Podcast: The Ride - Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls

Episode Date: December 8, 2017

On this episode, we tackle the theme park world's most beloved institution. The crown jewel of Universal's Toon Lagoon: Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls. Listen to Podcast: The Ride Ad-Free on Forever Dog Plus: https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/ FOLLOW PODCAST: THE RIDE: https://twitter.com/PodcastTheRide https://www.instagram.com/podcasttheride BUY PODCAST: THE RIDE MERCH: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/podcast-the-ride PODCAST THE RIDE IS A FOREVER DOG PODCAST https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/podcast-the-ride Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Feral Audio Hey everybody, welcome to Podcast The Ride, the theme park podcast hosted by three men who send each other links when Disneyland introduces a new taco. Joining me as always, Scott Gairdner and Jason Sheridan. Hello. It's been a while, Brett, by the way. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we're just getting back in the swing of things. I've been gone for a few weeks. Oh, I meant since taco news. No new taco news. Oh, yeah.

Step it up, Disney. Thanksgiving is coming. There will be a turkey and stuffing taco soon enough available for you to purchase. And we will send links to each other and excitedly talk about it. We are part of Feral Audio, which is home of Doughboys and other great podcasts. And today we're talking

a pretty weird ride. Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls in Universal Studios' Islands of Adventure. Scott was very skeptical about this. I was a little bit. I don't know.

You know what? I like the idea of that title sitting in the list of episodes being one of the first ones as if that's one of the major rides we have to get. You know what? Maybe it is.

Maybe we'll determine. It is major ride canon. For me, it is. I am, yeah, I'm ride or die for Islands of Adventure. I fucking love it unabashedly. It is funny because this is like one of the, this is still the first 10 episodes of this podcast, and this is one of the ones we've chosen,

and it doesn't make any sense. We've done, yeah, the essentials in the beginning. The Spider-Man rocks the musical. The Ellen's Energy Adventure. And then argued with Mike Mitchell a little. About nothing too specific. Just general stuff, like a feeling. We argued about feelings mostly.

Talked about your shared Ithaca experience. Yeah. There was a good 20 minutes on that, I think. I believe so, yeah. The cafeteria at Ithaca. Yeah, Ithaca experience. Yeah. Yeah. There was a good 20 minutes on that, I think. I believe so, yeah. The cafeteria at Ithaca. Yeah, Ithaca's weird currency system. Thrilling than any theme park.

Hey, well, yeah, we're still, first 10, we're bringing those bangers. We're taking you to Deadly Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls. But first.

First, yeah, we're going to be some theme park world hoppers today. We're going to take you all around the theme park universe into a very, very odd place that I just learned about that is a theme park world hoppers today we're going to take you all around the theme park universe into a very very odd place that i just learned about that is a theme park that has not

been open for even a year at this point i don't believe a place called motion gate dubai and the big the big news out of this place pretty recently within the last month at least of us recording is that they have opened the world of the hunger games it is the first actual hunger games theme park experience and it is not coming to one of the major u.s parks it is straight to dubai um and it's yeah it's it's it's it's pretty bizarre i think that i think the major theme park property opening first in dubai is sort of unprecedented as far as I know. Yeah, Dubai has had a lot of failed theme park stuff. I believe there is that indoor theme park that has Marvel stuff. A lot of stuff in Dubai is in domes because it is so hot in the desert.

And you also have to account for sandstorms. Because if it was outside and you were on a roller coaster, you would just get a mouth and eye full of sand. Yeah. And that wouldn't be good for the guests. Giant clumps in your eye. Your eye literally replaced by a pocket of dust. And you would probably find these people dead with a belly full of sand.

It would be like a nightmare. You just have to account for atrocities every once in a while, as opposed to a typical U.S. park where a death is totally unexpected. At an outdoor Dubai park, it's par for the course. Dubai is also the insane, hyper, hyper theme park of the world. Like, there was, there's just giant buildings. There's an indoor mountain that you can go skiing on. Does Dubai, do they have all those man-made islands where it's, like, islands, like, in the shape of states?

In the shape of states or countries? Yes, I believe that's Dubai. Like, Elton John bought, like, the Florida, the fake Florida island or something. Something like that. John bought the Florida, the fake Florida island or something. Someone bought, some very rich man bought the fake Florida island that was man-made in Dubai. I don't know, maybe it's not Elton John. Also, a lot of this stuff built by, at best, underpaid labor, at worst, slave labor from around the world. That's a good point, too. Oh, God, we're never going to get to go to Dubai.

