As longtime readers of this blog know, I reviewed both Mission Breakout and its Halloween overlay, Monsters After Dark, several months ago. After those initial reviews, I took the time to ride both versions of the Guardians of the Galaxy Tower multiple times in order to more fully assess the attractions. In doing so, I came to a surprising conclusion: I really, really enjoyed Monsters After Dark.
Now, liking a ride in itself isn't a strange thing, but it seemed that there should be few reasons for me to enjoy that particular attraction as much as I did. Not only is it an extension of the (in my opinion) hideous GOTG makeover of my favorite Disneyland attraction, but it is an overlay of an overlay, multiple levels of temporary solutions seemingly meant to avoid designing an original attraction. Yet, starting with my first ride on Monsters After Dark, I absolutely loved it despite its flaws. Something about it just worked.
Repeated ride-throughs of Mission Breakout, however, did nothing to improve my opinion of that attraction. The "mere exposure effect" never seemed to take root. Something about the experience of Mission Breakout just didn't work in the way that Tower of Terror or Monsters After Dark worked. In mentally comparing the three different attractions, I finally realized what was "off".
Tower of Terror, Monsters After Dark, and Mission Breakout significantly differ in their approaches to storytelling, with Tower and Monsters making the guests engaged and involved in the story (experiential storytelling) and Mission Breakout making guests merely watch the story (observational storytelling).
Tower and Monsters both have observational storytelling in addition to the experiential, of course. In general, rides have both types of storytelling present. Tower has the observable story of the five unlucky passengers whose elevator gets sent to the Twilight Zone via lightning (and the characters the guests represent being unfortunate enough to follow in their footsteps), while Monsters has the plot of Rocket trying to rescue Groot from the now-wrecked Collector's Fortress. However, both of these attractions also make sure the guests are engaged in the plot experientially; they balance the experiential with the observable.
In the Tower of Terror, guests are cursed to experience the fateful night of the Twilight Zone disaster. Supernatural forces take control of the hotel once again as the guests hope for survival, stuck helpless in the elevator car. Riders of course cannot change anything about the story, but this plays in to the horror. Both as actors and as characters we are forced to watch as the supernatural takes over and we hope for the best. The horror of events being out of your control, as well as wishing to escape the haunting unscathed, also engage the guests regardless of their familiarity with The Twilight Zone, and the basic concept of "haunted building doing scary stuff" works regardless of the IP. The pre-show even highlights the experiential nature of the attraction: "In tonight's episode, you are the star..."
Of course, in-story, why our characters are going through this is one of Tower's greatest plot holes and perhaps its most notable flaw. Pure Imagineering's best summary is "because reasons". Some research about The Twilight Zone has led me to one possible, albeit unsatisfying, conclusion, which I'll detail below (in green in case anyone wishes to skip this diversion and continue with experiential storytelling):
The Twilight Zone, in the eponymous show, is often (although not always) a realm of karmic punishment. In the book Everything I Need to Know I Learned in the Twilight Zone by Mark Dawidziak, the author notes that people who take dares fare especially poorly in the Zone. What was the marketing campaign heavily centered around? "I took the dare!" The pre-show video even states "We invite you if you dare to step aboard." It's possible that, by taking the dare to enter the building and/or ride the elevator, our characters were getting their punishment for taking dares. Likewise, our characters seemingly are poking around an abandoned and potentially dangerous tragic disaster site for no good reason, and thus being stupid and/or disrespectful--two other things that generally aren't rewarded in the Twilight Zone.
Of course, "this is happening because our characters were stupid jerks" is far from a satisfying explanation, and it stems from a knowledge of the ride's source material that the average rider may not have (and should not be required to have), so I won't posit my guess here as "canon". Instead it's merely the best explanation I can offer. Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Eye sadly does use "the curse happens because your characters were stupid jerks" as its official story, so it wouldn't be completely out of character for Disney to use this plot device, however.
Monsters After Dark also uses the guests' forced passivity to make them engaged in the experience. Rocket is trying to rescue Groot, but needs some bait to distract the dangerous monsters loose in the building. This results in him setting up a constantly-moving elevator of warm, tasty humans to distract a dragon. Our inability to affect the outcome of the ride is once again played for horror; we have to hope our elevator drops out of the dragon's jaws at the right time. Despite us watching Rocket rescue Groot, we are directly threatened by the dragon. There is a stake in the outcome regardless of whether or not the riders care about, or even know about, the Guardians of the Galaxy. The result is an engaging and thrilling experience that probably deserved better than being an overlay of an overlay.
In contrast, Mission Breakout is almost entirely observational and dependent on guests' familiarity with and love for the Guardians of the Galaxy. It's all about watching the Guardians, well, break out. The information presented in the queue presents little to introduce who the characters are, apparently requiring that the average guest watch a few Marvel movies first (although, being a Marvel fan, I cannot confirm that someone unfamiliar would be confused, as I did understand the references). The pre-show sets up that the guests' hand prints are required to shut down the building generator, but this duty is fulfilled within the literal opening seconds of the ride. From then on, the guests have no personal stake in what occurs; rather, the rest of the experience hinges on how much a particular rider wishes to see the Guardians escape. The guests are never in peril; they're the legitimately invited guests of the Collector's tour, and they merely watch the chaos of the breakout from the safety of their gantry lift. Furthermore, the ride does not even present this observational story in a coherent or entertaining way; between drops we just get randomized, disjointed clips of the various heroes jumping out of their cages, fighting monsters, or floating in zero gravity. If I recall correctly, at least one ending voiceover even had a Guardian thanking the riders, only for another (I think either Rocket or Star Lord) to interject, "But they didn't do anything!"
Experiential storytelling is probably one of the most important aspects of a theme park ride, especially one based on an intellectual property. There should be a reason the guests want to go to the park and ride the attraction, rather than staying at home and watching the film's blu-ray. Tower of Terror and Monsters After Dark both provide thrilling experiences that engage the guests in the action (including cleverly using the riders' helplessness to add to the horror), while Mission Breakout leaves us to watch characters having an adventure while hoping that we remain interested. It is this lack of balance that serves as Breakout's most core flaw, and the primary force holding it back from being a remotely worthy successor to Tower of Terror.
Tuesday, May 22, 2018
Monday, May 7, 2018
2004 AP Newsletter: DCA Tower Special
The Spring 2004 issue of Disneyland's Annual Passholder News was entirely geared towards promoting Tower, and I found my copy in time for the 14th Anniversary of the ride! Unfortunately, I'm a bit late to posting this for the anniversary, but better late than never, as the saying goes.
