HARMONIOUS SEPTEMBER 29, 2021

[RIDizney]

Disagree...the area where I watched it had tons of screams and cheering. The ending is awkward I will say but everyone where I was watching (near Canada) loved it. You really need to see it in person.

 

[gharter]

Disagree...the area where I watched it had tons of screams and cheering. The ending is awkward I will say but everyone where I was watching (near Canada) loved it.

could you see the main screen well from Canada? It seems like a show where you need to have a good view of the main screen.
I wasn't there to see it live, but the live stream I viewed had very short cheers and clapping compared to live streams of other Disney night time shows.
Hoping its better in person.

 

[MissSha]

Disagree...the area where I watched it had tons of screams and cheering. The ending is awkward I will say but everyone where I was watching (near Canada) loved it.

True.....I'm sure it must have been a different experience to see it in-person!

 

[k5xs]

I am highly confident it will make zero difference, but FWIW, I sent the following last night to: wdw.guest.communications@disneyworld.com

Maybe if a few hundred of us do likewise….or not.

<snip>

Please share this with Josh D’Amaro Chairman, Disney Parks, Experiences and Products; Jeff Vahle, President, Walt Disney World Resort, and with Kartika Rodriguez, the VP of EPCOT.

Illuminations made me cry for all the right reasons.

Harmonius makes me cry because it has no soul, it has no discernable message, it has zero transition between segments, and it has no climax. It was just a hyper-compressed Disney animation short film collection projected on spraying water. Maybe it belongs in MK, but I doubt it.

Technically it was great, but I expected that.

I hate seeing myself growing negative feelings toward Disney, but this was truly a horrible step backward from what was a highlight of every evening at Epcot.

You've destroyed an iconic WDW landmark.

<snip>

 

[momtwoboys]

not harmony at all, more like *******.

 

[momtwoboys]

not harmony at all, more like *******. not sure why the word Dis cord was blanked out. Its just a word

 

[MissSha]

I am highly confident it will make zero difference, but FWIW, I sent the following last night to: wdw.guest.communications@disneyworld.com

Maybe if a few hundred of us do likewise….or not.

<snip>

Please share this with Josh D’Amaro Chairman, Disney Parks, Experiences and Products; Jeff Vahle, President, Walt Disney World Resort, and with Kartika Rodriguez, the VP of EPCOT.

Illuminations made me cry for all the right reasons.

Harmonius makes me cry because it has no soul, it has no discernable message, it has zero transition between segments, and it has no climax. It was just a hyper-compressed Disney animation short film collection projected on spraying water. Maybe it belongs in MK, but I doubt it.

Technically it was great, but I expected that.

I hate seeing myself growing negative feelings toward Disney, but this was truly a horrible step backward from what was a highlight of every evening at Epcot.

You've destroyed an iconic WDW landmark.

<snip>

Good for you!

 

[VandVsmama]

I watched Disney's live stream last night and Craig's video version this morning at

. Here's what I think so far:

• I'd be willing to go see this in person ONE time in its current form. But it's not going to be a repeat for me.
• I feel like this show would have fit better overall at MK than at Epcot.
• It also felt like each of the countries in the international section of Epcot were represented in this show as Disney caricatures. I mean...all of the UK is summed up in the characters from Brave?
• Maybe I missed it but where was the ode to Canada?
• Out of all American music, they chose Princess & the Frog? I love the music from that movie, but holy cow, they could have expanded the repertoire a little bit.
• And of the entire huge nation of China, all they could come up with was music from Mulan?
• How come Japan didn't get its own musical section?
• And don't get me started on Africa...with that huge continent with all of its various rich cultures from so many nations and peoples, the best that Disney & Epcot can do is represent Africa as the Lion King?
• It felt more like a Disney princess water show.
• There wasn't any story line.
• World of Color at Disneyland is better.

I get where they were probably intending to go with this...using music as a theme as being something that can bring people together from all different nations. They should have had Richard Sherman consult on this project or something. The show needs some sort of song or set of songs that unifies everything together more. Instead, what we ended up with was a mish mash of Disney princess songs stuck together.

It was...meh, ok, fine. But it didn't leave me thinking, "OMG, WOW!" I expected more than that.