We'll never be flown to Motion Gate now. We gotta get the lid off of everything. So what is in the Hunger Gates? It's like a roller coaster and a snack bar. Is that right? We got two attractions.

There's one that looks like sort of a generic roller coaster that could apply to anything, but they made it slightly Hunger Games themed called the Capitol Bullet Train. Do you guys know Hunger Games, by the way? Because I don't know what I'm referring to. A little bit. I've seen a couple of the movies. I feel like I've saw the first one and the last one.

Was there a bullet train that went to the Capitol in one of them? I think they take the train to the rich part of this. The Capitol is where all the rich one percenters live. Elizabeth Banks' character, whoever that is. Elizabeth Banks, Stanley Tucci. The president is Donald Sutherland. Right. And they take this train to... So that's the ride.

You get on the train. I don't know if you end up in one percent world. I don't know if your life is improved significantly by the end of the ride. Probably just a roller coaster. And it seems like it's outdoors so watch out for sand gang oh really but he hadn't a motion gate to buy uh yeah i think so it seems like an outdoor park and then but the one that uh i could not find a ride through of it i couldn't find any footage but it seems like there's a more uh avatar harry potter-esque um motion simulator that's more specific called panem aerial

tour again panem a thing i assume is from the hunger games franchise um i don't i'm not familiar with panem um does anyone know panem tweet us let us know what uh let us know what panem what panem is we're being nice and specific here um there there is the the thing that i'm interested in is that there is a little bit of actual content from the stars of the movie no jennifer lawrence but you do get intro videos from elizabeth banks and stanley tucci yeah as their respective characters fe trinket and cesar flickerman we go. I think I got him right. He is very funny. He's just playing it at 11.

Like it's, it's when you let Stanley Tucci do whatever, like when you just let him go, like he was in a feud, Betty versus Joan is Jack Warner. And he's just the most scene chomping, like cigar smoking movie studio exec. And he's crazy. It's, cigar-smoking movie studio exec, and he's crazy.

It's pretty fun. I mean, it gets very dark, but it's fun to watch. I should probably see these movies. If they have, like, big, full-throttle, crazy performances, I'd probably dig them a little bit. You're nodding your head no. I don't know. They're fine.

I think it's mostly him. I think it's mostly him, and the rest, everyone's doing an okay job. I see. I see. But, yeah, but the rest, everyone's doing an okay job. I see, I see. But yeah, but you do get, and you can watch these on YouTube. There are ads with the characters, Cesar Flickerman and Effie Triggett, but they do, they're inside Hunger Games World, but they also say, we have it all at Motion Gate Dubai, which is very surreal.

I guess it makes Motion Gate Dubai canon within the Hunger Games world, which I saw some chatter online, people pointing out that it is a little odd that this movie about caste systems and dystopias is built in a world of caste systems and dystopias. Oh, in Dubai? Where if you are a foreign worker, your employer will usually take your passport when you

start working for them. It's a little strange. He'll probably give it back. Everybody can organize a bust into the passport safe. There's options. Look, they'll figure it out. When Scott brought this up, we were all kind of like, yeah, this is weird.

This Lionsgate-branded property at this random park in Dubai. By the way, as part of a bigger... In Motiongate Dubai, the themed lands are divided up into... It's real sloppy. There's the world of the Smurfs. You can go to Smurfs Village. And then the other ones are Columbia Pictures Land and Lionsgate.

As if Lionsgate is like Disney, as if Lionsgate is a brand that we're all super passionate about. Well, that brings me to my thing, because Scott brought this up. It was like, isn't this weird? And I was like, it is weird, and I can do you one better, because I had just recently learned about Lionsgate Entertainment City. What is Lionsgate Entertainment City. What is Lionsgate Entertainment City? The world's first Lionsgate-branded

indoor entertainment center. Set to open in New York's Times Square in 2019. Finally. We've all been waiting for something like that. The Lionsgate family. Go visit all my favorite Lionsgate characters. Somewhere a real estate

developer is like thanking whatever god they worship that someone was able to move into the four-story Toys R Us space that was my question it's the Toys R Us space I think it is right I don't I don't know that because Toys R Us closed which is a bummer that was a cool cool ass Toys R Us if you've ever been there. It was like four stories. There was a big dinosaur, like a full-size dinosaur. There was a Ferris wheel. There was an indoor Ferris wheel. Yes, there was a Ferris wheel.

