The Disney Frontier Blog

Wow, I had no idea that Keira Knightley was only 17 when they shot the first Pirates movie. She was 19 when they shot Dead Man’s Chest and she is now 21. Amazing. Listen to her discuss spending 4 years of her life running around being a pirate. She definitely has developed the sailors pirates language.

Watch the Video

Technorati : Keira Knightley, POTC, Pirates of the Caribbean

This blog started as a blogger blog. I then switched to a hosted blogger blog hosting it at Godaddy.com. This week, I switched to Wordpress. During the switch I updated the template and therefore the design. I plan to re-add the links page with the RSS aggregation that used to be on the left side.

Wordpress allows me to receive trackbacks as well as have categories. It is much more flexible and has tons of available plugins and themes. Hopefully, I won’t have to switch domains or software again (fingers crossed) and can just focus on finding and linking to great Disney content.

Technorati : Blogger, Disney, Redesign, Wordpress

BottomTime’s Disney Tunes is a page of Disney Midi sounds. There are sounds from ride attractions and from movies. Perfect for your old school ring tones. Give a listen.

BTW, they have the electrical light parade which I think was originally done in MIDI so it sounds authentic.

Technorati : Disney, Disneyland, Midi

With the release of the 2nd movie and the re-opening of the ride, there has been a huge influx of pirates videos, pictures and audio. I am going to try and consolidate some of it down to a single post here.

• Live Captain Jack Sparrow Show at the Magic Kingdom - Video
• Official Disney Podcast - Promotional video discussing the changes and taking a closer look at the new animatronic figures - iTunes link
• The Columbia at Disneyland dressed up like the Black Pearl - 2 min Video
• MSN’s webcast of the POTC Dead Man’s Chest Red Carpet Event - Replay the video
• Photos from the Red Carpet Event - Photos

Thanks to Ricky and all the Inside the Magic Listeners for posting these links at the Inside the Magic Forums.

Technorati : Disney, Disneyland, POTC, Pirates, Pirates of the Caribbean

Follow Johnny Depp through the ride and see him actually next to one of the animatronics of himself. Its pretty cool.

http://www.iesb.net/videointerviews/piratesride.php

UPDATE: The video is not available at the above url anymore. Instead try: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zYF44yE3k4
Technorati : Disneyland, Johnny Depp, POTC, Pirates of the Caribbean

Via Tiki Talk, the Tiki room turned 43 on Friday. Tiki Talk has links to an MP3 of the Tiki Tiki Tiki Room song from Tokyo Disneyland as well as links to some old postcards and pictures.

Technorati : Audio Animatonics, Disneyland, Tiki Room

This is a video of the Pirates of the Caribbean Disneyland attraction fresh after the rehab. In the video you can see Davvy Jones, Captain Barbosa and of course Captain Jack Sparrow.

Technorati : Disneyland, POTC

Awesome ride video of California Screaming at night. You even see the loop.

Technorati : California Adventure, DCA, Disney, Roller Coaster
Flickr : California Adventure

Ricky over at the Inside the Magic podcast has launched a new blog. I am a huge fan of his podcast and I can’t wait to see how his blog changes and evolves. He already has some good posts with great pictures. I am so jealous of anyone that gets to live that close to WDW (or Disneyland for that matter).

Technorati : Disney, WDW, Walt Disney World, blog, podcast

This is the second of three comics sent to me by Travis of Gemstone Publications. The first was reviewed here. This Volume 1 publication of Carl Barks’ Duck Tales Stories has 7 stories that all apparently were made into episodes of the popular TV series of Duck Tales. Again, the quality of the art and paper make this comic/graphic novel a collectible.

My review could never do justice to the passion that Gemstone has for these stories. After reading the introduction by Chris Barat and Joe Torcivia, I realized that they not only research the history of these comic series but have a passion for it and could likely talk for hours on the topic of Duck Tales alone.

Because of my novice status, I can’t quite tell the origins of the comics in this volume (I’m sure Travis could help out here). It appears that they were originally written by Carl Barks’ and Gemstone simple re-animated the cells. It does seem clear that the TV episodes of these stories were rewritten by the shows writers with some liberties toward Carl Barks’ originals. Maybe we can convince Travis to post a good description on his blog that I could link to.

