Friday, October 28, 2016

Review of Star Wars Fireworks at Hollywood Studios

We first saw the Star Wars fireworks event at DHS as part of the dessert party in January 2016 when the event was fairly new.  We saw the event again in October 2016, again as part of the dessert party.  So, we can compare the two events and offer some comments.  The desserts were just as good in October as January, although the current venue in the Star Wars Launch Pad is a bit cramped.

In January, the fireworks were closely synced to the Star Wars music.  The dramatic themes of the music were well matched to equally dramatic fireworks.  There was very little projection of movie clips, so the event was definitely a fireworks event.  The fireworks were centered behind the Great Movie Ride which made for nice framing.  That fireworks event was arguably as good or better than Wishes at MK.

Fast forward to October and things have changed.  Disney has gone crazy with projecting Star Wars film clips on the buildings around the Great Movie Ride.  Clips of the early movies and the newest ones were projected onto the buildings.  Sounds good except for some problems.  First the clarity of the images was less than ideal- projecting on buildings doesn't always work very well.  Second, there were trees and light posts in the way even when standing in a preferred viewing area.  Third, it was difficult to focus on the movie clips because of the very wide viewing angle and the fast changes.  It was difficult to take in the whole scene.  There were fewer fireworks compared to January and, strangely, they were off to the side of the Great Movie Ride.  Remember, our viewing area was directly in line with the center of the movie ride.  This really reduced the effect and was actually somewhat annoying.  The fireworks no longer seemed tightly synced to the music and the whole presentation seemed poorly integrated and somewhat cluttered.

So, we'll see if Disney is happy with this event or will make some changes to tighten it up and improve the dramatic effects.

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