a little surprise too. And then I was like, oh great. I’m watching this. So that’s great.

That’s cool. So Disney, that was an awesome, that was just awesome.

Justin: And some of the costumes were appreciate it. Super great. So the [00:03:00] one who won so great, the the fan favorite, the Dumbo.

Autumn: Oh. Petty coats and pachyderms that’s it? Petty coats and pachyderms. That was awesome. That was awesome. And I think the second best was the wasp.

Justin: Yeah. Well they awesome. She won the, she won the award, the, the Disney’s $2,300 award. The wasp. Yeah. She had like fully articulating wings and everything

Autumn: that went up in arms. It was, there’s so many others that didn’t, you know, that didn’t win a, a, a prize or in a category, but was just like amazing that people.

what they were able to create. Yeah.

Justin: Just amazing. And just people just like amateurs. That’s what I loved about it. These are just people yeah. In their garage. Yep. With that came out with servos and hot glue and sewing and

Autumn: it was, it’s all outstanding. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very cool. Very cool. so,

Justin: yeah, we watched that.

And then today was the big one for us parks fans, you know, it was the, the parks panel where Josh D’Amaro got up there [00:04:00] and just, just railed off a million different updates coming to parks and actually Disney Cruise Line as well, all around the world.

Autumn: And I ha I have to tell you all, I don’t know any of this.

I did not watch it. Mm-hmm I heard tiny bits of Justin’s reactions. like nothing indicat. I know nothing. So as. trying to see if these things are true or false, I’m going to be finding out with all of you.

Justin: and I, I was making real, but I’m excited. I was making reels as it went on, you might have overheard some reels or something like that.

Or you might have overheard some audio here or there, but I think,

Autumn: I didn’t hear, I know nothing about anything. All I heard was your response. No I heard was your ha ha ha. There was some good laughs that I’m like, oh, something

Justin: good. All right. Well we got a lot of ’em. I think we got like eight or nine, so let’s get right into em.

Ooh, let’s see. We get right into Highly Suspect Headlines. Yeah. And what highly suspect headlines are or is, is it’s how we do news here on the Easy Diz It podcast, correct. I’m going to read some headlines. All of which today are pulled from the D 23 parks. The panel [00:05:00] and I think actually maybe one or two from the day before and autumn has to determine, Hey, is this true?

Or is Justin feeding me a line? And we encourage you to play at home as well.

Autumn: Please do. And tell us and tell us what your experience was like.

Justin: Yeah. Let us know. We’ll send you a sticker, easy desert podcast that you gmail.com. Right? All right. First headline, autumn. Bob Chapek meet and greet at Magic Kingdom. There’s I’m sorry to clarify. They’re they’re no announced they they’re gonna do a Bob Chapek meet and greet at the Magic Kingdom.

Autumn: Hmm. I’m gonna say true.

Justin: Like, do you th would you, would you get a Lightning Lane for that? Would you use one of your genie pluses for the Bob Chapek meet and greet.

Autumn: I like if it was a location where I could go by and probably see him and not participate now, I,

Justin: I might, no, no. This is like, when we met Tiana, like you go right up to Bob Chapek and you, oh, you talk to him, ask him about his weekend plans.

Autumn: I I’m conflicted. [00:06:00] Like, there are things that I’d have, and if I was able to have a few minutes, it’d definitely be questions I might be interested.

Justin: Yeah. What would you ask? What would you ask Bob?

Autumn: But I, but I feel like I’d be more excited about meeting Bob Iger

Justin: okay. Okay.

Autumn: He’s my fave

Justin: what would you ask Bob? Chapek

Autumn: tell me about what brought you to Disney. Mm-hmm why you like, just tell me, just tell me about that. Just number two. Very, yeah. Very social working questions.

Justin: Yeah.

Autumn: What are, what are the motivations like? Obviously it’s a business, so there’s money, but what are, what, like where currently lie the motivations and.

Of the Disney company. Okay.

Justin: Now what if it wasn’t like a face character? What if this is just like a Bob Chapek stuffed to head the situation

Autumn: and you get to meet a stuffed head? Absolutely not.

Justin: All right. So I don’t know if you’ve guessed by now, but this is actually false. This is not true. There is no Bob Chapek Meet and Greet coming up.

I,

Autumn: it would be hopping. There’s a lot of people that would,

Justin: I think a lot of people would’ve a lot to say [00:07:00] to Bob Chapek and that would present some problems.

Autumn: I think that would be great.

Justin: So, okay. He did like the opening speech and he did, you couldn’t hear it on like the Disney feed, but there were definitely people in the audience booing him.

You could, some people post a videos, you could hear it pretty clearly. Okay. So yeah, I don’t think that would do well. I. All right, but I’m gonna keep going with this headline anyway. Okay. There was a character meet and greet announced. Pretty exciting character. Yeah. Figment, figment meet and greet was announced for EPCOT

yeah.

Autumn: Oh, nice. Well, those popcorn buckets.

Justin: That’s what I’m saying.

Autumn: Almost a, a lethal,

Justin: yeah.

Autumn: Hit four hour line. So yeah. So that’s cool. I hope

Justin: it does well, and I hope it sticks around, but I’m not sure it’s.

Autumn: I just don’t. Yeah, it’s cool. But he’s an old character and not a lot of people, I didn’t know about F

Justin: Disney.

He’s like a Disney nerd thing. I think he’s like a trending kitchy thing. I don’t see like kids begging their parents to get, gonna know to line up for that, you know, like Tiana and Mickey and [00:08:00] stuff like that.

Autumn: I wonder if some of these things too. Did they say, like when that would be happening?

Justin: They may have, I don’t have that down here.

Autumn: Well I’m just wondering too, if some of this is like specific to the 50th anniversary still and not necessarily something that would happen past

Justin: that. Yeah. I’m not sure of the date on that one.

Easy Diz Bot: I do believe I can help with that. Here is the quote from the Disney parks, Twitter “Just announced. Fan favorite character figment will appear to meet park guests by the end of 2023 “, saying “by the end of 2023” leaves it pretty open ended about when we should expect to see figment in my estimation.

Justin:

Okay. But I mean they made a bunch of announcements. They made a, a pretty cool announcement. I’ll give you another one that incredible Hulk is actually coming to Avenger’s campus and Avengers campus.

Wow. They bring out new characters all the time, so they could do that with figment too. They could do like, so. Yeah, relatively cheap. They have plenty of room at the imagination pavilion, right.

Autumn: There’s a lot of space. All

Justin: right. So that was, wow. This [00:09:00] headline number one. We’re going, are you ready for headline?

Number two? Wow.

Autumn: Wait. Oh, is that all part of one? That’s all part of one. Yeah. Oh, I’m like, is that like, isn’t that number two. All right. Yeah, I’m ready for number two.

Justin: okay. Dinoland USA at the Animal Kingdom to be replaced with Zootopia and Moana attraction. Stop. .

Autumn: It needs to go. I wanna say yes, cuz Dino -land needs to go.

I just needs to be overhauled. Read it one more time. D

Justin: land USA to be replaced with Zootopia and Moana attractions.

Autumn: Moana was very big. is very big.

Justin: Mm-hmm

Autumn: I’m excited about zoo. I think Zootopia did very well. Mm-hmm I guess I forget that. That is Disney. Mowan that’s interesting. I mean, Zootopia makes sense is Animal Kingdom.

Justin: Mm-hmm mm-hmm

Autumn: Dinoland has to go. I’m just gonna, I’m gonna say yes. Cause something, it needs to, it needs, I, I it’s uncomfortable when I walk in there, I feel like I’m in I’m bugging to get murdered and , [00:10:00]

Justin: you could get murdered in Dinoland. ?What

Autumn: get murdered in a, a bad, this is like the, it gives me that dystopian carnival ride I something about the other day.

Oh, It’s like a little unsettling. I dont like it.

Justin: Weird carnival vibes. Got it.

Autumn: I don’t like it.

Justin: Got it. Okay. Okay. Fair enough.

Autumn: I mean, that would be a big announcement they keep saying in the beginning. Yeah. Chip back was teasing these big, big things. That, that would be a big thing. Zootopia is amazing. Yeah. Moana. Yeah.

Justin: This is true. yeah.

Autumn: Zootopia is getting a thing. I hit that they were gonna get anything in the parks.

