3. Spoon-fed storylines

Do you know what the original versions of Snow White’s Scary Adventures, Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, and Peter Pan’s Flight all had in common? A lack of appearances by the main character! In each case, the guest took that starring role, experiencing the attraction through the character’s eyes. The Haunted Mansion expands on this basic theme, taking you on a tour through a ghost-inhabited manor home while leaving it up to your imagination to decide exactly who you are and why you are there.

Today’s attractions take guests through a spoon-fed sequence of events with a beginning, middle, and end. And Disney goes out of its way to make sure you understand exactly what your role in the story is. On Mission: Space, you are there to undergo astronaut training for the first manned mission to Mars. At Test Track, you are going through an automobile proving ground—now in fashion Tron colors! On Soarin’, you have been inexplicably transported to California, where you will go hang gliding.

4. Lack of exploratory attractions

Two of the best early-Disney attractions are open-ended and exploratory in design: the Swiss Family Treehouse and Tom Sawyer’s Island. In both cases, the story is told through a combination of an extremely well-designed space and a collection of signs. Due to its treehouse nature, Swiss Family is somewhat more inherently restrictive, but you are free to move around at your own pace and revisit particular areas as often as you like.

At Tom Sawyer’s Island, free play is the name of the game. Barrel bridges, forts, checkers sets, spooky caves…the possibilities just go on and on. Nothing built at Walt Disney World in the past 40 years even approaches the level of creative exploration afforded by Tom Sawyer’s Island…with the possible exception of the original Image Works, once located upstairs in the Imagination pavilion.

5. Thrills at the expense of content

With Universal Orlando’s high-tech thrills located just down the road, Disney could hardly afford to ignore the thrill ride market. Yet Disney’s carefully guarded family-friendly image keeps them from building anything too extreme. Instead, the past number of years have brought us a lineup that doesn’t quite hit the right notes in terms of either thrills or content.

The most glaring examples of this are Soarin’ and the new Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. Soarin’ is a terrific ride—but what exactly does hang gliding over California have to do with learning about the Earth and how to care for it? The Seven Dwarfs Mine Train seems like an attempt to squish together three very disparate concepts—a roller coaster, a dark ride, and a kiddie ride. The result is a coaster with a 38 inch height requirement that precludes small kids, a lack of the inversions or high speeds needed to draw coaster enthusiasts, and a collection of animatronics  from the old Snow White ride that are partially obscured to hide their age. What was the point of shutting down Snow White’s Scary Adventures again?

What do you think? Has Disney dumbed down over the years? Would you like to see a return to a higher level of engagement with visitors’ imaginations, or do you see passive entertainment as the wave of the future? Share your thoughts with us in the comments.