Click on the pictures/open them in a new tab to see them larger and read the articles. Apologies for some tilted angles and glare; I had to take these with a camera as the newsletter was too large to fit on my scanner.
It's too bad that Disney doesn't appear to distribute AP newsletters like this anymore. Promotional items like that poster were really cool, and served as fun memorabilia for favorite rides.
Click on the pictures/open them in a new tab to see them larger and read the articles. Apologies for some tilted angles and glare; I had to take these with a camera as the newsletter was too large to fit on my scanner.
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| Front cover. Note that the artwork shows the sign with a Florida-style green outline for the words "Hollywood" and "Tower", something that never featured on the DCA or Paris exterior. |
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| Pages 1 and 2 |
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| Pages 3 and 4 folded, showing the text. |
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| Pages 3 and 4 unfolded, showing the extra-long poster. |
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| Pages 5 and 6, with AP blockout date flap folded over |
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| Pages 5 and 6, with AP blockout date flap unfolded |
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| Back cover |
Tuesday, April 10, 2018
Alternate Tower Spotlight: The Florida Tower of Terror--The Library and Pre-Show
Much as with my coverage of DCA's libraries, I must sadly preface this section by saying that it is less complete than I would like. The Floridian libraries were arguably even more filled with detail than their Californian counterparts, but sadly I was subject to the same time constraints and lighting issues and thus was unable to get full coverage of this section of the attraction. However, I will do my best with my available resources.
When the library doors opened, a bellhop cast member issued them into the library. While Florida's libraries retained the carpet-bordered-by-wood flooring setup that DCA used in its earlier years, cast members did not instruct guests to stand on the carpet or any other specific area of the room. Furthermore, while DCA seemed to carefully count the guests for the room capacity, Florida seemingly packed in as many people into each room as possible. I spent several pre-show viewings rather uncomfortably wedged against the writing desk or a bookcase.
As at DCA, however, the sounds of the lobby loop faded away to the sounds of a raging storm outside the special-effects "windows". Notably, given the setup of Florida's lobby, with the fake window behind the "queen" statue, the window inside the left side library was not an architectural discontinuity.
Although the general setup of the libraries were mirrors of each other, with the same setup as DCA's pre-show rooms, the libraries had more notable differences from each other than California's. While California's Tower had the same desk and lamp setup in each library, Florida's libraries had unique desks, lamps, decorations, and possibly even carpets.
The Queen's Library desk had a single lamp. An open book sat on the desk, with illustrations about plants. Next to the book was a notepad, stopwatch, and magnifying glass, with notes about botany on the notepad.
The King's library desk had two lamps, whose stained-glass shades looked like drooping flowers. On the desk sat an open book with photos as well as a notepad with writing. Unfortunately, in my photos, the contents of the book and the text on the notepad are sadly unreadable, and I have been unable to find any clearer pictures online. If the Queen's library desk was any indication, this text was also likely unique and relevant to the other contents of the desk.
As you can see, the libraries were filled with tall bookcases, covered in dusty antiques. The level of detail was downright overwhelming--especially if one was looking for the Twilight Zone artifacts hidden in these rooms.
While later Towers made their references relatively overt to those who knew where to look, Florida Tower's approach to The Twilight Zone was surprisingly subtle. The artifacts hidden in the libraries were incredibly well hidden, and I failed to spot many of them in person despite purposefully looking and having online guides to help me out.
One of the few I managed to spot in person was the trumpet in the Queen's library, located on a lower shelf next to the HTH logo lamp.
I also spotted the Mystic Seer on the upper shelf in the King's Library, as I noted in one of the photo captions. I recall another Mystic Seer being in the Queen's Library on the top shelf as well.
Based on information from TowerSecrets.com, the King's Library had a letter labeled "Rod Serling" while the Queen's had a letter marked "Victoria West", both from the episode "A World of His Own". These letters were extremely well hidden compared to their DCA counterparts. They were tucked into the locked shelves, hidden among the closed-off artifacts. According to TowerSecrets, the Serling letter was locked away to the left of the television. Unfortunately, that site did not provide a location for the West letter.
The miniature spacemen from "The Invaders" were also on the top shelves of the libraries, and easy to spot. Unfortunately and ironically, I did not get any clear photos of them.
As for the other known Twilight Zone references that appeared in the DCA libraries--the broken glasses, the "To Serve Man" cookbook, and the Twilight Zone scripts--I sadly can neither confirm nor deny that they also appeared in the Florida version. I've read some claims that the broken glasses were in Florida's lobby, but I personally didn't spot them either in person nor while reviewing photographs. As for the cookbook and scripts, sadly my limited ability to explore the library left me unable to find or photograph them.
The presentation of the pre-show itself also differed significantly from the Californian Tower... although at least one these differences in presentation may have been recent for 2017.
The most striking difference in presentation was that the lights remained ON during the pre-show. When the lightning strike turned on the television, the lights briefly went out, only to return to normal levels within seconds. This suggested that, while the strike caused a power outage in the DCA/Paris version, it merely created a surge in Florida.
While the lights being on made photography of the libraries much easier, I can't help but personally feel this change detracted from the story presentation. DCA's power outage made the pre-show much more obviously supernatural; after all, if the power is completely out, how did the TV stay on? DCA's power outage marked a clear line where the hotel went from merely abandoned to overtly supernatural, while Florida limited the supernatural to the video itself rather than the entire room.
This striking change may also have been extremely recent to my 2017 visit. Older live recordings of the library seem to show the lights going out completely like at DCA, while videos from circa mid-2017 show the lights-on presentation I just described. I have no idea why Disney would suddenly change this show element.
You can view a live recording of the 2017 "power surge" presentation in this video (starts at 0:52 if the video does not automatically begin there):
Meanwhile, this live recording from 2011 shows the lights remaining out during the pre-show (starts at around 2:39 if video does not automatically begin there):
Here is a source copy of Florida's video:
Thus, guests learned the plot of the ride, and got an explanation for those crashed elevators in the lobby.
Of course, the Rod Serling footage was from "It's a Good Life", with the narration dubbed by Mark Silverman.