Justin: Yeah . Yep. So, yeah, absolutely.

Autumn: Okay. Okay. So, but I’m gonna interject,

Justin: please.

So love. Love it, especially the Zootopia. But I guess I’m a little upset that there’s an announcement about Moana getting a thing and then cont hasn’t gotten a thing

and Moana does have EPCOT too.

She’s already got Epcot. She’s got the Gar the gardens of water or the, the water. Oh, no, not, yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s what’s still under construction at Epcot is Moana’s deal there.

[00:11:00]

Easy Diz Bot:

“Moana’s deal” is actually titled Journey of Water. Inspired by Moana and will be brought to life within world nature. The Epcot neighborhood dedicated to understanding and preserving the beauty or, and balance of the natural world.

Autumn:

Yeah. So there’s gonna be a second Moana.

Justin: And animal kingdom to, so I don’t know exactly how they’re doing it. Like frozen doesn’t

Autumn: even have two things.

Justin: This is maybe

Autumn: true. Frozen, only has the right that’s right. And there’s characters, but there’s only one.

Justin: Huh. Okay. So,

Autumn: Hmm. I dunno how I feel about this. Actually. I do

Justin: they showed some like concept art or thought like maybe pre-concept art. They, they, this is the part of the panel where they kept it very, like, this is blue sky.

Like none of this is like definitely happening.

Autumn: Sure.

Justin: So I think the fact that Zootopia and Moana are going to be there is for sure, but like the concept that they showed is [00:12:00] not there was, I’m so excited there spinner ride in the concept art, which makes sense. There’s already a spinner ride there.

The dinosaurs, they can just refu that. Mm. What kind of bugged me is, well, so if they’re getting rid of Dinoland, what’s gonna happen with Dinosaur? Well,

Autumn: dinosaur is still very pretty popular ride. No pretty that ride was popular, but

Justin: just pretty old. And they’ve been letting it go in terms of rehab. Like it’s pretty hurt.

Mm. It breaks down a lot. The, the animatronics are, are often broken. Mm. So, and here’s the thing. So there is a Zootopia ride coming to Shanghai Disney. I don’t know if you know about that. This was already, we, this we’ve already know they built the no show they’ve been working on this for years. It’s it’s coming.

I think there was a date at the, at the show and they actually showed one of the ride vehicles at the show for this uh, Zootopia ride. That’s coming to Shanghai. Oh, and the RO the ride vehicle mockup that they showed is exactly the [00:13:00] ride vehicle from the Dinosaur and Indiana Jones ride. Oh, it looks exactly the same.

Autumn: Well, when you said that, I was thinking Zootopia. I was thinking a scene when you’re in, I forget the main character’s name, but like in her. Police car. Yeah, exactly.

Justin: It’s like a big something. Eight seated police car, 10 seated police car. So basically we’re, we’re looking at dinosaur getting rethemed to Zootopia

Autumn: or maybe

Moana.

There could be something that,

Justin: no, it was a zoo. So the, if they could, right. But Disney loves to make a ride in one place and just carbon copy it in another that’s what they did with Tron. That’s what they did with Remys it’s cost saving. so, I mean, I think the likelihood is, is that we’re gonna get that same transform.

We’ll get that same Zootopia ride that they’re getting in Shanghai in Disney world.

Autumn: Ah, Ooh, exciting.

Justin: That would be my guess. Yeah. Okay. So yeah, we’ll see how that goes. Would you ride that you’re gonna ride the Zootopia ride.

Autumn: I’d like to

Justin: it might be chiller. They probably make it less rough.

Autumn: Exactly the same.

Cause [00:14:00] Zootopia. I don’t know. It’s it’s a kid’s movie. Mm-hmm , you know, S I mean, dinosaur wasn’t a movie spec. Well, it was later a movie. Yeah. But, but I, I feel like the ride is designed to be for, that’s not,

Justin: it’s very frightening. It is very frightening. I would not put a little kid on that.

Autumn: So if that’s the case, I definitely think they’d have, they’re gonna have to change the track.

Yeah. You know, it’s not gonna be able to be exactly the same.

Justin: Yeah. Yeah. All right. Headline, number three, are you. I’m ready, Mickey and Minnie to be married, to celebrate the Disney company’s 100th anniversary. Ooh.

Autumn: The company’s been around for hundred years. Yeah, but it’s the 50th of the park.

Justin: It’s the 50th of the park this year.

Next year is the hundredth company anniversary. So that’s the next thing they’re hyping

Autumn: wow.

To be married. You said?

Justin: Yeah. Mickey and Minnie are getting married.

Autumn: Hmm. True.

Justin: This is false. This [00:15:00] is false. Why do you say true?

Autumn: Well, I was thinking I’m like, they’re not already married. Right. They’re married in my head, but I’m like, no, I, I don’t know that they’re married. They’re just together. They’re not,

Justin: yeah. They’re they’re sweethearts. They’re sweethearts. they live in different houses.

This,

Autumn: yeah. That’s and then I, yeah, I was like, oh no, they’re not married. Yeah. They’re just dating sweet on each other.

Justin: Would you believe that the Disney company actually considered this pretty seriously back in 92, 93.

Autumn: Oh. And then decided not to,

Justin: they decided not to. Yeah. Why don’t. So they were. So there isn’t a, so you can check out, I’ll link it in the show notes.

It’s an article, the Jim hill media. And he goes into the story of, you know, what he’s heard. And there were, there were a couple different reasons that were kind of, that maybe came up where they didn’t want to do that. But basically like when, what happens when people get married?

They’ve been

Autumn: to, they basically are married. They’ve been together for a hundred, maybe

Justin: is, but like, what is the, not a hundred historically something, what is historically, and traditionally the point of marriage, [00:16:00] children, children, children involve. — conceiving children. Oh my she . Okay. And so, I mean, oh yeah. So now you’re gonna have, I mean, they’re just gonna get married and not have kids. Yeah. And that, well, okay. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that. If that’s their choice for 90 years. And maybe it takes another 90 to have the kids, or maybe they don’t have kids and that, you know, that’s Mickey and Minnies choice, but you know, if we’re talking about, you know like archetypes, right?

Yeah. There’s kids. And then we’re also talking about, you know, maybe these two mice Having sex procreating. Yeah. and this isn’t, you know, maybe we don’t want guests thinking about that. I don’t know. That’s too.

Autumn: Come on. They have shows dealing with puberty on Disney. Like yeah. It’s that? No, I mean maybe, but that’s a that’s like that doesn’t make any sense.

They sign some of the other things they have that they, and whatever reason thinking that hard, they didn’t just be like, oh, they’re married. Cute. Yeah. Well, people already think they’re married. [00:17:00] Other friend. What did I say at one of the tri. Mickey’s like 92 years old. Yeah.

Justin: Well, they would’ve been in 92.

They would, they would’ve been 65 years old, so yeah, so that

Autumn: was so they’re too old to procreate Minnie has definitely hit menopause. Y’all so mouse marry them.

Justin: Mina minnie-pause mini mini pause,

Autumn: but don’t mic have periods,

Justin: Minnie pause.

Autumn: Minnie pause. Okay.

Justin: are you ready for the next headline? All right. The hat box ghost coming to haunted mansion in Walt Disney world.

Autumn: We, this was teased. No something about the hat box ghost this was, there was information about this. This was teased somewhere.

Justin: It was recently, I mean, I mean, it’s pretty recently it was put back into the Disneyland,

Autumn: right? Maybe that’s it something about the hat box coast coming back was in the news.

Justin: Hmm. I don’t remember that.

Autumn: Read it again.

Justin: Hat box ghost coming to haunted mansion and Walt Disney Worlds. [00:18:00]

Autumn: Oh, that would be so, yeah, I mean, so on mansion’s huge. It’s huge. It’s gotta be one of the most popular rides now. They gotta announce something about it. Right, right. They’ve got the new movie drop in. Yeah.

We’ll say this is true. I’ve been incorrect so far, but I’m just, I’m gonna say its true

Justin: I will play you a reel

Josh D’Amaro: well foolish mortals. We have heard you and IM

Autumn: who’s this

Justin: Josh D’Amaro i,

Josh D’Amaro: I am. fiendishly thrilled to announce that next year, the hat box ghost will materialize in the haunted mansion at Walt Disney World.

