E Is For.....Electrical Parade

This one is at the suggestion of my Mom, a huge Disney fan in her own right. I was planning an E Is For....Epcot post, but this is much better. My mom reminded me that one of the things I am most looking forward to on this Disney trip is the triumphant return of the Main Street Electrical Parade!

Yes, that's Elliot from Pete's Dragon, one of the most under-rated characters from one of the most under-rated movies in the Disney canon.

They fired Elliot for THIS?

It's been forever since we've seen the Electrical Parade, and John never has seen it at all. It was replaced some time back by a monstrosity called "SpectroMagic." I remember the first time we saw SpectroMagic. It was on the trip with my parents and sister and future wife to celebrate our graduation from college in 1993. We got our places on Main Street, looking forward to the Electrical parade. The music started and the lights of the parade approached and we were greeted not by Disney characters all festooned in lights, but by odd, and more than a little disturbing, well, things I guess. They were dressed all in white. Some had red hair, some just had big ping pong ball heads. They were playing instruments, and the music was good, but it was just so weird. Disney is great because it shows us the best of our culture and traditions. Disney should not try to do "avant guarde," it doesn't work.

What the heck ARE those things?

Captain Hook knows he looks silly

The Disney Characters did feature in the parade eventually, but they were all dressed in these shiny white suits. It looked fine on the princesses and Mickey and Minnie even, but who would put Captain Hook in a shiny white suit? It looked like a nightmare prom night from a David Lynch movie. I don't want to wish ill on anyone, but I hope the people who designed SpectroMagic have found employment elsewhere. Seriously.

But now the Electrical Parade is back, in all it's glory, newly refurbished and ready to go. We've scheduled it for our arrival day. We figure that and the fireworks will serve as the perfect welcome to a week at Disney World. And I'll get to see Elliot :-)