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Hollywood Land

As the Red Car Trolley dings its way around Carthay Circle, it aligns with a new straightaway set a decade later – welcome to Hollywood Land.

Forget the Hollywood Pictures Backlot. This new incarnation does in spirit what the land should’ve all along: it’s Hollywood in the 1930s and 1940s – the Golden Age of Tinseltown, alight with stars, cars, and the glamour of the movie capitol of the world. Admittedly, the transition from a Backlot to an "authentic" Hollywood Blvd. of yesteryear is admittedly the least robust makeover in the park, relegated mostly to placemaking and re-thinking of details.

For example, the Hollywood Blvd. branching off from Carthay Circle thankfully lost the "punny" shop names that had become such reminders of the park's "hip, edgy" origins. Back then, this Hollywood Blvd. was littered with signs advertising hair salons, plastic surgeons, and more, each a jab at the paparazzi-fueled, reality-TV inspired image of Hollywood prevalent when the park was designed. Since Hollywood Pictures Backlot was supposed to be a facade-lined boulevard of false fronts, the switch to Hollywood Land carefully enclosed and covered the land's "cheap" origin, recasting those facades as legitimate buildings as much as possible.

Image: Disney

But as the Red Car Trolley glides down this new Hollywood Blvd. to the sounds of old jazz standards, there's a new feeling in the air. And that air is immediately taken back out of your lungs as the Trolley rounds the corner before the Hyperion Theater and hangs a right on Sunset Blvd., with the pueblo deco, adobe-tinted Hollywood Tower Hotel looming overhead.

Naturally, this is home to California Adventure's version of The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. While California's ride is certianly a most cost-conscious version than the blockbuster original at Walt Disney World, it has a substantial part to play in the rebirth of this park.

After all, the ride (added in 2004 as a Band-Aid to draw guests to the still down-and-out park) has become an essential ingredient of the reborn park's impressive world-building. The looming, crumbling remains of the hotel make more sense from the perspective of a 1940s Hollywood Land than from a Hollywood Pictures Backlot, sure. But the Tower of Terror is integrated deeply into the new, Californian narrative of the park.

That's why, riding the Red Car Trolley, an overhead advertisement actually features the Hollywood Tower Hotel – albeit, without its main guest tower! Just a small piece of that Disney-style storytelling, that leads us to believe that, back in Buena Vista Street's 1920s setting, the Hollywood Tower Hotel was up and running, but without the (doomed) main guest tower that must've been a later addition!

And how spectacular that, wrapping together the park's first two themed lands, the Red Car Trolley is advertised as having stops on Buena Vista Street, Carthay Circle, Hollywood Blvd., and the Hollywood Tower Hotel...

Image: Disney

... Again, simply building out the apparent "world" being constructed in this park, uniting so many of its attractions into one overarching narrative.

Meanwhile, the set-back Hollywood Studios portion of the land was cleaned up of its industrial refuse, ugly "modern" placemaking, and the Declassified Disaster: Superstar Limo, and now features Muppet*Vision 3D and the pleasant family dark ride, Monsters Inc.: Mike & Sully to the Rescue. The grand Hyperion Theater (seating 2,000 in a Broadway-equipped theater!) is still playing the long-running hit Aladdin – A Musical Spectacular to full houses – a much-needed celebration of classic Disney animation in this otherwise Pixar-friendly park.

Altogether, Hollywood Land has made a miraculous leap forward, even if it's the least impacted of all of the park's reborn lands. So just imagine what's waiting further on in the park... Read on...

a bug's land

Image: Disney / Pixar

Added in 2002 – just after the park’s opening – to try to entice families in, A Bug’s Land (based on Pixar’s A Bug’s Life) had two useful goals: the first was to give a home to It’s Tough to be a Bug, the horrifying 3D film that debuted with the park and was nonsensically located in the Golden State land's Bountiful Valley Farm area.

Second, A Bug’s Land injected a handful of family flat rides into the park: Fliks’ FlyersTuck and Roll’s Drive ‘Em BuggiesFrancis’ Ladybug BoogieDot’s Puddle Park, and the favorite Heimlich’s Chew Chew Train are all attractions that young children could spend the whole afternoon on. And technically speaking, A Bug's Land has as many rides as the entirety of Disney's Hollywood Studios featured in 2012...

Image: Disney / Pixar

A Bug’s Land was an obvious, immediate, and appropriate response to the accusation that Disney’s California Adventure had literally nothing for kids to do. It succeeded in fulfilling that need, and put the park into the “maybe” category for many families when previously, it would’ve been an outright “no.”

For what it’s worth, the “miniature” scale of A Bug’s Land feels more successful and interesting here than in either of the Toy Story Lands in Paris, Hong Kong, or Orlando. The Bug’s Life film may not be as beloved as the Toy Story franchise, but there’s no denying that A Bug’s Land is a very fun little place for exploration. 