Autumn: Oh, oh, I wanna watch that whole thing. That’s great.

Justin: Yeah, so he’s coming.

Autumn: So what does this mean for Haunted Mansion fans? Like tell us about it. Let’s

Justin: well, let’s talk about hot back. Yeah. Let’s talk about hot box coast for those that don’t know. That’s a different ghost. Let’s talk about hat box ghost. Yeah.

He showed up in 1969 in Disneyland for like a [00:19:00] couple weeks, you know, and he, they couldn’t get him to work basically. So they took him. Because they took him out, you know, and things, legends like to develop rumors like to develop. Yeah. People just said that it’s cuz he was too scary. He frightened too many people.

Yeah. So they had to take him out, but it was really just cuz it was broken. Oh, but because of that, the rumors and everything, like, there’s kind of been like this cult following, like in, so

Autumn: of the hat box ghosts

Justin: of the hot box ghost, like there’s been additional merch there’s he’s popped up in like comics that the Disney Disney comics.

Autumn: Okay.

Justin: And actually, so Benicio, Deltoro has been working on a Haunted Mansion movie forever. Right, right. And it didn’t end up getting made. It’s not gonna get made. Uh, Now anyway, you know, there’s a new one coming. Justin Simien directing, but he actually was gonna center his whole movie around the hat box ghost.

Autumn: Really?

Justin: Yeah. It was gonna be the core of the movie, which

Autumn: that would be really cool. Wanna see? Cool,

Justin: cool. It’d be so cool. I Benicio Del Toro Haunted Mansion. Oh my gosh. I would, I would love it.

Autumn: [00:20:00] So this is exciting because this is a, a neat addition, but really one that like serious. Haunted mansion Disnerds

Justin: yeah.

Autumn: Would know most people wouldn’t have, wouldn’t have any idea cuz he was around for such a short period of time.

Justin: Yeah. And, and you mentioned just like a minute, a second ago about the new movie coming out. So I wonder if that has something to do with it.

Autumn: Yes. I wonder if, oh, I’m excited.

Justin: He’ll probably at least appear in the movie, you know?

Autumn: So did they say, was there any other things about hunted mansion that came out. Like news in addition with it, or

Justin: this was really quick like that, that clip I just showed you. It was like the whole thing.

Autumn: Oh I’m wow. Oh, I’m excited. I’m excited to get it, to have this exciting addition to my favorite ride.

Justin: all right. You ready for the next headline?

Autumn: Yes.

Justin: Okay. New restaurant Tiana’s palace is coming soon to Frontierland in Disney World.

Autumn: So this, there was speculation on this because I think we [00:21:00] talked to polices. We were talking about the rest. She does have a restaurant. That’s not one of the cruises.

Justin: That’s right. She has the restaurant on the cruise ships.

Autumn: Yeah. And, and then the ride Splash Mountains gonna be redone, supposedly. Yeah.

Justin: yeah, no, it is. It is. It’s it’s coming in.

Autumn: He just still no date?

Justin: No, it is it’s late 2024

Autumn: late 20. Oh, so they’re, they’re giving it time. Yeah. Okay. And then there were scrims was it, you told me somewhere that there were scrims somewhere that give you hand? I don’t remember what it was. Yeah. This is true.

What were, what was the, what was the,

Justin: that was in Disneyland. That’s right. Disneyland and signage.

Autumn: Yeah. In, in Frontierland, in Disneyland. Mm-hmm .

Justin: I feel like I can’t I’m I’m divulging too much information here. I feel like I’m giving away the game. Like I you’re asking great questions, but I’m done answering that.

Autumn: Read it one more time.

Justin: New restaurant Tiana’s Palace is coming soon to Frontierland in Disney. [00:22:00]

Autumn: that would be dope when we were there. I said Tiana needs, like I wanna go to Tiana’s restaurant. Yeah. I wanna be like that beautiful double animated section in the movie. Ooh, that would be exciting. Where is it going in Fronteirland you there’s not a lot of space over there.

Yeah. Alls I can think is of that Lincoln link link, the place with kind of like. Meat and potatoes food is

Justin: Pecos Bills.

Autumn: You got Country Bears, Pecos bills, no bathrooms, golden Oak

Justin: Oaks, golden Oak cafe, or golden Oak something.

Autumn: Oh, maybe that’s gone. I’m gonna say yes, because I think that would be that it’s gonna bring a lot of it would be cool to have that next, the ride.

Yeah. And I think that might actually bring a lot of good traffic to that section of the.

Justin: All right. No, this is false. ah, I’m sorry. I says so much just, sorry. Well, the, the issue here is it’s Frontierland. [00:23:00] We’re talking about Frontierland and Disney World Tiana’s restaurant is not on the frontier.

Autumn: No, but we ti the ride’s still it’s the middle of a city. It’s not in the frontier either.

Justin: Well, the ride doesn’t take place in the city and that you’re right. This is part of the continuing issue with breaking theming, because it does take place in like the twenties instead of the 1880s. Mm-hmm . But even like, in terms of like a place it take Tiana’s restaurant is in the city.

Isn’t it in the city.

Autumn: Do we know? It’s say in

Justin: well, yeah, I think we can say yes, it is in New Orleans. And so the true headline here is it’s Disneyland. They’re putting it in Disneyland in new Orleans square. Which is in Disneyland. Oh yeah. And that’s where I saw the scrims that’s where I saw the signage last year when I was visiting.

Where,

Autumn: why, so there’s a New Orleans Square in magic kingdom, but we don’t have one in

Justin: Disneyland. Yeah. There’s one in Disneyland. Where

Autumn: is that? Where does that fit in regards to Disney world? Like where is that? Is that in [00:24:00] between Adventureland and like where is

Justin: the park? Yeah, actually, yeah. It’s in between Adventureland kind of in between Aven, you could say in between adventure land and like Frontierland.

Yeah, exactly. Oh, but

Autumn: Disney world has to get Tiana’s place cuz gotta get

Justin: her restaurant. No, we just have to go to Disneyland and, and eat for oh, I mean Disneyland already has the bin. No does it? Yeah. Does has thes on land be getting the ride? Disneyland’s getting the ride theme as well. They’re getting, they’re gonna both.

And they’re also getting, they showed like some shops too. It’s getting a shop. Why are you shaking your head? We’re just getting Disney. I know, but this isn’t bad. This is good. Yeah. It makes sense. In New Orleans square, it does not make sense in frontier.

Autumn: They could have put it because I think it could go somewhere else.

Yeah, it could go somewhere else. Go any, just put it. I just want it to be in a park

Justin: world. Just give te her own land. Just build new Orleans square and Disney world. There you go. Yeah, there you go. Done. [00:25:00]

Autumn: I think that would be great. Also I really want some news about in something within Encanto in the park.

Justin: Well, we’re not done yet. Okay. Speaking of Encanto here’s the next headline? Tron Light Cycle run to open spring of 2024

Autumn: what speaking of Encanto?,

Justin: I was lying about that,

Autumn: Tron light cycle in Disney world. Mm-hmm to run 20, 24

Justin: Tron cycle run to open in spring of 2024. That’s too late. There’s been a lot of delays on this ride.

Autumn: Yeah, I think that’s too late. I cuz I thought the plan was 23 and when we were there, like. Working on it. I think they’re beginning to do test runs on it. I’m gonna say that’s false.

Justin: That is false.

Autumn: Mm it’s. Too late. Do you wanna guess when that I’m gonna say, cause they did announce where are we at? Oh, we’re almost at the end of 22.

Somewhere in between spring and fall. [00:26:00] yes, of

Justin: 23. Good. Guess it is spring of 2023. Okay. Yeah.

Autumn: Nice. Ooh. Oh, that’s so that’s cool because that’s like, the 50th is basically ends then mm-hmm but that will be another thing to draw. Keep drawing crowds.

Justin: Yeah. Yeah. Cool. All right. You ready for the last headline?

We the last

Autumn: one already. This is the last one. Oh, wow. Okay.

Justin: I’m ready. Plans revealed to expand magic kingdom within an entire land devoted to villain.

Autumn: Say that again? Yeah, go to bed.

Justin: go to bed! Plans. Reveal to expand magic kingdom with an entire land devoted to villain.

