The West Side of the Kingdom
Page 1 of 3
By Rick West
"Here Today, Gone To Mara - Six Years of Pure Magic!"
After reading this column, Discuss It on the LaughingPlace.com Discussion Boards
Ask any Disney enthusiast what the buzz was in March of 1995 at Disneyland, and it will be summed up with one word: Indy.
The Indiana Jones Adventure: Temple of the Forbidden Eye forever changed the face of Disneyland and brought the dawn of the mega-attraction to Southern California. Completely re-designing Adventureland, Walt Disney Imagineers set out to bring the next generation of "E" Ticket attraction to life with the help of an imposing temple, an incredibly elaborate queue area and a never-before-seen ride system; all involved had their work set out for them.
"The thing that makes the Indiana Jones Adventure bigger and better than anything that’s ever been done is the ride technology," explained Susan Bonds, the show producer for Indy. "I think that when guests come here, they don’t know what to expect, they get on the vehicles that are themed as old troop transports, and they’re going to be totally blown away by the experience. They’re going to believe that they’re in a real vehicle, that all of this is happening to them and the fact that it’s different every time you come back - that it’s never the same ride twice, not only can you not predict what’s going to happen to you the first time, but every time you come back it’s going to be different - I think that’s what’s going to totally blow away the Disneyland guest."
And Susan was correct. People lined up by the thousands to ride the new Indiana Jones Adventure. The queue not only snaked its way through Adventureland (this is after out-growing its 1,400-linear foot, 50-minute queue), but spilled over into Frontierland as well as Disneyland Park’s Hub area.
One of the key figures behind Indy at Disneyland was Tony Baxter, a long-time friend of mine and definite figurehead of Imagineering. While many years have come and gone between the opening of Indy and now, I still reflect on those early days of Theme Park Adventure Magazine (then known also as "The Brake Zone") and how carefully we followed the construction and opening of this amazing attraction. Whenever Tony would see us poking around Adventureland, he’d stop and graciously hint of the magic going on within Disneyland’s largest show building ever. He was just one on a team of many, but he was just as proud as he could be of this new attraction and it showed.
"We’ve never been able to create an adventure where, from all aspects - from what you see, from what you hear and from what you feel - you are really in it," stated Tony at the attraction’s opening. "It’s happening to you. It’s not an adventure about characters that you see. It’s not an adventure controlled by a pilot or someone else. It’s something that’s controlled and a part of you going through it. And it’s so awesomely big!"
Indy was indeed, a massive project with very impressive numbers.
At various times throughout the project over 400 Imagineers worked on the design and construction of the attraction, with a core team of nearly 100. There are 2,500 linear feet of temple corridor for vehicles to explore. It remains the single largest show building at the Disneyland Resort to date.
I’ve been to many attraction openings over the years, thanks to TPA. There has never been anything like the opening for Indy; never. Even the opening of Disney’s newest theme park, California Adventure, paled in comparison.
The opening of Indy was actually the first media event that my magazine was invited to at Disney. In fact, it was the first time that a "fanzine" was actually recognized by the company and given press credentials. A very proud moment for us, it signaled the Park’s willingness to allow true enthusiast publications to participate right along with large organizations such as The Orange County Register and network television stations. It’s also my personal opinion that we worked our tails off; we studied the attraction more carefully and played much harder than anyone else there. In 72 hours, we slept a total of six hours.
The "playing" part was the best. While most of the media covering the opening was broadcast of some form, we were and still are print media. That meant that once everyone else rode the attraction and shot their own footage, they all scrambled for the editing trailers and back to their own stations to prep their stories. TPA wasn’t on such a tight deadline, and so, we got our own ride vehicle. Our first ride lasted for 35 cycles through the Temple of the Forbidden Eye! Once we got off the ride, we soon became so stiff and sore that we literally limped through the rest of the event. It was the sweetest pain ever and an opportunity I’ll never forget. It’s weird to know that on that morning, I rode Indy more than most people ever will in their lives, no matter how many times they come back to the Magic Kingdom.