As you may have noticed, the Floridian pre-show video featured a major error. While DCA's video accidentally showed Paris' exterior (which wouldn't be apparent to the untrained eye), Florida's managed to show an entirely incorrect building exterior. The Tower is the wrong shape (being more square, with three rows of windows on the side instead of the actual two), the sign is in a different place (being almost on the roof rather than across the building front), and there is an additional triangular-roofed structure in front of the Tower absent on the actual building. I can't help but wonder how such glaring errors occurred... was the pre-show video somehow made before the building design was finalized? Would it have been that difficult to replace the exterior shots with accurate ones?
Another notable difference from DCA's presentation was that the Florida video's final lightning crash was very loud and reverberated throughout the library, approximately simultaneous with the exit door sliding open. I've heard that California's pre-show initially ended this way as well, but personally cannot recall the change or when it occurred. Perhaps (and note that this is pure speculation) DCA phased out the extra-loud crash when it switched from carpet to solid wood floors; the carpet may have included some sort of system to have guests better feel the reverberating thunder. That said, the thunder was quite intense in Florida even if you were one of the many guests who couldn't fit onto it during a packed pre-show, so this could be grasping at straws.
Once the pre-show concluded, guests filed out of the libraries and into the boiler room.
When the library doors opened, a bellhop cast member issued them into the library. While Florida's libraries retained the carpet-bordered-by-wood flooring setup that DCA used in its earlier years, cast members did not instruct guests to stand on the carpet or any other specific area of the room. Furthermore, while DCA seemed to carefully count the guests for the room capacity, Florida seemingly packed in as many people into each room as possible. I spent several pre-show viewings rather uncomfortably wedged against the writing desk or a bookcase.
As at DCA, however, the sounds of the lobby loop faded away to the sounds of a raging storm outside the special-effects "windows". Notably, given the setup of Florida's lobby, with the fake window behind the "queen" statue, the window inside the left side library was not an architectural discontinuity.
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| The library layouts, copied from my DCA walkthrough |
Although the general setup of the libraries were mirrors of each other, with the same setup as DCA's pre-show rooms, the libraries had more notable differences from each other than California's. While California's Tower had the same desk and lamp setup in each library, Florida's libraries had unique desks, lamps, decorations, and possibly even carpets.
The Queen's Library desk had a single lamp. An open book sat on the desk, with illustrations about plants. Next to the book was a notepad, stopwatch, and magnifying glass, with notes about botany on the notepad.
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| The Queen's Library desk, June 28, 2017 |
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| Notepad with stopwatch on top, July 3, 2017 |
The notepad was partially readable. A stopwatch obscured the top part, but the readable part of the note said:
" [text unreadable]plants unknown in this area.
Most varieties should eventually naturalize with proper soil amendments and irrigation."
Since this stopwatch wasn't broken, I don't quite think it counts as a Twilight Zone Easter egg.
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| A closer look at the botany book and letters on the desk, July 3, 2017 |
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| Overall view of the Queen's Library, July 2, 2017 |
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| Queen's library table and chairs, June 28, 2017 |
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| A view of the carpet and wood floor border by the desk and television cabinet, July 2, 2017 |
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| A look at the carpet in the Queen's Library, June 28, 2017. |
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| A book with pictures of birds at the back of the Queen's library, near the exit door. July 2, 2017 |
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| A light fixture near the exit door, July 2, 2017 |
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| Landscape painting on the disguised sliding exit door, under show conditions, July 2, 2017 |
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| The exit door painting, with photo flash, revealing some rather bizarre color choices, July 2, 2017 |
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| Looking back at the entrance to the King's library, with bellhop cast member. July 3, 2017 |
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| Overall look at the front of the King's library, featuring the writing desk, TV cabinet, and a lamp. July 3, 2017 |
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| View of the upper part of the King's library, showing the ceiling and antiques. You can also spot the "mystic seer" Eeaster egg near the center of this photo, among the antiques. July 2, 2017 |
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| Detail of the desk. Note how even the desk itself is different from the one in the Queen's library. June 28, 2017 |
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| A clearer look at the HTH logo lamp in the King's library. The Queen's library also had a lamp like this, in the equivalent spot next to the television cabinet. June 28, 2017 |
As you can see, the libraries were filled with tall bookcases, covered in dusty antiques. The level of detail was downright overwhelming--especially if one was looking for the Twilight Zone artifacts hidden in these rooms.
While later Towers made their references relatively overt to those who knew where to look, Florida Tower's approach to The Twilight Zone was surprisingly subtle. The artifacts hidden in the libraries were incredibly well hidden, and I failed to spot many of them in person despite purposefully looking and having online guides to help me out.
One of the few I managed to spot in person was the trumpet in the Queen's library, located on a lower shelf next to the HTH logo lamp.
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| June 28, 2017 |
Based on information from TowerSecrets.com, the King's Library had a letter labeled "Rod Serling" while the Queen's had a letter marked "Victoria West", both from the episode "A World of His Own". These letters were extremely well hidden compared to their DCA counterparts. They were tucked into the locked shelves, hidden among the closed-off artifacts. According to TowerSecrets, the Serling letter was locked away to the left of the television. Unfortunately, that site did not provide a location for the West letter.
The miniature spacemen from "The Invaders" were also on the top shelves of the libraries, and easy to spot. Unfortunately and ironically, I did not get any clear photos of them.
As for the other known Twilight Zone references that appeared in the DCA libraries--the broken glasses, the "To Serve Man" cookbook, and the Twilight Zone scripts--I sadly can neither confirm nor deny that they also appeared in the Florida version. I've read some claims that the broken glasses were in Florida's lobby, but I personally didn't spot them either in person nor while reviewing photographs. As for the cookbook and scripts, sadly my limited ability to explore the library left me unable to find or photograph them.
The presentation of the pre-show itself also differed significantly from the Californian Tower... although at least one these differences in presentation may have been recent for 2017.
The most striking difference in presentation was that the lights remained ON during the pre-show. When the lightning strike turned on the television, the lights briefly went out, only to return to normal levels within seconds. This suggested that, while the strike caused a power outage in the DCA/Paris version, it merely created a surge in Florida.
While the lights being on made photography of the libraries much easier, I can't help but personally feel this change detracted from the story presentation. DCA's power outage made the pre-show much more obviously supernatural; after all, if the power is completely out, how did the TV stay on? DCA's power outage marked a clear line where the hotel went from merely abandoned to overtly supernatural, while Florida limited the supernatural to the video itself rather than the entire room.