Autumn: that’s like too, like, you gotta be like no magic kingdom is so packed.

Yeah. Yeah. But there has to be more land and it’s almost too good for you to have made it up. Mm-hmm [00:27:00] you know what I mean?

Justin: There’s like 200, there’s a lot of acres down there. A lot of

Autumn: square miles. Yeah. I imagine that there is more land they can build on. Yeah. And it’s been, when was the last time they added a land?

The lands have been almost all been there since the beginning now. Yeah.

Probably

Justin: Toon town. Ooh,

read it one more time. Sure. plans revealed to expand magic kingdom with an entire land devoted to villains.

Autumn: That would be so dope

in magic kingdom. that’s where it would go. Mm-hmm it would go in magic kingdom. Mm-hmm might be a part of, could they expand off of fantasy land? Hmm. Hmm.

I’m gonna say it’s true. I’m gonna go wild and say the crazy thing. And that’s a crazy thing. That’s a, that’s like a, that’s like a, almost unbelievable thing to add to magic kingdom. Cause it’s been so [00:28:00] long, but it’s like too good. You, I feel like you also couldn’t have made.

Justin: Sorry, autumn, this is false. No.

Are you serious? you made that up,

Autumn: Justin.

Justin: There is.

Autumn: You made that up.

Justin: There’s some truth here. Do you wanna hear the truth?

Autumn: I’m afraid now I’m nervous.

Justin: All right. So this is, once again, it came from the last part of the show and a lot of this is all blue sky stuff is what they said. Okay. So these are not concrete plans, right?

A lot of this may not come true. Oh. It kind of was upsetting to me because they’re very like, like, Hey, this might not happen. We’re just talking here. These are just ideas we have, you know, these is not concept art. These are just ideas we have. So you, you can’t even really call them plans

they’re more like hopeful plan. Okay. But

Autumn: here are goals there.

Justin: There’s a little bit to get excited about here and you might not get it all from this reel, but here you go.

Starter. But you [00:29:00] can see here, the villains looming overhead with Casa Madrigal in the distance. And then we arrive at San Cecellia. That’s what could be out there beyond big thunder mountain.

Autumn: Oh,

Justin: oh,

Autumn: what.

Justin: There’s a lot there to unpack in that short little clip.

Autumn: Yeah. So because it was villains.

Yes. But then it went to Encanto

Justin: Uhhuh and also to Coco.

Autumn: Oh, I didn’t say I couldn’t

Justin: say. Yeah, that was the San Cecilia is, is the fictional town in Mexico where Coco takes.

Autumn: What? Okay. So tell me, cuz there is a lot that is a lot in one. I is you wouldn’t expect those things to be together necessarily. Yeah.

Justin: So basically they’re talking about an expansion past big thunder mountain and I’m like, wait, what?

Where? Yeah. So I, but I looked at the I looked at, I pulled up Google maps. There’s a real nice chunk of land behind big thunder map mountains. Like the train goes through. It’s like over a river. So when the train is back [00:30:00] running again, you could just, it would go, the train could go through this plot of land back there.

There’s a nice chunk back there. So, okay. There is definitely a place to do it. And so it started with, they’re talking about Coco, wouldn’t it be nice to have a place with Coco?

Autumn: That’s a great, yeah, it would.

Justin: And then wouldn’t it be a great place to have? Encanto yeah. Only Disney could bring Casita to life.

And the, one of the imaginaries started talking about that or the talking about wouldn’t it be great, you know, walking into Casita and maybe. Opening a door and getting your own door and finding out what your superpower is. Ah, kind of gave me chills you.

Autumn: Well, I’ve been talking about the whole time.

I’m like if they bring in ki it has to be, it has to be Casita has to Beita Cita and it has to, I mean, it’s gotta be, I don’t wanna, I don’t want nothing short of it.

Justin: And we, we talked about Lynn Manuel Miranda, you know, he had already mentioned like, he’s talking to people at Disney about this. Yeah. Like he wants this to happen.

Happen.

Autumn: Yeah. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Oh, so we are gonna get Some Encanto and Coco which I also love. That’s a fun movie

Justin: maybe. And then after that they [00:31:00] talked that’s when they got into like, what if we, you guys like villains, right. And everyone went nuts because people have been talking about, there’s been rumors of this for ever.

Autumn: Yes.

Justin: Because people do love villains. They do pay for villain stuff. People shell out a lot of money for the villain stuff. Yeah. And so, but I don’t like what’s the cohesion here. And so

Autumn: yeah, where where’s the Villa? That’s interesting.

Justin: Here’s a central American town, a south American town and a villainous mountain.

Autumn: Yeah. That’s where it goes. I, I was like, oh, really interesting. Yeah.

Justin: So I, I think that’s why it’s very underdeveloped, you know? Right. Like there has to be some cohesion here.

Autumn: They’ll yeah, yeah. They’ll

Justin: and maybe we get one of those. Maybe we get none of those.

Autumn: La Casita has to C he just gotta happen.

C’s said it now. It’s no,

Justin: you can’t take that back. No, no. taksies backsies

Autumn: no. And cocoa would probably be a really nice, still like with the the music and the cut. Like, I feel like those can go to those can [00:32:00] be linked somehow. Maybe the villains is maybe a door of Casita imagine if one door and Casita opened you to right.

This world of Villa, like maybe yeah. You know? Ooh, that would kind be interesting. Oh, that’s exciting. I hope I wanna, did they say anything about like, I don’t know, like how. I know it’s very a loose idea, but like following up or like

Justin: no state. Nope, no they’re saying basically this, the part of the project this is at is like, we are sitting around a table talking about it and someone made some art.

So, yeah, that’s how’s yeah. So who, we don’t know when, or if this could ever happen,

Autumn: but that’s how Joe Rhode made animal kingdom come to life. At some point it was just people sitting at a table with drawings.

Justin: Yeah, that’s true. But let’s talk about that because you’re, that’s a great question. So when does this happen?

Does this really ever happen? Yeah, let’s talk about Universal Studios for a second. Okay. They’re opening up a brand new entire state of the [00:33:00] art park. That’s a new car. Yeah. Epic universe. Epic.

Autumn: You mentioned it once. I’m sorry. You did. You mentioned it once.

Justin: Maybe just once I’ve this coming in 2025, right.

2025 steel is up. They are building the coasters. You can go on YouTube right now and see them building these coasters. This is coming. This is real. What does, what does Disney have to compete with that? Do they have to compete with them? I don’t know.

Autumn: Right? They’re still, they’re still Disney.

I

Justin: mean, they’re, they’re still Disney.

They’re still gonna get guests, but are they gonna get first crack at those guests wallets as you know,

Autumn: a whole new park?

Justin: I don’t think so. You know, that year, if they don’t have anything else, Disney might kind of be a secondary destination for a lot more families.

Autumn: Right. Well, and it’s a lot cheaper.

It’s a lot cheaper to stay

Justin: a lot cheaper to stay at Universal Studios. So, so. .

Autumn: Yeah. I mean, that does sound like it would be a lot to have together by 2025, still, even if it’s just images, but oh yeah.

Justin: There’s no way that Disney could do this by 2025 at all. [00:34:00] Any part of it, I think, but, but even looking past 2025, right.

When epic universe, they’re not gonna just stop after that. They’re gonna continue to expand Epic Universe. They’re gonna continue. They’ve been adding, attract. like pretty regularly mm-hmm and updating attractions pretty regularly adding resorts pretty regularly. There’s this pattern it’s growing.

It’s growing. It’s really good. You know, you’ll we,

Autumn: themeing is really good at universal.

Justin: Yeah. The rides are really good. Everything’s really good. You’ll where I’m talking to Tommy in a little bit. You’ll hear stick around and listen to that. We’re talking about Universal Studios there. Oh yeah. I.

They’ve gotta have something they’ve gotta like Disney can’t stop growing. You know what I mean? In 10 years it won’t be no, they know that. Yeah. Yeah. I’m, you know, I’m not worried about like Disney becoming Six Flags, you know, that’s not gonna happen, but six flags in terms of like continuing to be as profitable as they are right now.

And they are very profitable right now. Yeah.

Autumn: They have to.

Justin: You have to like, yeah, I love Disney, but there’s something better [00:35:00] down the street for less money.

