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Got two rides in today and absolutely exceeded my expectations, I want to thank Six Flags, Sally, and Kings Island for making this all happen, briefly wanted to share my pros and cons of the new ride and Share a few photos from the ride, I plan on many many more rides this summer.  Also got a super smooth ride on The Beast so shoutout to the retracking crew for doing a superb job.    Phantom Theater Pros: Soundtrack and Toccata is back Facade and Queue is outstanding with the spooky theme All the animatronics are amazing simply put New life has been breathed into the building especially when entering the loading area with the lighting windows  Cons: The wait time was ridiculous for a ride that has a tried and true loading process  Some effects are cheap and carried over from Boo Blasters like Larry on the turntable and the Bosco door   Not sold on the interactive aspect 100 percent, I like it but think it could be better, maybe it’ll grow on me  Some of the animatronics have a goofy look that fights with their scary original  Overall a phenomenal addition to Kings Island for families and friends to ride for years to come and a worthy successor and tribute to original Phantom Theater and so, so much better than Boo Blasters, could not be happier to have Phantom Theater back at the park.   

One could surmise that any park not given the President treatment is open for being sold off or closed.  Rumor was the ideal plan was to get to under 15 parks and this aligns with that rumor. Along with this change, it resulted in slashing of personnel as well....

I remember if there was a dedicated topic for Six Flags removing the General Manager and Park President position, so I'll put this here. Six Flags to Reinstate the Park President Position at 10 Parks The following quote is from a Green Tagged: Theme Park in 30 post and references the original story broken by Brady MacDonald at the Orange County Register on April 16th.   I am happy with this decision, but am also questioning the motive behind which parks were chosen to receive GMs. The five legacy Cedar Fair parks on the list are top performers overall. The list of legacy Six Flags parks is made up of both winners and losers for that legacy company. IIRC Chicago's Great America, Great Adventure, and Magic Mountain are all comparatively big time money makers while SFOT was doing horribly up until it got some refreshed investment this year. It does not feel great to have the threat of more park sales looming over Six Flags' head this close to when they just sold off 7 parks. Even if it results in good things for the company overall, reducing the company's overall size from 41 parks down to 32 (not including SFQC) over the course of a few years does not make it look successful. Only counting overall dry park resorts just looks worse with that number going from 26 parks down to 17. Selling any more parks without officially splitting the company sounds like it would scream "we're in a death spiral but want to make it look like we're not" to me.    If this really is a sign that the company is looking to divest more parks, I hope they don't sell the parks to Herschend. I don't want to see one mega chain forcibly shrunk only to see the other (now) mega chain grow even bigger. HFE does amazing things in their flagship parks, don't get me wrong, but I'd much rather see another new chain come into play instead of feeding the current ones. Do you think the reinstatement of the Park President position is a sign of anything to come? Do you, like me, wish they would call them General Managers instead? Change is sometimes scary, and boy am I scared for my happy place right now.

Can you expand on that? I can entertain rumors about Fiesta Texas, but Dorney does not seem like a good fit for HFE unless they're really trying to corner the PA market. If anything I'd be worried about Kings Dominion being sold to Herschend since they've received more/better investment recently. Also, before anyone tries to suggest otherwise, Jeffrey Siebert leaving Six Flags is not a sign that Fiesta Texas will be sold off. I've been following the "drama" (if you could even call it that) and it sounds like he left willingly for personal reasons. This might've been something he was already eyeing and the opportunity presented itself right as Six Flags announced that they were planning to reinstate the Park President position at 10 parks. I'll post more about that in a more relevant topic thread. It is odd that Fiesta Texas is not currently set to receive a Park President.

Great meeting you too!!