This striking change may also have been extremely recent to my 2017 visit. Older live recordings of the library seem to show the lights going out completely like at DCA, while videos from circa mid-2017 show the lights-on presentation I just described. I have no idea why Disney would suddenly change this show element.
You can view a live recording of the 2017 "power surge" presentation in this video (starts at 0:52 if the video does not automatically begin there):
Meanwhile, this live recording from 2011 shows the lights remaining out during the pre-show (starts at around 2:39 if video does not automatically begin there):
Here is a source copy of Florida's video:
The video opened with the titles from seasons 4 and 5 of the original Twilight Zone series. This means that the "lost episode" the Tower represented was from either season 4 or 5, which aired in 1963.
The following is a rough transcript of the pre-show audio, just in case those videos don't work or readers would rather read through. I'll put the text in blue to make it easy to scroll past those who don't want to bother reading the transcript after watching a video, although I did include some notes here about how the video synced up with the actual library environment.
Rod Serling: You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension. A dimension of sound,
[Window shatters loudly]
a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind. You're moving into a land of both shadow and substance, of things and ideas. You've just crossed over into... The Twilight Zone.
[Dramatic Music]
[Lightning Crashes]
Hollywood--1939.
Amid the glitz and the glitter of a bustling young movie town at the height of its golden age, the Hollywood Tower Hotel was a star in its own right-- a beacon for the show-business elite.
Amid the glitz and the glitter of a bustling young movie town at the height of its golden age, the Hollywood Tower Hotel was a star in its own right-- a beacon for the show-business elite.
Now, something is about to happen that will change all that.
[Lightning crashes, striking the Tower and sending the elevators plummeting]
[Lightning crashes again, this time synchronized with the special effects window in the library. Note that every lightning from this point onward in the video was synchronized with the "real" window]
The time is NOW, on an evening very much like the one we have just witnessed.
Tonight's story on The Twilight Zone is somewhat unique and calls for a different kind of introduction. This, as you may recognize, is a maintenance service elevator, still in operation, waiting for you. We invite you if you dare to step aboard, because in tonight's episode you are the star, and this elevator travels directly to...
[Audio now comes out of speakers hidden throughout the room, rather than from the television]
The Twilight Zone.
[Lightning crash, dramatic music, TV cuts out]
Thus, guests learned the plot of the ride, and got an explanation for those crashed elevators in the lobby.
Of course, the Rod Serling footage was from "It's a Good Life", with the narration dubbed by Mark Silverman.
As you may have noticed, the Floridian pre-show video featured a major error. While DCA's video accidentally showed Paris' exterior (which wouldn't be apparent to the untrained eye), Florida's managed to show an entirely incorrect building exterior. The Tower is the wrong shape (being more square, with three rows of windows on the side instead of the actual two), the sign is in a different place (being almost on the roof rather than across the building front), and there is an additional triangular-roofed structure in front of the Tower absent on the actual building. I can't help but wonder how such glaring errors occurred... was the pre-show video somehow made before the building design was finalized? Would it have been that difficult to replace the exterior shots with accurate ones?
Another notable difference from DCA's presentation was that the Florida video's final lightning crash was very loud and reverberated throughout the library, approximately simultaneous with the exit door sliding open. I've heard that California's pre-show initially ended this way as well, but personally cannot recall the change or when it occurred. Perhaps (and note that this is pure speculation) DCA phased out the extra-loud crash when it switched from carpet to solid wood floors; the carpet may have included some sort of system to have guests better feel the reverberating thunder. That said, the thunder was quite intense in Florida even if you were one of the many guests who couldn't fit onto it during a packed pre-show, so this could be grasping at straws.
Once the pre-show concluded, guests filed out of the libraries and into the boiler room.
Monday, March 12, 2018
The Tower and Buena Vista Street: Hidden Lore
In 2012, Disney officially unveiled Buena Vista Street, the extensive and expensive new "main street" of the re-imagined Disney's California Adventure. It transformed the quirky, abstract-surf Sunshine Plaza into a Golden Age of Hollywood street, which continued seamlessly into Hollywood Land (the former Hollywood Studios Backlot). With its commitment to detailed theming, this remodel naturally contained its own lore for the sharp-eyed guest to discover. Equally naturally, this lore tied in to the headlining attraction most tied to the new "classic Hollywood" theme: The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror.
The first reference to the Hollywood Tower Hotel was in Oswald's Filling Station. The radio inside this gas station-themed gift shop has its own unique audio loop of "radio broadcasts". One of the broadcasts was a performance of Anthony Fremont's orchestra playing at the hotel. At this time, no complete version of the radio loop is online, but thankfully there is a clip of the relevant Tower-themed section:
This reference was still in place as of October 2017, but I haven't been able to confirm it further (albeit mostly because I didn't feel like hanging around in a relatively small gift shop for so long just to listen through the whole loop). However, it definitely survived at least several months past the opening of Mission Breakout.
The next reference was one of the most detailed, and was at Mortimer's fruit stand.
On one of the prop-filled shelves above the actual merchandise stands was a box filled with Buena Vista Bugle newspapers. Generally, all except the paper title and maybe the headline was out of view of most guests... but the front of the paper actually had custom story-relevant text, which appeared as follows:
Note that I've corrected some typos and apparent minor grammatical errors from the actual prop.
There's... a lot to unpack about this article. Most obviously, someone put a lot of work into a prop that's placed where nobody can easily read it. I only got to see the text because a cast member was kind enough to take the prop off the shelf for me to see (that's their hands in the photo). Why put so much work into something people won't notice unless they specifically look for it? Why write custom story-relevant text when stock text could have filled the same purpose? However, there's also a lot to explore in the text itself.
First of all, it seems to get the hotel's opening date wrong. The paper is dated 1927 with the hotel stated to open "next year", making the opening in 1928. However, the plaque on the building itself gives the opening date as 1929, the same year that the real Hollywood Tower opened. It seems bizarre that such a basic piece of lore would be wrong, given that the lore in question is printed obviously on the attraction itself. Interestingly, this isn't the only Tower-related Easter Egg that changes the date; apparently some hidden lore at Shanghai Disneyland also gives yet another opening date for the Hollywood Tower, and seemingly confirms that both the Twilight Zone (DCA, Florida, Paris) and Hotel Hightower (Tokyo) versions of the Tower of Terror are "canon" to the increasingly interconnected Disney Parks lore.
