Pirates - The Ride

With the second installment of Pirates of the Carribbean making big bucks at the box office, Disneyland recently reopened the ride of the same name after their latest renovation. I thought I'd give you a little review of the new refurbished ride after having a chance to go through it for the first time last night.

I wasn't too impressed with the last redo of Pirates in which they sissyed up the ride by making it more politically correct. At that time they tried to downplay the pirates chasing the women, and instead had them chasing women carrying food, as though that's what they were after. It was pretty silly and some of those elements are still there.

Of course the main purpose of this latest effort was to incorporate characters from the hit movies into the ride. Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp in the film) was added to the pirate cast and could be seen at least 4 times in the ride. The first time you see him is upon entry into the interior part of the waiting queue. On the wall are several drawings of pirate captains, and the first one right inside the door is Sparrow.

The first part of the ride hasn't changed until you splash down after the second ramp. They've changed the music in that part of the ride. The treasure room has also been spiffed up with lots of new bangles and baubles, and even a skeletal parrot which I had never noticed before.

After leaving the treasure scene you no longer hear the familiar narraration ("perhaps he knows too much...he's seen the cursed treasure" and "dead men tell no tales"). Instead you come up on a very realistic looking waterfall upon which the Davey Jones character from the movie is projected. The boats actually pass through the waterfall (a fog effect) and it's done very well. You almost think you're going to get wet.

Beyond the waterfall is the battle scene with the pirate ship firing on the town. The captain on the ship now looks and sounds like Barbarosa from the movie, and the audio effects in the scene are much improved. You now "feel" the shots as well as see and hear them.

Moving to the dunking scene at the well you get your first look at the audioanimatronic Depp. That's probably the most realistic of the three robot versions of Sparrow, and looks very much like the movie character. You pass through the auction scene and see Sparrow again, this time popping up out of the barrel where there used to be a women hiding. The character next to the barrel also refers to Sparrow.

Moving through the town fire scenes, they've added some guys with torches and generally cleaned up the scenes a bit. When you finally hit the ramp to take you back to the upper level you get your last look at Sparrow. They've replaced the final scene that had the guys trying to pull the treasure up the ramp with a small room full of treasure and Captain Jack sitting there singing along with the "Yo-Ho Yo-Ho, A Pirates Life for Me" song. To me this depiction looked the least like a real person, but it was done pretty well.

All in all, a good update to the ride with the waterfall effect being the most impressive. Wait lines are pretty long, though we were completely through the ride in less than 45 minutes. It's worth the wait at least one time to see the changes.