Wondering What Ursula Will Look Like “Under the Sea”?

WDWNT on March 9, 2011

While the following piece from the Disney Parks Blog is meant to be promotion for California Adventure’s “The Little Mermaid – Ariel’s Undersea Adventure”, the ride is almost 100% identical to “Under the Sea: Journey of the Little Mermaid” coming to Fantasyland at the Magic Kingdom, so the Ursula animatronic you see below will also be swimming over to Florida in 2012:

The infamous evil sea witch, Ursula, has taken her place inside The Little Mermaid ~ Ariel’s Undersea Adventure attraction opening June 3 at Disney California Adventure park. When you’re on the attraction, you can’t miss her. She’s 7 ½ feet tall and 12 feet wide! Of course, the Disney Parks Blog was there to capture this exciting day! Come with us behind-the-scenes as we show you Ursula being installed, and meet some members of the amazing team of Walt Disney Imagineers who brought Ursula to “life.”

Vinylmation Recap: March 8, 2011

WDWNT on March 9, 2011

A lot happened today on the Vinylmation front, so here is a recap.
Disney officially announced an April 1st
release date for Vinylmation Series Park 6.
We had pics of the pins representing Park 6,
but today Disney released turn around pictures
and the artist’s names.
We already knew Urban 6 would be
released on March 18th, but today
we were treated to turn around pictures
of the series. We also now know all the
artist’s names and narrowed down what
the chaser might be.

Check out Urban 6 Explained here.
It was our lucky day! Disney also released
photos of all the figures from Jr Series 3
Good Luck / Bad Luck… including the
chasers.
Disney also released some turn around
pictures of the 8 figure open window
Tron set. We know these are currently
available at Hong Kong Disneyland,
however no US release date
was announced.

Please visit Tron Explained.
More Cutesters Too variants? Maybe.
Disney’s official Vinylmation Blog linked
to a page with “original artwork” from the
Cutesters Too set. It including 2 variants we
have never seen… bringing the possible total
number of variants to 5.

Jacks Has a Variant Too? More Surprises from Cutesters

WDWNT on March 8, 2011

Update: 3/12/11 We got a response from Maria, “The yellow jacks and pink bubbles were just concepts. I had presented some variants and not all of them were chosen to go forward with. The concept art was just for fun!” So that answers our question. There are only the three variants in Cutesters Too, although I think I would have preferred the pink bubbles to the purple ones!

Cutesters Too came out back on February 4th, and we are still finding surprises. Disney posted some original artwork in the Fun section of the Vinylmation website. This artwork revealed more variants. We now know there is a variant to Jacks and a second variant to Happy Lollipops. Here is the complete list of Cutesters Too variants side by side with the normal figure from the set.

Yellow Jacks
(Variant)
Update: Nope!
Jacks
Pink Bubbles
(Variant)
Update: Nope!
Purple Bubbles
(Variant)
Yellow Bubbles
Yellow Happy Lollipops
(Variant)
Happy Lollipops
Sour Apple
(Variant Chaser)
Sweet Candy Apple
(Chaser)

Disney World Website Previews “Star Tours: The Adventures Continue”

WDWNT on March 8, 2011

From the Walt Disney World website:

On May 20, 2011, the power of the Force and the magic of Disney combine once again to create an unforgettable new Star Wars experience in Star Tours – The Adventures Continue – in 3-D! This deep-space flight simulator features light-speed travel to galaxies, far, far away.

Join the Rebellion

Climb in to the Starspeeder 1000 with old friends C-3PO and R2-D2, along with new additions Star Tours Pilot “Ace” AC-38 and Spokesbot Aly San San. When you board, several different journeys await. You might take flight in a Tatooine podrace or weave through the city planet of Coruscant. You could find yourself on the run from Boba Fett or meeting Princess Leia. You’ll never know which characters and worlds you will encounter.

But, Beware! Darth Vader could attempt to create a disturbance in the Force. A showdown may be inevitable.