Grizzly Peak

Image: Loren Javier, Flickr (license)

Even back in 2001, Grizzly Peak (then called Grizzly Peak Recreation Area – a sub-land within The Golden State district) was a standout. Dedicated to California's beloved national parks, Grizzly Peak was modeled after a High Sierra national park of towering evergreens, geothermal geysers, pounding waterfalls, and magnificent natural features. The in-park resort hotel, Disney's Grand Californian, is even in on the act, modeled after a California craftsman style lodge that any self-respecting national park would feature – a clever backdrop for the forested land.

But like so much of the rest of the "original" California Adventure, designers simply weren't content celebrating California's rich natural history with a nostalgic and transportational trip through an ageless national park. Instead, when the park opened in 2001, Grizzly Peak was cast differently. Set in modern day, the "National Park" infrastructure was intentionally aged and rusted. The story? This is an old, boring, dusty national park, and an extreme sports company had arrived to save us from our misery. They'd set up camp around the park, offering white water rafting excursions.

But now, in the new California Adventure, the clock has been turned back. By stepping into the expanded Grizzly Peak land, we're traveling back in time to the heyday of the family road trip; to 1950s California, with the family station wagon parked alongside the iconic and instantly-recognizable National Parks signage.

Grizzly River Run is not an extreme sports company’s attempt to make an old, boring park fun; it’s a park activity for the family that pulled up in their station wagon ready for adventure together! With pounding waterfalls and gorgeous rockwork, it's at least a beautiful and stunning use of the mountain, even if it's still not Disney quality in its storytelling or effects.

Most wonderfully, a "Phase II" of California Adventure's re-opening also saw another former-Golden-State mini-district – Condor Flats – absorbed into Grizzly Peak, as well. That makes tremendous sense, because the mini-area (containing Soarin Over California) was simply not large enough to get across the "high desert arid landing strip" theme it purportedly was built with. Instead, its desolate, dusty color palate and industrial rocket part graveyard look felt cheap.

Image: Disney

So its vast emptiness and red desert rocks were pulled down and replaced with still more evergreens and mossy boulders; its industrial flight towers and rocket engine props were replaced with a National Park fire watchtower, a classic '50s biplane, and other period-appropriate elements. Now called Grizzly Peak Airfield, the sensational, latern-lit extension of the dense forests of Grizzly Peak National Park make this once-modern mini-land feel historic and immersive just like the lands of Disneyland Park!

Another reborn land awaits on the next page... 

 
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Comments

Disneyland is no longer the Disneyland Walt envisioned. Not one Disney family member is involved with the company any longer. Disney is run by bean counters who have no creativity or vision. They are turning Disneyland into a Universal Studios. Star Wars Land and Marvel land are cash grabs in order to recoup the money they lost on California Adventure early on.

I loved this article! I was a big early champion for California Adventure. The opening of Tower resonated so greatly with me, and showed a ton of promise for what a park themed around California in California could do. When DCA 2.0 was announced, I watched in fevered anticipation as a new story grew from the shell of DCA's admittedly cheap base. I was even so privileged to work on Buena Vista Street in it's first year of operation.

I was immensely devastated when Tower was announced to be closing. Your other article, Lost Legends, covered so much of my feelings about its closure, and this one also retouched on it. Tower's disrespectful slow removal while in operation and what replaced it so removed the anchor to California Adventure, the attraction that I saw as the prime inspiration for the 2.0 remake.

When Pixar Pier was announced, the punny names of stores and the irreverence completely turned me off from DCA. I refused to renew my annual pass when Tower closed, and the sharp reversal to DCA 1.0's mentality with a slightly higher budget just soured my love for the park. I can't find myself going back to California Adventure anymore because of the blatant face slapping of hip and modern IPs with short shelf lives. I find myself missing the original DCA 1.0, if not for the promise of the DCA to come years later.

The disappointment of the continued changes though, seems as if Disney has lost the true zeal of what makes their parks great. The art of it feels lost in the push for more crowds in an already crowded resort all with the promise of making good on what Universal Studios already does. I miss the Disney experiences, and I find myself dreading more theme park meta jokes. Rocket's Disneyland call out and the tongue in cheek tease of Incredicoaster just breaks the immersive quality of Disney Parks. I keep wondering when the irreverence will catch up with Disney, and I see glimpses of it (such as in the abrupt rehiring of James Gunn for Guardians right as a Twilight Zone reboot is about to be released) speaks to the shakiness and uncertainty of the push for now and in the moment when those now moments will be gone tomorrow.

California Adventure seems to be more like the West Coast version of Hollywood Studios in Florida or Disney Studios park in Paris... maybe it could use a change of name to reflect that.

In the 5th page, you said D23 Japan was held in November 2017. But it was held in February 2018. It might be a little difference though.

This makes me think of the entire "Chester and Hestor" debacle at Disney's Animal Kingdom.
Yes, it has an immersive and creative story.
Yes, the story itself is well executed.
But at the days end the story embraces and is a running riff on EXACTLY the type of roadside distractions Walt wanted to avoid by moving to Florida where he could have the "blessings of size."

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