I do remember a few of these stories as episodes on the TV show. The versions in this novel are much more exciting to read and seem to be more complete if that makes sense. Anyway, any casual fan of Duck Tales the TV series or Disney Comics will enjoy these as would any hard core fan like the guys over at Gemstone.

Technorati : Ducktales, comics, disney

The Unofficial Walt Disney Imagineering Page (TUWDIP?) has lots of great information on Walt Disney Imagineering. For those who don’t know, this group is responsible for attraction creation through all the Disney parks. This is the uber cool position to have within Disney that many cast members aspire to. This site has a blog - last updated 2/28 - a FAQ, WDI art and attraction posters and much more. Spend some time here, you won’t be disappointed.

Technorati : Disney, Imagineering, WDI, Walt Disney

Here is a video courtesy of the Inside the Magic Video Podcast. This is a promotional video put out by Disney showcasing the attraction Pooh’s Hunny Hunt in Tokyo Disney. One interesting fact about this ride is that the cars don’t run on tracks. They are free roaming. If anyone knows more about how they do this, please post a comment.

Technorati : Disneyland, Pooh, Tokyo Disney
Flickr : Disneyland, Pooh, Tokyo Disney

Growing up, I missed out on the comic book experience. I was more into collecting sports trading cards and reading the sports section of the local paper. I think this is why my drawing skills are less than par. That is why I was excited to introduce my 3 year old daughter to comic books - I could experience it for the first time through her eyes. I posted about previous comics here and here and so Travis from Gemstone contacted me and asked if I would like to review some of there comics/graphic novels.

The comic starts with the story of “The Black Knight Gorps Again.” It ends in a cliff hanger and part two is found as the last story of the comic. Great idea! In between are “Sorceress’ Apprentice,” “No Thanks for The Memories,” “Generous to a Fault,” and “Passport to Lisbon.”

When I was in my early tweens, the Disney show Ducktales was on everyday after school. Reading these 5 stories was like watching those TV shows all over again. The biggest difference between this Uncle Scrooge comic and Ducktales is Donald Duck was rarely on Ducktales. He is in most of the stories in Uncle Scrooge.

I tried to read it to my daughter but I think she is still too young to enjoy this type of comic. The dialog changes quickly and I have to always narrate who is speaking which makes the story choppy and less interesting. I think kids learning to read - maybe 5 and up - as well as tweens would love this comic. Its retail price is $6.95 but the quality and length make it worth that price. Also, anyone who used to watch Ducktales - you know who you are and more then likely you are humming the theme song in your head right now - would get a kick out this comic.

Technorati : Comic, Disney, Gemstone, Scrooge
Flickr : Comics, Disney, Uncle Scrooge

Boing Boing has a posting about a letter retrieved from a time-capsule. The letter is from Walt Disney addressed to the future and is worth a read. His main assertion is that even in the distant future of 2006, people will still have a need for entertainment and relaxation. No matter how technology advances, people will still need to escape to places like Disneyland and into movies and other forms of entertainment. Here is a link to the actually letter (PDF 200k).

Technorati : Time-Capsule, Walt Disney

I took the family to Cars on Saturday and it will be is another hit for Pixar. The movie is 1 hour and 57 minutes. The actual storyline is fairly common: a self absorbed star gets shown the virtues of caring about others and reforms by the end of the movie - timeless and consistently good. But add that storyline to the Pixar magic - especially Pixar magic directed by John Lasseter himself - and you have a block buster.

All the characters were great with the exception of Bonnie Hunt - the voice of Sally the Porche. She did a fabulous job there and I have no complaints with her voice acting. Its basically the simple fact that I knew who was doing the voice and I couldn’t picture her as a young sexy actresses to play opposite of Owen Wilson. The last role I knew her from is the mom from cheaper by the dozen.

I can’t wait to see it again. I can’t remember a Pixar movie that I saw in the theater that didn’t have me jazzed when I was leaving. This is no exception. Its too bad we will have to wait so long before it is out on DVD.

Technorati : Cars, Disney, Pixar