It's kind of a shame really.The best example of a (mostly) unchanged WED theme park and its history is barely commented on.Tokyo Disneyland has a rich history and I wish there was more documentation of it.Well I plan to do my part by writing more about this undocumented park.I plan to start with a change of a classic E ticket attraction:the Jungle Cruise.
Jungle Cruise:River Expedition
2014 brought change to Tokyo Disneyland's Jungle Cruise,which of only one real change was ever made when they switched Salesman Sam's shrunken heads for a bounty of fruit.
Now this revision was pretty major.New name,new soundtrack,new storyline,new script,new scenes,and a new nighttime experience.Now while I think that a lot of these changes were good,I don't think ALL of them were good.I this article I want to get deeper in the revision.
The Good
I want to start off positive.There's actually quite a lot of good things to say about Wildlife Expedition.The first is the script.It is a new script,in the vein of the comedic spiels of skippers in the American parks, but thinew spiel was written by a Japanese writer in Japanese so the jokes are more familiar to the culture in the same way the Jungle Cruise skipper spiel in the domestic parks is in line with American culture.This reminds of a story Wally Boag told in an interview about his work on TDL's Enchanted Tiki Room.He had a Japanese comedian help make his jokes more Japanese-friendly and he discussed how Jose instead of saying "I think someone left the shower running" he instead yelps "Cover your bellybutton!".If you don't get it just look up Japan Cover Your Bellybutton.Suffice it to say,when you find out why he says it it actually is pretty funny.
Cover your bellybuttons!Also can we talk about the fact that Michael was named Johnny at TDL?
The Bad
Now Tokyo's Jungle Cruise has always been a cut down,mirrored version of Orlando's amazing Jungle Cruise.It did receive three additional scenes from Disneyland's 1976 version of the Jungle Cruise.All these scenes were planned for Florida but never happened.One important aspect that Tokyo retained from Orlando was the sunken temple.That scene was the crown jewel scene of the 1971 Jungle Cruise and the perfect representation of the "nature wins over man" theme of Adventureland.
Unfortunately, the temple scene at Tokyo was gutted for a screen effect.Now I believe this ruins the effect of the temple.The temple is supposed to be mysterious,scary,and at the end a little funny.Now this strange magic effect does not have the same impact.It cannot compare to the effect of the Haruman statue sitting among gold and jewels,being guarded by cobras and large spiders or the effect of being threatened by a Bengal tiger.Now the scariness of the tiger and the mystery of the Monkey god and his guards is balanced by the levity of monkeys playing in the treasure.
Conclusion
Overall the refresh of the Tokyo Jungle Cruise was successful but the loss of the Sunken Temple thoroughly ruins the balance of the Jungle Cruise.
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