Autumn: Yeah. That would be a way to do it. And it sounds like they know the things that would really. Make them like top, top something with villains, some kind of villain something and Encanto because the world’s gonna be screaming that for a very long time.

Yeah. Yeah. Like that might, this might be, and I didn’t, you know, Frozen at its had its thing or whatever, and I didn’t think anything was gonna beat that, but I think incon might. Yeah. I mean, I think it’s better movie.

Justin: You think they’ll do it. They’re gonna do Encanto sequel, right? Maybe even a series. I think that’s already in the works.

Autumn: Imagine there might be a sequel. Yeah. But I don’t know. You know, sometimes it’s like tough when you have something really. great too. And if they feel like they’ve told. that story. Yeah. You know, I don’t know. I don’t know.

Justin: And part of me is saying it’s just, it doesn’t need it the way they lumped in like the villains thing.

I’m like, are you just trying, cuz this is D 23, right? This is for Disney fans. These are the Disney mess. Now maybe

Autumn: it’s just multiple ideas.

Justin: Yeah. Yeah. That’s for sure. Sure. This is [00:36:00] people sitting around a table talking. Yep. But I’m thinking if one of this idea, what’s like the goal here and maybe I’m being cynical, but the D 23 is for huge Disney fans.

Right. It’s not for like the family that kind like Disney, that’s going there and spending a bunch of money. These are, this is for like pass holders and oh, you’re right. They own DVC.

Autumn: So you’re right. This isn’t for most people that come, what do

Justin: fans. they love Figment, right? Which they’re getting. Thank you.

And they love. They love villains like that is, you know, that’s they, people have been rumoring and talking this rumor’s been going around for a while for a reason. Right. Cause people love the idea. They want it to happen.

Autumn: The villains after hours, babe, I was like, let’s go, let’s spend the money.

Justin: Well, that was a real thing.

Autumn: I don’t wanna do this stuff. Yeah. Yeah. But that was something that I was like, yep. Yep. I need to go experience that. Yeah.

Justin: So I think maybe like I was thinking maybe. They’re kind of throwing us fans of bone hair with the villains thing.

Autumn: Yeah. I think that I, some idea of that is gonna come to fruition.

Yeah. It might just not look exactly like what they said, but I imagine [00:37:00] that those, those ideas are strong enough to, at that

Justin: point. Sure, sure. Yeah. And I mean, they’ve said to this, you know, Jim Hill says this on the Disney dish podcast. No good idea dies in Disney. So even if it doesn’t happen like this as a package, it seems like a weird package.

I don’t think it’ll happen like this yeah, we’ll see something villains and big, you know, we’ll definitely see something Encanto.

Autumn: Yeah. I feel like Epcot can use some newer things and we couldn’t put Casita

Justin: well, here’s the thing here’s. EPCOT just got a bunch of new things. They just remodeled the entire

Autumn: oh, that’s right.

Justin: The entire sys like middle of EPCOT yeah. They’re getting Moana. They’ve got guardian of the Galaxy’s right. Moana. They just got Remys that’s right. There’s I forget about, and they tend to rotate, you know, like a, a lazy Susan kind of situation and Animal Kingdom is definitely due Animal Kingdom’s up next.

Autumn: Yeah, no, you’re right. Oh, cool. I just, I want Casita and I want villains. There you go. [00:38:00] so I’m gonna be like, I guess just keep on keeping on with Disney news, right?

Like just keep on tuning in.

Justin: Definitely. Yeah. That’s what we do every week here on the Easy Diz It podcast. I’m looking at you, like, what do you, are you talking to me? Are you talking to the listeners? Okay. So yeah. Good point, autumn. This is a great time to highlight the fact that, Hey, we talk about news every week here on the Easy Diz It podcast.

And if you, this is where you should come to get it. And we’ll, we’ll be talking about all these things I’m sure in the next year or two, these, these will be coming back again, for sure.

Autumn: I’m super excited. I have an additional question. You didn’t mention this in the headlines, of course, but maybe you got here.

Do we know about Dany DeVito and the live action Hercules yet?

Justin: Nothing about that.

Autumn: Yeah. They’re keeping that tight lip and the data’s like for next year, and we don’t know anything about it. Yeah. But maybe it’s not next year. Maybe I’m making that up. I thought it was. No, it is. It is.

Justin: It’s the next March.

Autumn: We don’t know anything.

Except I think maybe the [00:39:00] actor that’s, that’s playing Hercules. There’s nothing. It’s let, it’s weird that it’s I can, it must not be PA it must be farther out. I think it, I think

Justin: it was March cuz we’ve this has come up a couple times. Yeah, March 2023 who can you say? Oh, wait, you’re talking about, you’re talking about Hercules.

Yes. I’m not talking about Hercules. I was talking about once mansion. I’m sorry. Oh, I’m going. I don’t think. Yeah, no, there is not a release date for the live action. Hercu Hercules

Autumn: and like less than a year out. And

Justin: we don’t know. Who’s no, it’s way more than year out. Yeah. It’s probably 25. Yeah.

Autumn: Okay. Well cuz they had teased it at the end.

Was it the th it was the Thor. All right.

Justin: So let’s all right. No, no. That was a different Hercules movie. That was a Marvel Hercules movie. They teased this. This is a live action Hercules of like the, the, the movie that we know and love. they’re just remaking it live action. Oh my God. There’s two Hercules.

Yeah. There’s there’s just, I didn’t know that. No, no, I thought, and then there’s the Hercules Hercules. I thought stage Marvel show as well. Musical. Wait a minute.

Autumn: Yeah, we have marvels [00:40:00] Disney. So I thought at that ending

Justin: Marvel’s Marvel, that’s a difference cinematic universe.

Autumn: Oh yeah. But there’s no release date for that.

The Marvel ES no, no, there. Oh, and then I just, I didn’t realize these were, they were

Justin: too. I could be wrong. Maybe they’re doing a crossover, but I didn’t assume it. I did not assume it was a crossover. Oh yeah. I thought it. Yep. We’re just getting a lot of Hercules in the next few years. That’s what it’s been.

Autumn: Oh, I’m so excited. Hercules Hercules. For any of you fans out there that saw any of the nutty professors, , that’s what that was from.

Justin: Thank you for that.

Autumn: That’s a great I wanna rewatch the nutty professors, any who This is exciting. There’s some, there’s some exciting excitement,

Justin: exciting stuff. Yeah. Is there anything else that you wanted to hear about that didn’t get that you didn’t hear about?

Autumn: Well, in con no. I mean, I answered in Encanto villains is something I wanted for a while. Mm-hmm so that tickled my fancy mm-hmm haunted mansion. That was a nice surprise. Yeah. To have, you know, an [00:41:00] update there. I was excited about that. No. Yeah. I think that. That was pretty good. Yeah. Yeah. So let us know, let us know what you think about those headlines. Let us know if there are things that you were hoping that you that D 23 would, would let us know about that.

Justin: Maybe you didn’t. Yeah. That’s the question of the week. What did you want to hear about at D 23 this weekend that you did not hear about? Yes. Send that in easydizitpodcast@gmail.com or just message us on Instagram at @easydizit

Autumn: that works. Yeah. All right. Thanks everyone for joining us this week. And we’ll see you soon.

Justin: Yeah. Stick around and listen to Tommy. And I talk about universal studios, Florida.

Autumn: Oh, that’s gonna be exciting. All right. Bye everyone.

Tommy and Justin Talk Universal

Justin: [00:00:00] All right. How’s it going, Tommy?

Tommy: Hey, Justin, how are you?

Justin: I’m pretty good. Thanks for joining me today.

Tommy: Oh, pleasure to be on the show again. I love it. Yeah.

Justin: So you recently went to Universal Studios and from what I understand, you had a pretty good time, is that correct?

Tommy: We did have a great time, but I wanna preface it by saying it’s not Disney.

It’s it’s just not, I have to say it. I have to say it right out the shoot. Yeah. But it’s great, but it’s just not.

Justin: It’s not Disney. All right. All right. So I’m going in November and I haven’t been in over a decade, maybe like almost two decades. Yeah. It’s been since I’ve been, so I’m looking forward to it and I’m, I’m talking to a bunch of people that have gone recently and that go frequently just to kind of get myself excited about it.