Hopefully, the Force will be with you.

While these details aren’t all new, the possible chase with Boba Fett is confirmed. This correlates with the pin series we discussed last week, which may provide a little more credibility to the other rumored destinations featured. The information above also doesn’t claim that Tatooine and Coruscant are the only two scenarios for the attraction. I guess we will just have to wait to find out… Stay tuned as more information becomes available on Star Tours: The Adventures Continue!

Jr. Series 3 Vinylmation Explained

WDWNT on March 8, 2011

The theme to Jr. Series 3 is Good Luck / Bad Luck. The 18 figure series is designed Thomas Scott and will be released on March 11th at D-Street Orlando and CA.

First, we take a look at the GOOD LUCK figures from Jr. Series 3

 Four Leaf Clover
Fortune Cookie
Happy Emoticon
Horseshoe
Ladybug
Lucky 7
Lucky Cat
Triple Cherry

Now, we take a look at the BAD LUCK figures from Jr. Series 3

 Black Cat
Crow
Friday the 13th
Losing Spin
Sad Emoticon
Snake Eyes
Spilled Salt
Upside Down Horseshoe

MYSTERY CHASERS

 Good Luck Chaser

Click on picture to view
Chaser
Bad Luck Chaser
Click on picture to view
Chaser… if you dare!

Vinylmation 3D Pins: Big Eyes, Cutesters, Wall-E and Eve

WDWNT on March 8, 2011

The Disney Pins site has announced some new Vinylmation 3D pin sets that feature designs from previously released Vinylmation sets. All four of these pin sets will be released on April 4th at WDW and DLR. No edition sizes has been announced.

If you missed the Vinylmation set the first time around, pick up this Wall-E and Eve pin set. 
This set will retail for $19.95.
This Big Eyes set features Mickey, Mike Wazowski and Pluto.
It will retail for $25.95.
With so many condiment sets hanging around the D-Street shelves for so long, I am surprised they turned this into a pin set. This set will only have Ketchup and Mustard, so we may see two more sets in the future.
It will retail for $19.95.
These pins are from the first Cutesters series.
This set will retail for $25.95.

Tailspin, Delivery Service Delivered

WDWNT on March 8, 2011

On a happy note, we did get our Tailspin’s today. (Only 6 days later, that’s pretty cool) Let’s avoid all the controversy for now and just take a look at the first set of the Disney Afternoon Series.

First off, the back of the box is awesome. While the front and sides are covered with the paint splatters that were reminiscent of the Disney Afternoons promos, the back was a big change. A nice black background with shiny black lines covering it. The lines form pictures of Louie the bartender, Kit, Baloo, and Molly. The back also notes the edition size: 1000. Both hats look nice, with Baloo’s cap actually an accessory. And for all you Combo Contest fans, it does come off!

Here are the backs of the figures. Nothing all that interesting, just a couple of tails and some details clumps of hair.

And here’s a look under the feet of each figure. Here they note the edition size, the name of the character and series, and the name of the artist, Christopher Chapman.

Did you get your set today? What do you think of the figures now that you actually own them?

Added Insult to Insult to Injury: The TailSpin Vinylmation Saga

WDWNT on March 7, 2011

As if changing the dates, making us wait for the release, retro-actively changing the prices on blog posts and not owning up to it… Disney sent me this today:

It’s my TailSpin Vinylmation! But wait! What’s this on the bottom?

Are you kidding me Disney!!! You can take the time to jack up the price to $26.95 at the online store. You can go back and edit all your previously dated blog posts. But you can’t change the price tag on the item you charged me $26.95 for. After not owning up to it, that’s just insulting. Shame on you Disney. I am writing the customer service department and I encourage you to do the same. Just go to the DisneyStore.com page and click on “contact us” and fill out the email form.

In case you missed it, check out our post calling attention to the price change with a screen shot of the $24.95 price Disney went back and changed after our post.

What do you think of this TailSpin saga?