There was a whole Wonka area with fun candy. But it was all the same. This is a bygone. These things are starting to disappear from Times Square a little bit. The giant weird kid spectacle. The Virgin Megastore is long gone. That was another big space there.

FAO Schwartz doesn't seem to exist. Is FAO Schwartz... Well, the FAO Schwartz was taken over by the Toys R Us and then Toys R Us bought FAO Schwartz, I believe. Yeah, I think the big famous FAO Schwartz was further down like Fifth Avenue. Oh, okay, then I'm thinking of a different...

You can still visit the Plaza Hotel. You can still visit the Plaza. Kevin McAllister asked directions from a lovable passerby. Whatever happened to that man? I wish that was the question. So you may be asking yourself, what attractions will be in an indoor theme park in the middle of Times Square based on Lionsgate properties? And I'm reading from, I cribbed this from a Deadline article and a Variety article.

Attractions will include a Hunger Games flying simulator attraction, which sounds pretty close to the Dubai thing. That's the Panem Aerial Tour. Okay. Panem is also the nation in, I looked it up, was the nation in the Hunger Games. But so it's capital, the capital is the city. Capital city, Panem is the country. Sorry, sorry. Back.

A divergent themed obstacle course, another dystopian teen movie. The John Wick chapter two shooting ride where fans go head-to-head with a series of assailants, a 4D film and live theater, and a virtual reality entertainment center, including a Nerve VR motorcycle experience. What? You all remember Nerve, right? The Emma Roberts, Dave Franco banger about an app where...

I don't have any clue what you're talking about. What is Nerve? I really don't know. I love knowing stupid bullshit that came out and making fun of it, but I've never heard of Nerve. What are you talking about? crowdfunded app like a Snapchat sort of app where you play a crazy game and the users have to tell you what to do and it's one crazy

night but then it starts to get dangerous. I'm looking this up. I don't have a memory of this. I remember the poster. It was backwards for some reason. Unless I was looking at one that was backwards. Okay. That one's not backwards okay that one's not backwards this one is not bad i might have just been i remember seeing it in a food court and i

think it may have been improperly installed it may have been put up backwards uh what is urban here here we go you have the backwards one the backwards one whoa yeah that's right that's right backwards now why is it backwards? Is there something about the Nerve app? I think because it's sick and twisted. It turns this genre upside, the evil apps come to life genre upside down. Yeah. Slash backwards. So I do want to go back and talk about the John Wick Chapter 2 shooting ride, which is a-

Is it called a shooting ride, first of all? It is referred to as a shooting ride. Cool. Shootings in Times Square. In Times Square. Is it called a shooting ride, first of all? It is referred to as a shooting ride. Cool. Shootings in Times Square. In Times Square. I was talking to a friend of mine from college after we released an early episode and we mentioned Dick Tracy's Crime Stoppers, where you would have shot at criminals from a car. Oh, yeah.

And he said- Never built Disneyland, Disney World ride, Dick Tracy's Crime Stoppers. Yeah. And we were talking about what would that have been bulldozed for? Probably Star Wars Land. It probably would have been being bulldozed right now for Star Wars Land. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's no way that survives the sands of time.

I also think they may have just shut it down after Columbine. Because if it had opened in 96 when it was supposed to, and three, four years later Columbine because if it had opened in 96 when it was supposed to and like three four years later Columbine happens like but it wasn't Dick Tracy's Crime Stoppers wasn't going to take place in a high school no but you were still going to be riding around with like you know six shooters

shooting at people I mean well do you think it being an actual gun like a bullet gun makes it a problem as opposed to men in Black where you're firing weird lasers. Lasers at aliens, at like grotesque aliens. But a ride where you're a person shooting people is weird.

I think it's worse. And I mean, John Wick gets gruesome. But they weren't. I love it. Like those movies are super fun. Well, John Wick does seem crazy because those movies are very gory. But like Dick Tracy, you weren't going to be shooting robots and like blood was going to shoot out the back of their head or anything.

