Saturday, September 27, 2008

Forgot This One

I accidentally omitted this image from my previous trip report:

As Kevin and I wandered into the far reaches of Walt Disney's Magic Kingdom, we noticed that Chip 'n Dale's Treehouse looked a little bare. Getting ready for winter, perhaps? Upon closer examination, it looks like the tree's leaves are literally falling off (or have mostly fallen off)! Unfortunately, no broken leaves lay scattered on the ground for interested souvenir hunters.

5 comments:

Major Pepperidge said...

I usually only to to ToonTown to ride the Cartoon Spin, and never make it over to the treehouse. How does this tree look from a distance, is it ridiculous?

Jason Schultz said...

Major: I don't normally visit Mickey's Toontown. It still looked odd to me because I remember it with leaves. It doesn't look terrible--but imagine the Adventureland treehouse without any leaves!

Anonymous said...

Yeah I had noticed this about a year ago. Very sad state of disrepair. Upon closer inspection the leaves seem to be made out of some kind of stiff rubber and the parts that were still on the tree are horribly cracked and rotted by the elements. I assume that a longer lasting alternative is being looked into. That whole corner of Toontown is pretty sad, though I believe they finally fixed Donald's boat, which for the longest time was missing it's masts and the Daisy figurehead was pretty badly worn also. I'm confident that they are working to fix these problems, but that they leave it visible to guests for so long before fixing it is pretty unacceptable.

Mike said...

Toontown should be turned into a backstage area and never spoken of again. It is the ultimate "Eisner," even down to the use of the derogatory term "toon" to show disdain for animation.

From day one, Toontown began to deteriorate since it was done entirely on the cheap. Pick ANY attraction, lamp post, sidewalk, water feature, plant, play area (or more likely FORMER play area) or whatever, and you will find: rot, decay, fading colors, chipping or missing paint, grease, hard water stains, roped-off empty spots (see Chip and Dale's house and the old cave area behind it that I think had bounce balls for kids to play in ala Chuck E Cheese---this is now deserted).

And can we please buy some SHADE!!

Who would design an ENTIRE "Land" without SHADE!!??? Do they honestly expect that frying the tiny tots who are apparently Toontown's target audience is a good guest experience? Is this good show?

If I hear Donald Duck's ship's horn blown one more time---I'm going absolutely postal (and I'm taking Roger Rabbit down first before he can maim another young child).

The faded green hills forming the facade and backdrop of Toontown are vomit-inducing as well.

So are the shlocky plastic "toon" cars, facades and props. It looks like the "Fun Zone" from a county fair, only not as nice.

Otherwise, I like Toontown just fine.

--Mike
Jungle Is "101"

Jason Schultz said...

Mike,

I have from a very reputable sources that Toontown was supposed to be indoors. Now, I don't know at what point in the design that was nixed, but it may explain the lack of shade. It certainly does not excuse it, however. That and the fading paint have always irked me. Kevin and I both felt the hills looked more vivid than we remembered them, though.