The Ultimate Disney Parks Attraction Bracket -- Round One, Day Thirteen

Prepare for liftoff.

Who’s ready for the weekend? I know I am (and I’m typing these words a few days beforehand, but feel confident that the assessment will stand firm when the post publishes). But the brackets never sleep, as you know, whether I post them here or on Twitter. (BTW, if you’re on Bluesky, I’m there as well under my normal handle, and I just feel like I’ll be using that more often as Twitter continues to crumble brick by brick.)

Anyway, let’s get into today’s sure-to-be-uncontroversial quartet of first-round matchups in the Ultimate Disney Parks Attractin bracket. Come on!

(2) Space Mountain (WDW) vs. (63) Luigi’s Flying Tires: OK, this one should genuinely be uncontroversial. On one hand, we have Space Mountain. And on the other hand, we have not Space Mountain. (Seriously, Luigi’s Flying Tires sucked so bad that the Imagineers had to go back to the drawing board and make an update that manages to suck a little less, while still not being very good at all.)

You know what to do.

Space Mountain (WDW)

Luigi’s Flying Tires

(31) Casey Jr. Circus Train vs. (34) Citizens of Buena Vista Street: I have no doubt that some of you already know which of these I’m voting for, and why I am voting for it. For those of you who don’t, I will point out that when you ride Casey Jr. Circus Train, you have a 50/50 chance of sitting in a very tiny carriage with a lot of other people because of how tight the train cars are designed.

It’s me, hi, I’m the Tall Person, it’s me. (That’s a solid T-Swift reference, right? Sure it is, don’t tell me otherwise.) Tall person! Me! Not a fan of the Circus Train. So let’s give it to the Citizens of Buena Vista Street.

Casey Jr. Circus Train

Citizens of Buena Vista Street

(15) Peter Pan’s Flight (DL) vs. (50) Gorilla Falls Exploration Trail: I’m going to vote for the Gorilla Falls Exploration Trail here, and would you like to know why? Well, I’m going to tell you anyway.

The issue here isn’t height or size. If you’ve traveled to Disneyland, then you know that the West Coast version of the Peter Pan-themed dark ride does not have a skip-the-line option the way the East Coast version does (or has, in the past). And you know that Peter Pan’s Flight is one of the handful of attractions to get a decent-sized line pretty quick early in the day, compared to other Fantasyland attractions. Unless you’re enormously lucky and/or fleet of foot, you wait about 30 minutes at the start of the day (at least). And…it’s all for a ride that lasts 3 minutes.

I realize that other Fantasyland attractions are short and can get long lines. But there’s something about this one getting such a long line that has always vexed me. It’s a perfectly fine attraction, but…man, I don’t love waiting in such a slow-moving queue. The Gorilla Falls Exploration Trail is one of a few walking trails in Disney’s Animal Kingdom, and I just prefer those (at least being able to dictate my own pace).

But enough from me. Have I swayed any of you to vote against the boy who wouldn’t grow up?

Peter Pan’s Flight (DL)

Gorilla Falls Exploration Trail

(18) The Hall of Presidents vs. (47) 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea Submarine Voyage: As noted elsewhere in this bracket, I have not been to Walt Disney World since 2012. So the last time I saw the Hall of Presidents, the keynote speaker (as it were) was President Obama. Since that time…well, things sure have happened in the modern fabric of American politics! And I absolutely do not want the comments section of this newsletter to turn into an argument about those things!

What I do want to say is that while I…uh, much prefer that President Biden is the current keynote speaker (if you follow me on Twitter, this will come as no surprise to you, and if you don’t follow me on Twitter…well, I’m surprised you’re here, frankly), I wonder if the Imagineers would’ve been better off giving a kind of cut-off in terms of which presidents speak, and for how long, and so on. It’s one thing to create Audio-Animatronics of each American president, but another to give the current president a few minutes to go on about the American dream. (The operative phrase there is “current president”. You want Honest Abe to give a speech along those lines? Fine by me.)

Honestly, it’s a long-winded version of me saying that even though Trump isn’t the big speaker anymore, seeing him on the pedestal is just…real goddamn grim. (I write these words as many folks laughed over his ridiculous response to being indicted a second time this calendar year, for hoarding materials he shouldn’t have hoarded, and yes, it is funny that he hoarded documents in his shower. But hey, the whole “indicted a second time this calendar year” thing just reminds me that this fucking guy was president, and that people are still staking themselves to him. I don’t get it! Don’t try to explain it in the comments!)

So…I vote for the old submarine and Captain Nemo. At least he’s a fictional demagogue.

How do you vote?

The Hall of Presidents

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea Submarine Voyage