You were probably going to like shoot their hat and like the hat flipped up. Or like the bow tie would spin. You would shoot the guy's bow tie and it would spin. Like there was no way those guys were going to be grisly murdered. Now, John Wick 2. Yeah, that's a far more realistic

Where you have to shoot at virtual Common. Where you have to shoot at where Common plays a rival assassin. I mean, the thing of Mayor de Blasio is going to have to shut that thing down. There's going to be so much commotion. So there's also more, because what themed entertainment center would be complete without retail and dining establishments, including a Lionsgate Cafe. Who cares? A Mad Men-themed, quote, dining and lounge experience. Oh, now you've got our interest.

Yeah. You've piqued our interest. That's a thing that weirdos would go to. Oh, yeah. Go dress, go do their own little dapper day at the Met. Although, can you imagine if you live in New York and like walking through Times Square, you'd feel like Batman's parents. I'm like going to see the... I'd be so embarrassed, I'd be so mortified to be in public in like Mad Men clothes

walking to the Mad Men cafe. Well, also like Tavern on the Green, Peter Lute, like all of these like very old establishments that they eat at and Mad Men, whether it was filmed on a soundstage or not, are mostly still there. Imagine if New York still felt like the 30s. Well, kind of.

What else? The Hunger Games inspired Peeta's Bakery and the Capital Confectionary. They have those also at Dubai. I noticed Peeta's Bakery. She is like a baker in the movies, I think. That's a good deduction

from the name. We're Hunger Games experts. Along with the first ever Lionsgate Studio Store. Mommy, mommy, I want to go get a souvenir at ever Lionsgate Studio Store. Mommy, mommy, I want to go get a souvenir at the Lionsgate Studio Store. I want a shirt from whatever movie Marlon Wayans finagled them into producing.

I really don't know what's a Lionsgate. Yeah, we'd have to look. I was just going to make a nerve joke. I was going to make a joke about nerve shirts. I could buy shirts with... You know what we're missing, though, here, is I want to say Lionsgate is the studio behind Tyler Perry.

I think they put out the Tyler Perry movies. Is that right? Yeah. That seems like, if anything, in Lionsgate world, you'd want to go on a Madeo walk-around to be so exciting. One of three or four like it

takes three or four studios and production companies to put out any movie nowadays yeah there was one last the entertainment center will also feature party rooms for private events and special programming that can be customized for lions gate properties everyone slide in your favorite so you can do so they they put out power rangers they did la la land oh oh they have my little pony they have the expendables so a live la la la la land live now that's a theme park show you want to see the twilight movies huh i mean you were right about the tyler perry connection okay uh the big sick hey come on the big sick first aid clinic yeah come on we gotta get out of here before they bill us we gotta get out of this hospital

if they send it in the mail maybe they'll forget about the billing. So this is, I mean, the thing about this is it really seems like they're trying to pitch it as like, hey, America and the world, you know Lionsgate? Y'all love Lionsgate, right? Because when Universal opened their Florida park. They had a decade and a half of just giant blockbusters to pull from. And movies that felt iconic. E.T. is a huge hit. Iconic pretty quickly. You know that that's a universal.

Big Spielberg movies. And they also had the Hollywood park to go like, well, this worked there, and we can probably make it bigger in Florida. Or this didn't work, so we're not going to build the Miami Vice stunt show. And then, uh, uh, so they had a lot of properties and I think they would have, they would have had the license, some of the Hitchcock stuff for that show. And they had a license Ghostbusters cause they didn't put that out. And then when Disney opened the original MGM studios, that's mostly like licensed stuff. Like the first few years, Star Wars, Indiana Jones.

Disney's movie fortunes were not great in the 70s and 80s. Bad in the 80s. Condor Man. They couldn't build a Condor Man. Yeah. Black Hole, Black Cauldron. The Rescuer. Stuff that did okay, but it wasn't until

the stuff that they talk about in the Waking Sleeping Beauty documentary. Their big Little Mermaid Aladdin. But Lionsgate. I should also add, when I searched Lionsgate financials, the first article that came up was from the start of 2016, and the headline was, Lionsgate shares plummet following disappointing earnings. Do you get to go on a ride that simulates their earnings plummeting? Whoa.