Interconnected lore brings me to the second point: Pete Corrigan. It's odd to give the manager a name and appearance here, almost as if Disney had more plans for him. I highly suspect that Corrigan was intended as a possible connection to the ongoing "SEA" storyline that Disney has increasingly worked into its parks. SEA is the Society of Explorers and Adventurers, a collection of various wacky characters that tie together the backstories of Disney's parks and attractions. Members include (or included; the lore changes occasionally) Indiana Jones' pilot, the owner of the Big Thunder Mountain mine, and Harrison Hightower of the Tokyo Disney Tower of Terror. Had DCA's Tower not unexpectedly closed (and indeed, the amount of Tower connections put into Buena Vista Street seems to indicate that the designers didn't suspect the attraction would close a mere 5 years after BVS debuted), I believe that Pete Corrigan, manager of the Hollywood Tower Hotel, would have been revealed as a member of SEA or connected to them in some capacity.
Third, the article mentions a mahjong game in the lobby. Florida's Tower is the one with a mahjong game in the lobby; DCA had a card game instead (although DCA did have mahjong sets in the libraries). It seems strange for the company that made the attractions to mix up a Florida vs DCA difference, but admittedly it is a minor point. Perhaps it was even intentional; references to the Twilight Zone Tower in places such as Shanghai's Easter Egg seem purposely coy over whether the Floridian Gothic or DCA/Parisian Art Deco versions of the hotel are "canon". However, since this article clearly is meant to be about DCA, it would not make sense to bring intentional ambiguity.
Fourth, the "timeline" of this newspaper's placement seems to be a discontinuity. Why is Mortimer's stocking a paper announcing the hotel's future opening celebration, when Oswald's across the street already has radio broadcasts playing from the hotel? I've heard some fans insist that Buena Vista Street itself represents an ongoing story/changing timeline, with the earliest events being at the gate and the latest events ending at the Hollywood Tower (hence why the hotel "will open next year" at Mortimer's but has already opened, operated, and closed by the time guests reach the attraction). However, even if that were the case, Oswald's is right before Mortimer's.
Finally, that mention of the red car stop... I'll get to that later in this post.
The next significant connection to the Tower came in the form of the Silver Lakes Sisters, fictional owners of the Fiddler, Fifer, and Practical cafe near the Carthay Circle Theater. I covered most of the information about them and their connection to the Tower of Terror in my post about Halloween at the Hollywood Tower.
One thing I did not include in that post, however, was the sad replacement posters put in the cafe after Mission Breakout opened.
As you can see, they're the same images as before... but with "Hollywood Tower Hotel"hastily replaced with "Carthay Circle Theater". They even left in the building shape and a reference to the Tip Top Club! I have no idea why the original posters couldn't have stayed as an Easter Egg, especially when Mortimer's and Oswald's got to keep their (admittedly much more hidden) references. Even with the Tower gone, it isn't out of character for Disney to leave in nods to past attractions for fans to notice, which makes their attempted erasure of Tower here especially strange.
Now, back to that red car...
In addition to having a specific Hollywood Tower stop, the red car also featured an advertisement for the hotel.
As you can see, the ad rather awkwardly depicted the Hollywood Tower Hotel... as not having a tower. Admittedly, the dimensions of the ad space meant the tower part would have to be cropped out anyways, but the artwork still makes the odd decision to depict the building as just the front part without the main hotel building behind it. It isn't like the tower is cropped out either; that's clearly the sky above the disembodied lobby!
At this time I don't know if the Tower ad is still in the red car. I've heard some people insist it was taken out around the same time the Fiddler, Fifer, and Practical posters got changed, but haven't ridden the red car myself to investigate.
On a tangent, apparently some developments at Disney's Hollywood Studios in Florida saw the addition of a new Red Car Trolley mural based on DCA's, but with their Tower design dropped in. As noted in one of my Florida Tower posts, their trolley is not an actual ride but instead part of a forensic story emphasizing how the hotel was once bustling enough to have its own trolley line but became abandoned after the disaster. The fact that DCA had an operating trolley with a stop at the Tower, which was explicitly emphasized in the newspaper, seems to show an interesting loop of ideas between the Californian and Floridian versions and their executions of the same story.
Overall, I feel like the Buena Vista Street connections emphasize exactly how much was lost with the conversion to Mission Breakout. Disney California Adventure didn't just lose one stellar attraction; it lost carefully crafted worldbuilding and attention to detail that is quickly giving way to a random mishmash of quick overlays.
The first reference to the Hollywood Tower Hotel was in Oswald's Filling Station. The radio inside this gas station-themed gift shop has its own unique audio loop of "radio broadcasts". One of the broadcasts was a performance of Anthony Fremont's orchestra playing at the hotel. At this time, no complete version of the radio loop is online, but thankfully there is a clip of the relevant Tower-themed section:
This reference was still in place as of October 2017, but I haven't been able to confirm it further (albeit mostly because I didn't feel like hanging around in a relatively small gift shop for so long just to listen through the whole loop). However, it definitely survived at least several months past the opening of Mission Breakout.
The next reference was one of the most detailed, and was at Mortimer's fruit stand.
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| In the box, February 2018 |
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| Front page image of the Tower sign being "installed", featuring a questionable-quality photoshop rendering of what the pre-disaster hotel looked like. |
On one of the prop-filled shelves above the actual merchandise stands was a box filled with Buena Vista Bugle newspapers. Generally, all except the paper title and maybe the headline was out of view of most guests... but the front of the paper actually had custom story-relevant text, which appeared as follows:
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| The headline article. Note that the papers were stuck together with glue. |
The Buena Vista Bugle
Wednesday, May 4, 1927
Hollywood Tower Hotel to open next year!
Promises to be a star in its own right!
Locals of the Hollywood Hills have all been watching as construction has been underway on the new hot spot coming to the area. The Hollywood Tower Hotel says it will become a beacon for the show business elite. The hotel manager, Pete Corrigan, assures our readers that once the Hollywood Tower Hotel opens, it will be unlike any other lodging in the surrounding areas.
"We're very excited to open with a party for the ages," says Corrigan. "We are proud to announce that our house band, led by Anthony Fremont, will be performing in the Tip Top Club into the wee hours of the morning."