Maybe get some of the listeners excited about it. Mm-hmm and maybe pick up a couple tips and tricks. So, so yeah, could, could we start like who was in the party?

Tommy: There was a bunch of us. It was me, my wife the two kids. Her my wife’s parents. My wife’s sister there was seven of us. We had a blast.

It was great. I love go. I love going [00:01:00] when it’s one big group like that, it was my stepson’s graduation present. That’s where he picked, he wanted to go to Universal cuz he is older and he wants the thrill. Yeah. Yeah. You know, rather than the Disney.

Justin: So your, your, Your older son, he appreciates the he’s more of the thrill.

Tommy: Oh yeah.

Justin: seeker Where would you put yourself? And your wife in terms of like thrill.

Tommy: My wife definitely does all the thrill rides she loves it. I do too. But with my recent health issues, it’s a little bit tougher. I try to get through it as best I can, but some of the stuff like the going backwards stuff really throws me for a loop now, all of a sudden,

Justin: really?

Tommy: Yeah. I’m not sure. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But I still did it, you know, you’re, you’re there to have fun. So I wanted to do it with the kids.

Justin: I’m noticing even just like getting older, I can’t ride roller coaster the way I used to. And like, I’ve always heard that. And I’ve always said to myself that won’t be me.

I’ll just do it. Yep. But now it’s like, maybe not ride a roller rollercoaster again. Yeah. Late now.

Tommy: Well, it’s funny too. Cuz when you go up to the rollercoaster, you see the warning [00:02:00] sheet. and I pretty much have every one so everyone always looks at me like, mm, should you be going on this? Yeah. it’s it is pretty funny.

Justin: So how many days in the parks did you do?

Tommy: So we stayed for eight days and it was, we had a length of stay pass mm-hmm . So every day you could go to the park, come and go. Now that’s already better than the Disney. Cause it takes all the pressure off. Yeah. So you don’t feel that pressure where you have to go from rope drop to, you know, closing every single day so we can pick and choose if it’s too hot, we can go at night.

Or if we wanna just go in the morning and bang out one of those sections, we can do that. So I really enjoyed that part. We stayed at the Cabana Bay. We stayed on property.

Justin: Did you like the Cabana Bay?

Tommy: I did. There was definitely pros and cons. Now, when we first got there, we get up the plane and we took the.

The superstar shuttle over to the cabana bay, there was a two hour, wait to check in to check in to the [00:03:00] line was huge.

Justin: Did you have to wait for the superstar shuttle?

Tommy: How was that experience? That was almost immediate. The guy was waiting right there. It was wonderful. Yeah. And he didn’t even let the bus fill up.

We just took off. Oh, that’s awesome.

Justin: Yeah. So for listeners who might not know superstar shuttle is the universal exclusive pick you up at the airport service. They do charge a fee. Is it like

Tommy: 29? Yeah. It’s about that. Yeah, it wasn’t too. It wasn’t too.

Justin: Yeah. But that’s great to hear that you didn’t have to wait that long.

Cause I know sometimes with like Mears Connect or Sunshine Flyer, you can, they say you can wait up to an hour. Yeah. I don’t think that’s like the typical experience. Mm-hmm but you be

Tommy: prepared to wait for it up to an hour. Yeah. It wasn’t like the old Magical Express where you had to wait in the lobby mm-hmm and then get shuttled out to the bus like cattle, you know so you,

Justin: but when you got to Cabana Bay, you had

Tommy: to wait two hours for check in two hours for check in.

So we waited that amount of time. We get up to the. And you know, we get our, a ticket, our rooms, our room keys, and then I asked about the tickets and she goes, no, the tickets are a completely separate desk behind you. And I look back and there’s another 12, [00:04:00] 13 deep people there not I’m like, oh, come on.

Yeah, I’m supposed to be on vacation. I’m like Disney. Wouldn’t do this to me. yeah.

Justin: The first two things, your first two experiences. Vacation. Shouldn’t be two lines.

Tommy: No. And then when you get the tickets, I was all excited because the length of stay, I, I love that idea. Yeah. And I wish O other people would do that.

So we get up to the desk, we get our tickets and I said, all right. So we parked here too. We have a rental car. Mm-hmm and can we park at the parks also? And they’re like, yeah, no, that’s a fee. Gotcha. I’m like, but I’m already paying a resort fee to keep my car. That’s not included in that. No, that’s not included.

So that was another major turnoff.

Justin: That’s a great something great to know for people listening though, that you, you will be paying for the parks, even if you’re staying at a universal resort.

Tommy: Yeah. Unless, unless you have like an annual passholder gotcha. Like one of the, you know, the the memberships that includes the parking.

Yeah. You can get in that way, but we don’t have that, so. Gotcha. I mean, that was too turns off right away, but then we get to the [00:05:00] room, the room was pretty big for a, you know, for a four person room. And, and as soon as you opened the curtains, we saw volcano bay staring at us and I’m like

Justin: a Volcano Bay view room

Tommy: we had, well, it was, it wasn’t a volcano Bayview room, but you could see it out of the corner, which was really awesome.

And you look straight down, you could see the lazy river and the other than one of the major pools, they have two major pools there with the lazy river also.

Justin: That’s nice.

Tommy: It was pretty cool.

Justin: The re we’re looking at maybe a couple days at cabana bay after a Disney stay either next year, the year after next, depending on how things go.

Yep. But the main selling point for us is the lazy river, you know,

Tommy: the lazy river. And I’m gonna tell you another huge selling point is the five minute walk to Volcano Bay. I was gonna ask about that. They have like a little secret entrance. Yeah, it’s amazing. It was.

Justin: So if you’re really going for Volcano Bay, if you’re really into the water parks, that’s a big plus for CAbana Bay

Tommy: that’s the best one to stay at.

Yeah. Yeah. It’s literally, you can see it from any part of the water park. Also looking back towards cabana bay. It’s like engulfs, [00:06:00] the whole park. It’s so cool.

Justin: So did you stay in like a two bed room or did you do like one of the family

Tommy: suites? No, we did. We just had a regular room, but it was a joined room.

So we had the door open, so we had all seven people could come and go. Through the two rooms. It was great. Yeah, we had a blast, but the, the Volcano Bay, I’m not a huge water park guy. Let’s talk about it. Oh, it is. That was the best part of my trip.

Justin: What sets volcano bay apart from other water parks?

Tommy: Well, first off, I’ll tell you and the listeners that you gotta bring your own towels,

Justin: bring your own towels,

Tommy: bring your own towels. And also you can bring waters or anything like that in a soft sided. They allow that no bottles, no alcohol. Yeah. But you can bring in, you know, tons of water where that’s all we brought was water was so hot, you know, was July.

Justin: That’s great.

Tommy: Yeah. So that was great. So they have these cabanas all around volcano bay.

There’s two floor cabanas. You can rent the first floor or you could rent both. If you have a huge party. The double cabana [00:07:00] is $1700

Justin: ooh.

Tommy: It’s all priced for the time of year that you go. Yeah. Yeah. So if you go in January, it might be 400. Who knows?

Justin: Right. Includes, does that include a meal or is it just service?

Tommy: It’s just, you get like a little meal at the beginning, you get some fruit and some breakfast stuff, breakfast items, but it has a concierge kind of like a. That comes and goes. But the other thing is you can scan, we’ll get into the Tapu Tapu, which is another brilliant idea. Yeah. But they have the Tapu Tapu machine right.

In the cabana. So you could pick your ride, you wanna scan into and scan it rather than walk around the park.

Justin: Oh, wow. Yeah. That’s, that’s kind of cool.

Tommy: That’s huge.

Justin: That’s kind of cool.

Tommy: That’s fun.

Justin: So let’s talk about Tapu. Tapu. Yeah. So at Tapu Tapu, this is how they do lines of volcano bay. Tell me about it.

Tommy: Well, I’m familiar with the old. Where you have to, I was dreading having to drag your raft up 30 flights, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not, not here. This was, this was a game changer. [00:08:00] So you sign into your app, the universal app, you put in your name, you know, everything, your room where you stay in your credit card and then the Tapu tapu just.

Connects right to that. As soon as you put it on, they, they wave it on their little magic screen there and you’ll instantly connect it. So now you can use your Tapu, Tapu to go get drinks. You can use it to charge anything at the store, if you would like, if you wanna go get some souvenirs and then also each ride has a kiosk that you just waved the Tapu Tapu.