 

[Airb330]

When epcot forever is considered better, you know the new show must be really bad

Right! That's my feeling too. Ranking the nightime shows for me:
I really liked (not loved) Illuminations and like Fantastic.
I loved Wishes, World of Color, and HEA. I also usually love anything at DL that I see on Youtube as well.
I really disliked Rivers of Light and thought it was a big missed opportunity. I was neutral to dislike for Epcot Forver. I liked the music but Illuminations was better.

I am now worried for this and Enchantment! HEA isn't that old so I really didn't think it needed to go, why spend the money? Give us a nighttime parade AND HEA. Sigh. HEA was pyro heavy and I fear enchantment is going to rely even more on projections (which in a pandemic, really is a poor choice).

Do y'all think our feelings on the new shows may be clouded by our feelings of the WDW management right now? I don't like the direction of the WDW resort right now and I think that could impact a lot of feelings on the new shows.

 

[disneydreamer1980]

This was horrible. The ending was so weird, like it didn’t seem like it was over, you’re waiting for something else to happen but it doesn’t lol. The few claps throughout were for the fireworks which were very few. There’s nothing that ties this together, just IP to IP. I’m so sad. Being disappointed in Disney seems to be a theme for me now. It seems like Disney’s lost its soul, whatever magic that made it “Disney” seems to be gone. I want illuminations back!

 

[fabfemmeboy]

I watched Disney's live stream last night and Craig's video version this morning at

. Here's what I think so far:

• I'd be willing to go see this in person ONE time in its current form. But it's not going to be a repeat for me.
• I feel like this show would have fit better overall at MK than at Epcot.
• It also felt like each of the countries in the international section of Epcot were represented in this show as Disney caricatures. I mean...all of the UK is summed up in the characters from Brave?
• Maybe I missed it but where was the ode to Canada?
• Out of all American music, they chose Princess & the Frog? I love the music from that movie, but holy cow, they could have expanded the repertoire a little bit.
• And of the entire huge nation of China, all they could come up with was music from Mulan?
• How come Japan didn't get its own musical section?
• And don't get me started on Africa...with that huge continent with all of its various rich cultures from so many nations and peoples, the best that Disney & Epcot can do is represent Africa as the Lion King?
• It felt more like a Disney princess water show.
• There wasn't any story line.
• World of Color at Disneyland is better.

I get where they were probably intending to go with this...using music as a theme as being something that can bring people together from all different nations. They should have had Richard Sherman consult on this project or something. The show needs some sort of song or set of songs that unifies everything together more. Instead, what we ended up with was a mish mash of Disney princess songs stuck together.

It was...meh, ok, fine. But it didn't leave me thinking, "OMG, WOW!" I expected more than that.

It felt to me like their starting point was "What movies could we make cool cultural music out of?" and it went from there. It wasn't related to World Showcase per se, as evidenced by the inclusion of India and Scotland...and Greece and vaguely Polynesia-ish. I don't think it was meant to represent the entire country by one song (as in the most prototypical song for the country), it was more about putting Disney music in its cultural context. Which worked better for some songs than others. But I really do think the starting point was "oh, Aladdin in a more traditional-middle-eastern-style would be awesome!" and it went from there. Even then, some of the song choices were really odd. "Out There" for France instead of Beauty and the Beast? "Go the Distance" for no discernible reason and overlaid with Moana when the music didn't mesh? I mean...on the plus side they didn't try to shoehorn "Let it Go" in there in Norwegian but when that's my most positive comment about the music...

 

[Leigh L]

The DIS' recording of Harmonious was WAY better than Disney's. At least I felt you get a better idea of the pyro (and more of it) than the Disney stream showed. I think DIS' recording also makes viewers feel like they were "there" so to speak. I think it was Disney's stream panning out too many times (too high and far away) giving even a larger feeling of disconnect.

For me, the biggest disappointment is ruining the daytime WS look and at the additional cost of offering good viewing for the nighttime show. It appears to be limited to only parts of WS. And still, that ending(?!).