The Tip Top Club also offers a full menu of both food and drinks for your enjoyment. The hotel also features several presidential suites on the higher floors, fantastic views of Hollywood, and state-of-the-art elevators that will deliver you to your accommodations in style. "We are very proud of our new fleet of elevators and are quite positive our guests have never traveled in ones so smooth," says Corrigan. "Guests at our hotel will not only enjoy all of our amenities, but get the chance to rub elbows with some of Hollywood's finest talents," Corrigan raves. "This is something we're very proud of. Many guests come to Hollywood expecting to see the likes of their favorite stars. Well at the Hollywood Tower Hotel, there's a good chance you can enjoy a game of mahjong in our lobby with your favorite personality of stage or screen." The hotel property is also proud to offer an exclusive Red Car stop in front of their main lobby, as well as a discounted rate for those staying in town for one of the many premieres at the beautiful Carthay Circle Theater. The Hollywood Tower Hotel is sure to be a treasured place of Hollywood for both the city and its citizens.
Note that I've corrected some typos and apparent minor grammatical errors from the actual prop.
There's... a lot to unpack about this article. Most obviously, someone put a lot of work into a prop that's placed where nobody can easily read it. I only got to see the text because a cast member was kind enough to take the prop off the shelf for me to see (that's their hands in the photo). Why put so much work into something people won't notice unless they specifically look for it? Why write custom story-relevant text when stock text could have filled the same purpose? However, there's also a lot to explore in the text itself.
First of all, it seems to get the hotel's opening date wrong. The paper is dated 1927 with the hotel stated to open "next year", making the opening in 1928. However, the plaque on the building itself gives the opening date as 1929, the same year that the real Hollywood Tower opened. It seems bizarre that such a basic piece of lore would be wrong, given that the lore in question is printed obviously on the attraction itself. Interestingly, this isn't the only Tower-related Easter Egg that changes the date; apparently some hidden lore at Shanghai Disneyland also gives yet another opening date for the Hollywood Tower, and seemingly confirms that both the Twilight Zone (DCA, Florida, Paris) and Hotel Hightower (Tokyo) versions of the Tower of Terror are "canon" to the increasingly interconnected Disney Parks lore.
Interconnected lore brings me to the second point: Pete Corrigan. It's odd to give the manager a name and appearance here, almost as if Disney had more plans for him. I highly suspect that Corrigan was intended as a possible connection to the ongoing "SEA" storyline that Disney has increasingly worked into its parks. SEA is the Society of Explorers and Adventurers, a collection of various wacky characters that tie together the backstories of Disney's parks and attractions. Members include (or included; the lore changes occasionally) Indiana Jones' pilot, the owner of the Big Thunder Mountain mine, and Harrison Hightower of the Tokyo Disney Tower of Terror. Had DCA's Tower not unexpectedly closed (and indeed, the amount of Tower connections put into Buena Vista Street seems to indicate that the designers didn't suspect the attraction would close a mere 5 years after BVS debuted), I believe that Pete Corrigan, manager of the Hollywood Tower Hotel, would have been revealed as a member of SEA or connected to them in some capacity.
Third, the article mentions a mahjong game in the lobby. Florida's Tower is the one with a mahjong game in the lobby; DCA had a card game instead (although DCA did have mahjong sets in the libraries). It seems strange for the company that made the attractions to mix up a Florida vs DCA difference, but admittedly it is a minor point. Perhaps it was even intentional; references to the Twilight Zone Tower in places such as Shanghai's Easter Egg seem purposely coy over whether the Floridian Gothic or DCA/Parisian Art Deco versions of the hotel are "canon". However, since this article clearly is meant to be about DCA, it would not make sense to bring intentional ambiguity.
Fourth, the "timeline" of this newspaper's placement seems to be a discontinuity. Why is Mortimer's stocking a paper announcing the hotel's future opening celebration, when Oswald's across the street already has radio broadcasts playing from the hotel? I've heard some fans insist that Buena Vista Street itself represents an ongoing story/changing timeline, with the earliest events being at the gate and the latest events ending at the Hollywood Tower (hence why the hotel "will open next year" at Mortimer's but has already opened, operated, and closed by the time guests reach the attraction). However, even if that were the case, Oswald's is right before Mortimer's.
Finally, that mention of the red car stop... I'll get to that later in this post.
The next significant connection to the Tower came in the form of the Silver Lakes Sisters, fictional owners of the Fiddler, Fifer, and Practical cafe near the Carthay Circle Theater. I covered most of the information about them and their connection to the Tower of Terror in my post about Halloween at the Hollywood Tower.
One thing I did not include in that post, however, was the sad replacement posters put in the cafe after Mission Breakout opened.
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| Overall view of both posters |
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| The right side poster |
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| The left side poster |
As you can see, they're the same images as before... but with "Hollywood Tower Hotel"hastily replaced with "Carthay Circle Theater". They even left in the building shape and a reference to the Tip Top Club! I have no idea why the original posters couldn't have stayed as an Easter Egg, especially when Mortimer's and Oswald's got to keep their (admittedly much more hidden) references. Even with the Tower gone, it isn't out of character for Disney to leave in nods to past attractions for fans to notice, which makes their attempted erasure of Tower here especially strange.
Now, back to that red car...
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| The stop was specifically named for the hotel. Photo by Mrbellcaptain |
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| Stop names listed on the front of the trolley. Photo by Mrbellcaptain |
In addition to having a specific Hollywood Tower stop, the red car also featured an advertisement for the hotel.
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| photo by Mrbellcaptain |
As you can see, the ad rather awkwardly depicted the Hollywood Tower Hotel... as not having a tower. Admittedly, the dimensions of the ad space meant the tower part would have to be cropped out anyways, but the artwork still makes the odd decision to depict the building as just the front part without the main hotel building behind it. It isn't like the tower is cropped out either; that's clearly the sky above the disembodied lobby!
At this time I don't know if the Tower ad is still in the red car. I've heard some people insist it was taken out around the same time the Fiddler, Fifer, and Practical posters got changed, but haven't ridden the red car myself to investigate.
On a tangent, apparently some developments at Disney's Hollywood Studios in Florida saw the addition of a new Red Car Trolley mural based on DCA's, but with their Tower design dropped in. As noted in one of my Florida Tower posts, their trolley is not an actual ride but instead part of a forensic story emphasizing how the hotel was once bustling enough to have its own trolley line but became abandoned after the disaster. The fact that DCA had an operating trolley with a stop at the Tower, which was explicitly emphasized in the newspaper, seems to show an interesting loop of ideas between the Californian and Floridian versions and their executions of the same story.