And it tells you when to come back, right? And then you can go enjoy the wave pool or the lazy river or the crazy river, whichever one you want. And then it tells you which starts going off. It gives you like 15 minute 15 minutes out. It’ll stop beeping on you and let you know, you need to head over warning.

Yep. Stop heading over.

Justin: Yep. So it’s what it is. It’s like it’s on a wristband on your wrist, right?

Tommy: Yeah. Like a little smartwatch, like a little smartwatch. Yeah. That’s cool. No, it’s fantastic. And,

Justin: Can you just have one ride reservation at a time? Yes. One line at a time.

Tommy: Yeah. One at a time. [00:09:00] Cool. But that’s what I mean, if you’re in the cabanas mm-hmm and you can scan the machine right there and you can just stay right there.

yeah. That’s pretty fun, but it’s, it’s a huge perk, but you gotta pay for that perk. So yeah, I mean, we walked around, we didn’t get a cabana, but the best thing. I’m not a huge, like walking around a water park. I was dreading doing it in my bare feet. I was dreading doing in flip flops. You think you’re gonna, you know where you gotta put ’em, you know?

Yeah, no, this place has water jets in the cement, walkways in the curbing that shoots out towards the middle of the walkways. So it keeps everything wet. Cold.

Justin: Get outta here, that’s. So was excellent design.

Tommy: Excellent design.

Justin: Customer focused. Hey, let’s let people be comfortable in our place. That’s that’s huge.

Tommy: That was huge. That was a big, big deal for us. Yeah. So I got to walk around my bare feet the whole time and I didn’t suffer. I mean, every now and then you’ll catch a jet that doesn’t work. Yeah. You know, but they’re, they’re like five [00:10:00] feet separate all the way through. It’s unbelievable.

Justin: So I took my daughter Dar when she’s two and a half to the water park a couple times over the summer.

Mm-hmm . And what she likes to do at the water park is walk in between things and say hi to people. so I’m just following this kid around. She’s got her shoes on, but I’m always like, how far is she gonna go? Do I put on my Crocs or do I do this barefoot yep. So that’s cool that you don’t have to worry about the hot feet situation

Tommy: you don’t, but they also do have like a shoe.

Okay, so little shoe cut for your hats. You can’t wear hats on the ride. You can’t, you can’t wear your shoes. Okay. So they do have a little shoe rack there at all the rides for you. Cool, cool. But when you walk into Volcano Bay and see that 200 foot Krakatau volcano, it’s unbelievable. What a view. I mean, you see like the castle and the EPCOT ball and it’s just like that.

It’s just is magnificent to see in. So

Justin: that’s I actually wanted to ask you about that. Mm-hmm cause like I’ve heard that Volcano Bay is like really well thinked. Like it, it has a, like a pretty extensive backstory and everything. Yeah. [00:11:00] And you mentioned it, like when you walked in, you saw that thing and it seemed like it really ma had an impact.

Oh, on just seeing that volcano, like what role did themeing play? What for you during your visit and for your family? Was it, was it, was it a big part of the draw or you, was it more about like the, the rides themselves?

Tommy: Well, this family loves the beach. I’m not a beach guy, but the rest of the family loves the beach and that’s that’s it felt like you were on a Polynesian beach.

Justin: Nice.

Tommy: It, it was absolutely. Palm trees everywhere. There’s plenty of shade. If you needed to get in the shade, there was plenty of it. But I like that kind of a setting. I like that Polynesian. I mean, that’s my favorite resort, you know, so it’s, it was all about that. It was great. It was very immersive to that.

Awesome. Yeah.

Justin: Awesome. So I, so when I go, right, mm-hmm, , let’s make this about me, cuz this has gotta be about me.

Tommy: No, of course. I’m gonna just, it’s like a quick weekend thing. So I have like a PM a full day and then a morning. So I’m not sure, just because I haven’t been to the parks in so long that I’m gonna make it to [00:12:00] Volcano Bay.

Justin: Yeah. Plus like, I, I can do a theme park by myself. No problem. I haven’t yet done a water park by myself. I don’t think I’m at that level. Yeah.

Tommy: I could see where that would be a little. That would be a little weird. Yeah. Yeah. So off on it this time. Yeah. Weird to some, maybe not to me. I mean, I could probably do it because I loved it so much if you hadn’t been there yet.

Maybe not. Yeah. But now that I know some of the things to hit be a solo, like in the crazy river, you could stay in there all day long is the most amazing.

Justin: So we went to Water Country over the summer in Williamsburg. And they have one of those there where they just give you the life vest. Yeah. And so fun.

Mm-hmm it was so fun. I could

Tommy: do that for hours. It was even better. Once I realized I could fit in the life vest then it was game on. Let’s go it was so much fun after that.

Justin: all right. So tell me now about the parks. And before we get into the parks, I have a question. I think it’s a qualifying question.

Okay. [00:13:00] In the, in your travel party, were there any like Harry Potter fans, any pre like die hard Harry Potter fans or big Harry Potter fans?

Tommy: I wouldn’t say die hard. Harry Potter fans. My oldest is probably the most into it. Mm-hmm but it’s not like he is room is decorated with it, but he just, he just loves the whole theming of it.

He loves the wizardry, he, the robes, the wands, he likes all that stuff, but he, it like around. Yeah, you wouldn’t see it. You know, he doesn’t walk around talking, you know, and casting spells on people or anything. Yes. He doesn’t declare himself house. No. Well, he did. I think he was Ravenclaw, Raven. Yeah. He picked up a few Ravenclaw things.

I see a, like a, a tumbler around here, Raven claw and. Some other things, so,

Justin: and yourself, would you say you’re like not really much of a Harry Potter

Tommy: fan? No, not really. I, I, I think it’s cool, but I just never took the time to read the books or watch the movies. I really, nobody really said, Hey, you have to watch this.

Please sit down and watch this with me. [00:14:00] So that was never, that never

Justin: happened. Given that, like, how was your experience in the Wizarding world? Like either, either one of the parks,

Tommy: it really is. It’s beautiful. It’s unbelievable. I mean, I, I know of it. Of course, you know, everyone knows of it. And the the castle is just out of this world.

It’s so beautiful. Well done. Designed the inside is spectacular. The hallways, the the Sorting Hat is talking to you as you’re walking through. If you’re familiar with. The everything in there. Like they have almost like video screens of all three. What was it? Harry Hermine and I’m not sure what the other guy’s name is.

Justin: I wanna say Ron, I wanna say Ron,

Tommy: Ron Weasley, that’s it. Ron Weasley. So they have video things like that in the ride, as you’re going through and talking to you and getting you all hyped up for the ride. The castle was great, but I’ll tell you the one thing that blew me away was the Hagrid’s Motor Bike.

Justin: It was good. Huh?

Tommy: It was unbelievable. That was probably the best [00:15:00] rollercoaster I’ve ever been on.

Justin: Wow. See, I’ve done pretty good with this. I haven’t watched any videos on this. It’s hard cuz I do love rollercoaster videos.

Tommy: All right. I won’t tell you anything about it, but tell you can

Justin: tell me about it.

So it is like, I know you have an option of either the bike or the car. Yes. Which one did you

Tommy: ride on? Well, I was with the, the little Swiss. Okay. So he wanted to drive the motorcycle. So I was the side car guy side car. So we got. It’s constantly moving. It’s almost like the haunt dimension it’s belt.

It’s constantly moving. It. Doesn’t stop to let you load. It’s always moving. Wow. So when we got on, he was too short, he couldn’t reach the handlebar with the, so we had, they had to take us off. They took us off and, and kind of brought us around. And then we had to wait for the next bike to.

Justin: Then, so the, the two different vehicles have two different height requirements.

Tommy: Yeah. Cuz the reach, cuz you had to reach out where he had to reach to hold the handlebar and where the, the lap bar came down. He couldn’t, it just didn’t jive.

Justin: So [00:16:00] I’m glad he got to ride though. That would’ve stopped. Yes.

Tommy: He loved it. He, he loving it. It was great. I, I won’t give away too many spoil.

It was just, it was definitely the best rollercoaster I’ve ever been on by far.

