PREMiERdrum

I could have SWORN I saw him on CP's midway dressed us as "Nicky the Nickle"...

For what it's worth, KI has already created a "Historical Album on their Facebook page with a photo of the old sign, and started a discussion asking for what you'd like to see. That was fast!

Woohoo! They answered my question. I love the answer, too. I started a discussion on the Facebook page for suggestions as to what you'd like to see. Weigh in with your ideas!

Correct.

Well, sir, there's nothing on earth Like a genuine, Bona fide, Electrified, Six-car Monorail!

And there very well could be some parks for sale soon

And who says Q wouldn't want to pay them? Or sell the park to someone who would?

That all depends on what "Q"'s intentions are... 040810

Hot Blooded! Starring "sexy" Dora. Truly, nothing is off limits.

Which is, at the onset, a disadvantage. However, in the long run this could prove to be a big advantage, as the character's relative obscurity will allow the park to have much more control of the characters' context. Outside of the park, and the occasional holiday special, most families won't see Snoopy or Charlie Brown on TV or in Toys R Us. Remember last year when the new "grown up" Dora the Explorer debuted? Parents groups went on the offensive, claiming that the new Dora was too "sexy," and grown up. The controversy eventually died down, but if there would have been a larger backlash against the franchise, what could the park have doen to protect their own image? With the PEANUTS, the park gets near-exclusivity of the characters, albeit with a built-in fanbase and library of work to reference. With the Nick characters, the park had over-exposed and often quickly-dated franchises that I think could have been a bigger liability (financial and otherwise)than most of us realized.

They're doing a great job getting their customers familiar with the new characters. They're tackling the issue of character relevancy head on.

One of the FB'ers commented that it was out of service more than it was working last season.

While I see the marketing advantage to adding a whole slew of new attractions in one "new" area at once, I think that long-term the park would have been better served by having the new attractions spread out in different areas. I keep picturing an Adventure Village (retaining it's safari themeing) featuring a bird-themed Flight Deck, Amazon Falls, Drop Tower (perhaps tribal themed?), Face/Off (renamed Anaconda?), SoB (with a backstory about the lone survivor from Lion Country Safari, an unknown beast that chased off the other animals), and King Kobra eventually to be replaced by Tomb Raider: The Ride (how much better this would fit here...). Then, have Delirium installed where TR:TR was placed, with a sawmill theme (the disk of the ride painted as a circular blade, queue in an old mill). If the proposed build up of Kentucky Kingdom into a "mega park" was anything like the build up of Worlds of Adventure, Kings Island didn't have a thing to worry about.

And a Ford Fusion!

http://www.chillicot.../NEWS01/3220317 Talk about Terpy being conflicted: a. I think this is a very nice thing for the park to do. I'm amazed it's free. I think it will encourage kids to read. I think it gives the park a good reputation. I think kids will pay attention and love it. b. I can hear activists claiming it's commercialization for Cedar Fair in the schools and unfairly promotes Cedar Fair at no charge to Cedar Fair. For the most part, I think this is crap, yet I can see their point...a little. I know we have kids, teachers, students studying to become teachers and even principals here, not to mention some very good people with sound ethics and principles. What do you think? And parents, do you like this? Have a problem with this? Ironically, I can see Snoopy doing this, but have great problems imagining Dora or any Nick character doing it. I can see Scooby doing it even better than Snoopy would, though... Please, let's talk about THIS program, and not politics in general. This place is not the place for that... Well, as an educated person, AND a new parent (2 weeks ago, to be exact), I see nothing but good here. I wouldn't say that the publicity comes "at no cost" to Cedar Fair, as it certainly won't be a volunteer inside the Snoopy suit and I doubt that person will walk to the school. The bottom line is that the kids will benefit, and that should be the major concern of the schools. Now, if RJ Reynolds was the sponsor and Joe Camel was reading to the kids, I'd see an issue. Way back when I was in school, and every Pizza Hut had a dining room and buffet, my elementary participated in the "Book It!" promotion. You would collect points for reading a certain number of books, and the points were redeemed for a free personal pizza at Pizza Hut. Of course, your parents would inevitably end up ordering plenty of additional food items when you got there, which is probably why Pizza Hut donated the freebies. Now, even though I participated in Book It! for all 5 years, I didn't develop a nasty pizza addiction. When all is said and done, the kids will have a memorable day that hopefully got them a little bit more interested in reading, and the park will have both gotten kids familiar with their new mascot, and earned goodwill with parents. Win win.

Well done sir! The portion that I quoted is how I remember the area. Everything about it (landscaping, materials, architecture) supported the theme.

It does look great, I figured we'd see those large-format graphics like they have at CP's Planet Snoopy. I'll reserve final judgement until we see KI's finished product, but I do have high hopes for the makeover.

Actually, I disagree. The Adventure Village theming was horrible. The area just prior to the switch to Action Zone was the absolute eyesore section of the park. However, they never should have done away with the original Wild Animal Habitat theming. There's a huge difference between those two. Shaggy You might need to refresh my memory of the differences... I was just referring to "Adventure Village" meaning the WAH area but without the animals. The architecture, colors, signage, and landscaping of the area is what stands out in my mind. How much changed between the animals leaving and Action Zone's debut?

I tend to think that, when Action Zone first "debuted," it was a much-appreciated change. Plus, you honestly can't deny: Son of Beast, Drop Zone, and FACE/OFF in two years? That was probably the largest investment over that short of the period ever in the parks history, and certainly has changed the park's lineup of attractions by leaps and bounds. The investment was great, the execution was awful. Back when that was the most popular area of the park, the guest flow issues were terrible, and the heat with no shade was unbearable.

In a perfect world, they never would have done away with the Adventure Village themeing.

Or operate it as a premium dining option, with special packages for the nightly fireworks, daily parade, or other events. It could be extremely profitable.

I remember seeing XFlight operate with all 3 trains exactly ONCE... and the stacking was terrible.

As far as "The Fun and Only", I definitely like it better than "Where Else?" I would much rather have seen an evolution of "Where else?" into "Kings Island: Where you can." I think it would have made a nice campaign, I'm picturing ads with the "Where you Can" graphic on the screen over video, then as the scene changes, different words would appear after the "....can". For example, close up of riders on Firehawk "Where you can fly", video of a family walking through Planet Snoopy "Where you can reconnect", video of kids in Boomerang Bay "Where you can refresh", video of adults with the Peanuts characters "Where you can act your age", etc... I like the new jingle, and I like the new tag line... I just think that from a marketing perspective you can build in a good amount of potential to a slogan. I don't see bucketloads of potential built into "The Fun and Only."

Red and black would really look out of place in the middle of the area, in my opinion. They are using all the Red and Black paint for the much needed work on Top Gun Oh really? First one to get pics of this much needed paint work gets a lemonade from me sometime in the 2010 season.