Overall, I feel like the Buena Vista Street connections emphasize exactly how much was lost with the conversion to Mission Breakout. Disney California Adventure didn't just lose one stellar attraction; it lost carefully crafted worldbuilding and attention to detail that is quickly giving way to a random mishmash of quick overlays.
Tuesday, February 20, 2018
Secrets from the Van Eaton Gallery Exhibit!
I'm quite late in getting this post together, as the holidays and first month of this year have been quite busy for me. I apologize for that, but I figure quality is worth it over getting posts out quickly... right?
Anyways, the Van Eaton Gallery auctioned off several significant set pieces from DCA's Tower of Terror in December 2017, and put them on free public exhibit before the auction. I of course took the opportunity to finally see these props up close... even if it was rather sad, as the auction was proof that DCA Tower is 100% officially gone for good.
The first thing I noticed was the sheer size of the lobby props. I always vaguely felt that the lobby felt a bit too small to be the lobby of a large hotel, but apparently that was a bizarre optical illusion caused by filling what must have been a gigantic space with equally gigantic furniture. I'd estimated that the lamps by the fireplace, for example, were about my height. Instead, they towered (no pun intended) over me (they were 80 inches tall, according to the gallery's description), and the key cabinet was even taller (107 inches tall, to be exact)! Likewise, the fireplace grating was suitably large for the scale. Even the "small" lobby lamps, which hung over the side scenes such as the card table, were far, far larger than expected... these "small" lamps would easily dwarf the average dining room chandelier.
Hilariously, the key cabinet still had blue painters tape on it from when it was installed in 2004! While my photos didn't show the tape, some photos by Daveland do show that this painters tape was on the key cabinet for the entirety of Tower's run.
The televisions used for the pre-show were likewise unexpectedly large. The TVs themselves weren't for auction, but the decorative "HTH"-logoed casings that housed them were. The gallery's measurements for the casings didn't include the size of the screen cutout, but the casing dimensions were 28.5 x 46.5 inches. Based on my own visual estimate, screens would have been considered "large screen" for 1994 and even 2004, much less 1939! I suppose they were situated high enough on the shelf of the library that their anachronistic sizing wasn't apparent to guests.
Perhaps more interesting than the size of the props, however, were some fascinating Easter Eggs that I managed to miss while the attraction was in operation. The most notable were the messages on the bulletin board which used to hang in the boiler room hallway that led from the libraries. I'd never heard anyone mention any Easter Eggs on the board, and I never really lingered long enough in that hallway to actually read it. My photos of the board in situ were too blurry to note the details. In the brightly-lit gallery, however, I was finally able to examine it.
The board was divided into three panels, so I'll delve into them from left to right. Since a lot of the items on the board were made to look handwritten, they were very difficult to read. Words that I have attempted to guess are followed by "(???)", while words I could not decipher at all are marked as "[unreadable]".
The topmost item on the left panel was a note written on yellow paper reading:
Anyways, the Van Eaton Gallery auctioned off several significant set pieces from DCA's Tower of Terror in December 2017, and put them on free public exhibit before the auction. I of course took the opportunity to finally see these props up close... even if it was rather sad, as the auction was proof that DCA Tower is 100% officially gone for good.
The first thing I noticed was the sheer size of the lobby props. I always vaguely felt that the lobby felt a bit too small to be the lobby of a large hotel, but apparently that was a bizarre optical illusion caused by filling what must have been a gigantic space with equally gigantic furniture. I'd estimated that the lamps by the fireplace, for example, were about my height. Instead, they towered (no pun intended) over me (they were 80 inches tall, according to the gallery's description), and the key cabinet was even taller (107 inches tall, to be exact)! Likewise, the fireplace grating was suitably large for the scale. Even the "small" lobby lamps, which hung over the side scenes such as the card table, were far, far larger than expected... these "small" lamps would easily dwarf the average dining room chandelier.
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| View of the majority of the Tower props on display. Sharp-eyed viewers will notice the fireplace lamps are turned the wrong way; this was to hide the fact that a glass panel on each one's lampshade was broken. |
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| This "small" lobby lamp measured 38 inches tall, not including the chain, according to the official gallery description. Just behind it you can see one of the "dragon" lamps from the vines area of the outdoor queue; interestingly, the gallery's catalog says that the head on the lamp is that of a Foo Dog and not a dragon. |
Hilariously, the key cabinet still had blue painters tape on it from when it was installed in 2004! While my photos didn't show the tape, some photos by Daveland do show that this painters tape was on the key cabinet for the entirety of Tower's run.
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| Painter's tape on the bottom of the key cabinet |
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| More painter's tape along the side. |
The televisions used for the pre-show were likewise unexpectedly large. The TVs themselves weren't for auction, but the decorative "HTH"-logoed casings that housed them were. The gallery's measurements for the casings didn't include the size of the screen cutout, but the casing dimensions were 28.5 x 46.5 inches. Based on my own visual estimate, screens would have been considered "large screen" for 1994 and even 2004, much less 1939! I suppose they were situated high enough on the shelf of the library that their anachronistic sizing wasn't apparent to guests.
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| Queen's library TV case |
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| King's library TV casing |
Perhaps more interesting than the size of the props, however, were some fascinating Easter Eggs that I managed to miss while the attraction was in operation. The most notable were the messages on the bulletin board which used to hang in the boiler room hallway that led from the libraries. I'd never heard anyone mention any Easter Eggs on the board, and I never really lingered long enough in that hallway to actually read it. My photos of the board in situ were too blurry to note the details. In the brightly-lit gallery, however, I was finally able to examine it.
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| Overall view of the board on display |
The board was divided into three panels, so I'll delve into them from left to right. Since a lot of the items on the board were made to look handwritten, they were very difficult to read. Words that I have attempted to guess are followed by "(???)", while words I could not decipher at all are marked as "[unreadable]".
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| The left panel. Click on image or open it in a new tab to zoom in and examine the entries! |
The topmost item on the left panel was a note written on yellow paper reading:
Staff Meeting Thursday
9pm Boiler Room
Refreshments will be served
Below that was a handwritten note on white paper, reading:
Lost-- reading glasses, horn rim, thick lenses AD-0405
Obviously, this second memo referenced the broken glasses Easter Egg found in the library, which in turn were from the Twilight Zone episode "Time Enough To Last".