Justin: Yeah. I’ll tell you what I know. It’s it’s a multiple launch coaster. Yep. There’s more than one launch and there’s, there’s some pretty cool audio animatronics. That’s what I know.

Tommy: It’s really cool. and then you add, and you add in a 17 foot free fall.

Oh nice.

Justin: Oh, oh, track

Tommy: drop. Ooh. I wasn’t I wasn’t aware of that.

Justin: Yes. And what is it? Bush gardens has a ride with a track drop and it’s like their family coaster too. And I did that over the summer and that was, we were, we were just talking about how rides affect you differently when you get older.

Yeah. That one affected me differently. I was like

Tommy: yeah, it’s great. I like that. What I thought it was really cool when you were in the. It’s like the, the motorbikes are going through and they actually making motorcycle sounds. So you see all these and there’s so many of them. Yeah. [00:17:00] They, they must have five or six bikes going at the same time.

So they’re all whi through and running by you. It was great. That’s cool. It was really cool.

Justin: That’s one of the benefits of a multiple launch coaster is you can actually usually put more trains on the track.

Tommy: Yeah. So yeah, you can time it better. Yep. Yep. That’s cool. It was fantastic. It was.

Justin: Did you do the train ride?

The ho was it the Hogwarts express, the train ride between the two the, between Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios.

Tommy: I didn’t do that. The family did do it. Most of them, the wife and I went back with Ryan. Gotcha. The other four did do the train ride. They loved it. They said it was super immersive.

They was sitting in the car and a little booth and like the window was like a screen, not projector. And you could see like the Hogwarts and leading up to the castle. And they said it was really, really good. Cool. Yeah. I wish I wish I had done it, but we would’ve done that day. The heat, the heat crushed us

Justin: when you’re done. You’re done.

Tommy: I know.

Justin: It’s so smart to go back to.

Tommy: Yeah, because we could, if we were at Disney, you’d keep [00:18:00] going because you feel like you have to, you know, but here, yeah, we were done that day.

Justin: So I’m pretty excited about, you know, checking out this themed world, just cuz I hear it so immersive and I’ve never been before.

What if there was just one thing I’m gonna do more than one thing, but if there were like one thing you say, Justin, don’t miss this while you’re there. Whether it’s one of the restaurants, one of the shops, one of the shows, one of the rides, what, what would you advise me not to miss?

Tommy: I would advise you not to miss the visual of the castle.

You have to see the castle and go on Hagrid’s you really do need to go on Hagrids there’s another one. There’s another whole part in the old section it’s called Daigon Alley. Mm-hmm it’s another Harry Potter world in there. And they had the Gringots ride. Yes. Yes. Fantastic. Really good. Yeah, that was kind of like the castle ride you’re in, like, it was a rollercoaster.

But you’re also watching lots of video screens, three screens as well. You get the drops, you get the spins, the car spins. And to turn to either way [00:19:00] kind of like the, yeah. You know, the Guardians of the Galaxy ride.

Justin: It’s what, I believe that the technology on that ride’s called a, I’m probably gonna say it wrong, but a Kaku arm or cuckoo arm, something like that.

Yeah. But it’s basically an arm that you might see in a in like an auto plant, basically. It’s like a large arm that articulates and moves you around. I’m. Pretty excited about .

Easy Diz Bot: Actually Justin, the rider to universal that uses the Kooka arm is Harry Potter and the forbidden journey at Thailands of adventure.

Tommy:

That’s crazy’s fun. And the elevator, when you go down the elevator to go down to the ride, well, you think you’re going down.

You think you’re probably just going through another door, but it actually makes you feel like you’re on a dropping elevator without the heavy, without the Tower of Terror drop feel. Gotcha. It’s like, it’s so cool. They, they, they did that. Harry Potter world is really, really.

Justin: Yeah, I’m excited. I’m excited. So I’m going by myself and I was hoping to take care advantage of some single rider lines, but now I’m hearing how cool some of [00:20:00] these lines are though.

And if you do the single rider, you miss out on a lot of it. So I guess I’ll just be standing in line.

Tommy: I would do a bit of both. I would try. I mean, you have to see the castle, the inside of the castle is yeah. Remark.

Justin: Maybe second rides. I’ll I’ll do single rider.

Tommy: Yeah. It’s single ride. Like I would single ride the mommy ride, which wasn’t open.

It was closed. Yeah. That’s my, that was my favorite at universal missed it. Yep. I just missed it. It opened pretty much a day after we left.

Justin: So when I went to universal last, that was fairly new that had just opened up in like, I think like the last year. And dude, that ride is so good. Oh

Tommy: yeah. It’s really good.

It’s really good. I loved it.

Justin: That was probably the. Multiple launch coaster. I had been on mm-hmm and I didn’t know, you could do that on a rollercoaster. You like you’d think it’s over.

Tommy: Yeah. You think it’s over and like the Velo coaster doesn’t stop. It just gets faster. yes,

Justin: it’s crazy. I was really excited about that as a rollercoaster enthusiast.

Well, this is an Intamin multi launch [00:21:00] coaster.

Tommy: Yes.

Justin: And

Tommy: so excited. No shoulder harness,

Justin: no shoulder harness.

Tommy: It’s wild.

Justin: There is a, it has like a, you might call it like a sister coaster or a brother coaster, and that’s in Busch gardens. It’s called Pantheon mm-hmm and it’s very, it’s very similar except in Busch gardens.

It’s basically in a field, like they say, it’s themed after like Greek gods. Right. But it’s just in a field. And what, from what I understand about Universal, the themeing is it’s pretty good.

Tommy: The themeing is pretty good, but it just didn’t immerse me enough. I don’t know what it is. I don’t know if it’s the characters.

I don’t know if it’s the stories. yeah. You know, all the different sections that I’m just not into dinosaur vibe. Didn’t go. Yeah. I’m just not a Universal guy, I guess, but I had a great time and don’t it’s back one o’clock don’t miss Volcano Bay.

Justin: That’s I think the takeaway from this conversation. Oh, it was is don’t miss volcano bay.

Tommy: I would go back just for a day. It was so good. It was really that good. Wow. Wow. Yep.

Justin: All [00:22:00] right, Tom. I really appreciate you coming on and talking if anyone out there wanted to get in touch with you pertaining to your travel planning service, maybe to get some of these tips that you just laid on us right here.

Yeah. How might they do that? How might they get in touch?

Tommy: Well, they can get me on Facebook at Unlocking the Magic Travel with Tommy Shaw on Instagram. I’m @unlockingthemagictravel_shaw, and we’re on The Cheesy Mouse podcast.

Justin: That’s right. Don’t yes, everyone here after you’re done listening to this podcast and making sure you hit subscribe on this podcast and writing a review head on over to the Cheesy Mouse podcast and do the same over there.

Follow review. Listen I enjoy listening to your show. Last show I heard you had Ashley on. Yes. And then I really enjoyed that design.

Tommy: Yeah, she’s great. Yeah, she was awesome. And I did. And we are on Google now just for you. Oh, that’s yes, I appreciate that. Okay, good. I did that just for you. I hope you would realize that.

Justin: I did. I’m like, ah, oh man, this is great. I don’t have to go to another app

Tommy: after you have mentioned it to me. I’m like, yeah, I’m gonna go on Google just for Justin. [00:23:00]

Justin: so checking out on Google, Spotify, everywhere. You can find podcast The Cheesy Mouse Podcast thanks again, Tommy. Appreciate it.

Tommy: Thank you, Justin.

Outro

[00:00:00] Hey everybody. Thanks for listening to the show today. Sorry, there wasn’t a show last week, I appreciate you all understanding. How life can be tricky sometimes. And I’ll sometimes we have to prioritize other things than Disney podcasts. I know it’s unfortunate, but. Well, yeah. Thank you so much to Tommy for coming on today. I appreciate him sharing his Universal knowledge and I encourage everyone out there listening.

Hey, if you’re looking to book To Universal to Disney Disney cruise line get in touch with Tommy. He’s a wealth of information and he’ll help you plan a great vacation. Check us out on Instagram @easydizit or TikTok @easydizit or shoot me an email. easydizitpodcast@gmail.com with any show ideas, questions for the show, or maybe just Poem say you write a poem and you want to share it. Send it my way. I’d love to read your poetry.

All right until next time. Easy Diz It