 

[VandVsmama]

I never saw Illuminations so I can't really compare this new show to that one. This show has no cohesive theme or story to link the different elements together. From a technical standpoint, it's a beautiful show...that part was really cool. But it's the overall theme of the show that is totally lacking.

In my head, I'm sort of comparing this to Disneyland's fireworks show for their 60th anniversary back in 2015. THAT show told a story. It included new elements which hadn't been used before, like the projections all on the buildings down Main Street...or the sea anemones that popped up on top of the buildings on Main Street during the Little Mermaid section of the fireworks show. And you could see that fireworks show from multiple areas in the park and still have a great experience.

This show at Epcot, though, is an expensive equivalent of a 'mash up' from Pitch Perfect.

 

[cman]

I'll wait until I see it in person. Watching it on a live stream no matter how big your TV is doesn't do it for me. Being there adds to the overall experience.

 

[gharter]

The DIS' recording of Harmonious was WAY better than Disney's. At least I felt you get a better idea of the pyro (and more of it) than the Disney stream showed. I think DIS' recording also makes viewers feel like they were "there" so to speak. I think it was Disney's stream panning out too many times (too high and far away) giving even a larger feeling of disconnect.

For me, the biggest disappointment is ruining the daytime WS look and at the additional cost of offering good viewing for the nighttime show. It appears to be limited to only parts of WS. And still, that ending(?!).

Good to know. I watched the Disney Park version last night and was greatly underwhelmed.
Will watch the Dis version tonight .

 

[Nappy1380]

My initial reaction after watching the Disney feed was that this was just an absolute failure on all fronts. Craig had said on the Tuesday show to essentially just watch the Disney feed as it would be an entire production, but good lord did Disney absolutely botch it. It was just a complete mess that made the show look horrible, visually confusing and showed more swinging arms and poor sight lines than anything.

I just watched the video Craig shot, and it is exponentially better than what Disney showed. There are so many effects and visuals that did not translate when watching the live stream from Disney. The visual elements when viewed from a center stage view are absolutely incredible. If you watched the Disney feed I would strongly urge you to watch Craig's. It's an entirely different experience.

What didn't change, regardless of the visual beauty, was that the show itself has no soul at all or emotional pull. Just not something anyone with any interest in what EPCOT actually is can get on board with. Wouldn't even call it a poor man's HEA....that would be an insult to HEA.

 

[VrBchJ]

To paraphrase Dan Quayle "I knew Illuminations. I loved Illuminations. This is no Illuminations."

 

[Hendlaw]

My wife and I watched the stream last night. We both felt like it was a letdown. I agree that it has no cohesion, no flow, and forces product placement into a too loosely structured narrative of "around the world". It had no soul (pun intended). The end felt like a tag added after the completion of production by some exec. It has little to no connection to the park and seems to be a part of a larger plan to erase EPCOT's history and create a whole new frankenpark made up of magic kingdom elements tied to food booths and festival stuff. It makes me concerned for what they will do with the new MK show. HEA was special and magical. I am afraid the new will be cost conscious and soul-less.

 

[MikeRx]

We will see this live next week so I will reserve final judgement. FWIW, while I agree with most that stated that the overall theme was not apparent, there were not any real transitions, and the ending was odd, I did get Disney's attempt at harmony through each segment. As they transitioned from language to language I was able to continue singing along in my language to the songs. I believe this is the underlying theme and attempts to tie music across all cultures/languages and link us. Not sure if this somewhat subtle theme is enough for such a center piece spectacular. I hope the in-person experience changes my initial impression.
Mike

 

[Chuck S]

I'll wait until I see it in person. Watching it on a live stream no matter how big your TV is doesn't do it for me. Being there adds to the overall experience.

I agree with the point that seeing it in person will be a different experience than the live stream. But at the same time, after the live stream of EPCOT Forever, I was excited to see it live, even though I never had the opportunity to do so, and knew it wasn't the best Disney could do. I was excited for the memories, the nostalgia, remembering the park as it was when I would travel with my Mom...Harmonious live stream did not leave me excited about seeing it. And to compare, I liked Wishes, Illuminations, and Happily Ever After. I even liked Rivers of Light. I'm hopeful tonight's stream of Disney Enchantment will leave me excited.