The next note was on yellow paper again, and also looked handwritten. It read:
Lost--silver thimble, slight scratch Call Ives (???) yo-7169 (???)
This referenced the dented thimbles from the lobby, which were from the episode "The After Hours".
The next item down was thankfully easier to read, thanks to being typed. It was an announcement for a fictitious play, which read:
The Tower Players Present
"Where is Everybody?"
Open Auditions for our next production
Tonight
7:00 to 11:00 PM
Volunteers needed for the following technical positions:
Director
Stage Manager,
Set Designer
Lighting Director
Costume Designer.
No experience necessary--but helpful.
Note that the random comma and period in the list was on the actual list on the board. This was perhaps the most significant Easter Egg I found on the board. "Where is Everybody" was the very first Twilight Zone episode! I've never found record of anybody else discovering this reference in the Tower before either!
This announcement overlapped with a group photo of a large amount of people. Were these supposed to be the Tower Players?
The lowest items on the left panel were a Works Progress Administration (WPA) poster reading "Work Promotes Confidence" and a 4th place ribbon. 4th place for what? We may never know.
Now, on to the center panel.
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| The center panel; once again, click or open in new tab to view larger! |
The first item on this panel was another WPA poster, reading "Work Pays America".
The item below it was a photo of a house. I have no idea if this house has any significance, or if it was merely a stock photo chosen as a filler image.
Next was a large printed announcement. On yellow paper it read, "TONIGHT" while on blue it read:
Annual Costume Ball
Employees and their families Ballroom C
Dance Contest
Door Prizes
This mention of an annual costume ball reinforced that the Twilight Zone disaster happened on Halloween Night.
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| Costume ball flyer detail, photo by Mrbellcaptain |
At the bottom of the center panel was a series of "For Rent" ads printed on yellow paper. They were rather abbreviation-heavy and unfortunately light glare prevented me from getting a clear photo of some of the words, but from what I can tell it read:
For Rent
325 MODERN dbl. Apt, Sep, Ent, Frig, Gar 412 S. Norton SC-24718
327.50 4-RM & sleeping porc, X bed, Redec. 2111 Magnolia
332.50 4-Rm Upper 2607 Orchard ave, Just S. of Adams
Avail. Nov. 1st, 380- Unfurn., 3br., 12 baths, deck, porch, 9947 Young Dr. CR-17048
335, Nr., New May co, 4-rm, sleep porch, Frig, Gar, Nr School, Child welcome, 4261 W. Olympic PA- 5827
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| "For Rent" posting detail, photo by Mrbellcaptain |
I have no idea if any of this has any significance, or even what some of it means. I am, however, particularly intrigued by the listing that seems to state that some place to rent has three bedrooms, but TWELVE bathrooms. Perhaps that mysterious house picture is meant to be one of these places for rent? If so, is it the one with twelve bathrooms?
Below the for rent sign, crumpled at the bottom, was a 3rd place ribbon. I know from my photos of the ride that this was originally pinned next to the 4th place ribbon on the left panel. This still gives no answer as to why there are even ribbons there in the first place. Third and fourth place for what?
The right panel was the most frustrating. It had many notes, but they are all handwritten, or alternately done in a messy font made to look handwritten. I absolutely cannot decipher many of them, or can only figure out one or two words. I've transcribed what I can; please comment if you've figured one out!
The first note was a large square paper, reading, |
| Overall view of the right panel; once again click or open in new tab to view larger and see details |
One of the finest cooks in [unreadable] [unreadable] Salary open TR-4429
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| Detail of the first note, half of the second note, and the third note. Photo by Mrbellcaptain |
The next note read:
NURSE, companion, unencumbered, will travel, ref TR-4429
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| Detail better showcasing the second note. Photo by Mrbellcaptain |
The next read:
Want-- intell. Reliable steno-typist to earn tuition for pt time work in costume design school HE 4067
Beneath that note were two pinned side by side. The smaller one on the left read:
Mother's helper, Sal, Put Rm (???), Thurs & Sun off (???) NO-11567
The larger note to the right read:
Cook, husband as gardener, Apt furn, CA-16354
Cook, husband as gardener, Apt furn, CA-16354
No, that wasn't an error--this note actually had the exact same text repeated twice!
The next paper had two notes written on it. Sadly, the first note is basically unreadable, and the second half was a copy of another note already on the board:
[unreadable] new or used furniture, [unreadable] [unreadable] [unreadable], MO 11057
Mother's helper, Sal, Put Rm (???), Thurs & Sun off (???) NO-11567
The next note read:
Young girl, mother's helper, no (???) washers (???), Call [unreadable] [unreadable] CR [unreadable]
The next note was approximately the size of a post-it and had three short lines of handwritten-looking text. Unfortunately, none of the photos I have available were clear enough to decipher ANY of this message.
The final message on the right side was arguably the most interesting on this panel:
LOST-- pocket watch, substantial value, broken dial (???) [unreadable] call HE-4067
This, of course, referenced the broken stopwatch in the lobby, which in turn referenced the Twilight Zone episode "A Kind of a Stopwatch".
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| Detail of the lower section of the right panel by Mrbellcaptain |
I was ecstatic to find new (well, new to me) Easter Eggs on the bulletin board! Furthermore, the thimble, glasses, and stopwatch Easter Eggs added an internal continuity to the Tower. However, given that the thimble and watch were placed next to gift shop advertisements in the lobby, it seemingly implies that the staff were pranksters--putting lost items on display!
I don't have much in particular to say about the rest of the items on display, but figured I'd include photos of them here anyways:
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| Attraction poster. Photo by Mrbellcaptain |
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| Elevator dial and "service elevator" sign. The dial was actually from one of the lobby elevators, photo by Mrbellcaptain |
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| Anthony Fremont poster, photo by Mrbellcaptain |
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| The "broken chair" and some gauges from the boiler room, photo by Mrbellcaptain |
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| Lobby chair, possibly from the card game scene, Photo by Mrbellcaptain |
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| Wooden display cabinet from one of the lobby waiting areas |
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| Men's bellhop uniform. The gallery specifically noted that this costume was from the Floridian version of the ride. |
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| "Picture if you will..." sign |
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| Wide view showing the "Tower Hotel Gifts" sign |
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| HTH logo Club 33 Opening Date keychain |
If anyone manages to spot any more Easter Eggs on that bulletin board, or can decipher the remaining posts on it, please comment!
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