We've been rebranded. Unhappy shareholder animatronics like but that's that's what happens with some of these these in the middle east and and uh some of these licensed parks that never got made or even in europe and around the world all this stuff that gets made and the the money just isn't there so it's like that lion's gate is going all in on themed entertainment. It seems like an odd business to get into if your studio is not as established as Disney. And also from what I can tell about Motion Gate Dubai,

I was looking at videos from this park and Stanley Tucci saying, come to Motion Gate Dubai. That has like 400 views. None of the videos of lions gate world have any views and i saw another video of people like their little video diary like our day at motion gate dubai a park to ourselves clearly they are documenting that nobody else is in this park so it's yeah i don't know they're off to a weird start it's a weird guy i looked at if i i looked

forever to find the video of that one and i can't think of the name of the park in dubai that has it is marvel it has adventure time for whatever reason from cartoon network like there's an adventure time ride time world you can go into but it's but it's all indoors it feels like a bad mall of america ride they all feel like but and they're and like the reboot ride at the luxor sure yeah exactly technically a ride but kind of chintzy right right, right. But I was trying to find these videos forever, and then finally I got one, and it's empty in there. No one's in there.

It's depressing. The lights are down. Like, there's a Marvel ride that's just a, they look like repurposed carnival rides, and then there's one 3D movie that I couldn't find video of. The Adventure Time ride is like, it's just cardboard things of the characters

and you're like oh they didn't spend any money like they're trying to do a disney thing but they're not going to spend any money and no one gives a shit and being in a chintzy theme park you really feel you feel it especially if you've been in a better theme park yeah yeah yeah the pictures i saw at motion gate dubai felt very i was noticing, like, no trees, no vegetation. They don't feel very lived in. It reminded me a lot of the Disney Studios Paris, which I got to go to, which we haven't, I don't think we've talked about on here,

but it's, like, a very chintzy park that uses the excuse of, like, it's sound stages to have no decoration or charm whatsoever. Yeah, it's weird. I think you have to spend money to make money at these theme parks. I don't think you can half-ass these places. Also, Dubai is like a playground for the hyper, hyper rich. There was an article a few years back written by George Saunders,

MacArthur genius George Saunders, author of the recent novel Lincoln and the Bardo and a bunch of short story collections. He was paid by, I think it was GQ or Esquire, to go and write about Dubai, like go to Dubai and write about it. And like his, he went to a hotel, like not even like the fanciest hotel, like a Hilton or something in Dubai, but like still a hyper fancy version of

Hilton. And like his GQ corporate credit card was almost declined. And he's like, oh my God, I'm not going to have a place to sleep in fucking Dubai. He's going to end up like, respected writer George Saunders. Resive writer. Eating sand. Yeah, and wandered around and was just kind of amazed and also mystified at this place of the highest of highs. Like, wow, they built an indoor mountain and these children are seeing snow for the first time and it's man-made. It's like... Right, so what you're saying is if this Lionsgate Park and the Hunger Game Park is going to work there, these rich men need to be able to hunt children for real. Hunt for.

That's what has to happen if these people are going to be satisfied with their experience. There's no way they're going to go and see a screen of we're going to fly over where the battle would happen. No, they have to have a bow and arrow and be able to shoot children and win the Hunger Games. The actual Hunger Games have to happen for this thing to be a real success. You can feel the cheapness of fake child blood. That's right. The 3D blood isn't going to be good. You need to taste that child's blood on your tongue.

And feel the sense of satisfaction you get from murdering a boy. Have an animatronic Donald Sutherland sleepily tell you good job. If this is Dubai, let's get Donald Sutherland and just pay him a ton of money to be there every day. Come on, let's not fuck around here.

It's been a good deal. They put me up at the Hilton. It's an okay hotel, close enough. Alright, that's the best I could do with Donald Sutherland impression I guess we can say we're cautiously optimistic about these places step it up and kids

volunteer as tribute that said we'd love to be at the opening of the Lionsgate Entertainment Center yeah we'll take a few seconds to kiss up after we've shit all the Lionsgate Entertainment Center. Yeah, we'll take a quick second to kiss up after we've shit all over Lionsgate. After we've portrayed

Dubai as a barbaric state. We'll take a free trip, though. But New York we love. Oh, the charm of New York. Love Times Square. We love you, Mayor de Blasio. We love, yeah, we love that we can't buy big sodas. We love you, Mayor de Blasio. We love, yeah, we love that we can't buy big sodas.

We love it. Hey, well, send us to Dubai, and we'll be right back. Welcome back to Podcast to Ride. We are now going to get to the main event, the thing we're so excited to talk about. Here we go. Dudley, do-rights, rips, all falls. Rips,. Here we go! Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls! Ripsaw Falls.

Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls. You've been asking for it ever since we started the pod. Yep, we've gotten all the tweets, and we are gonna deliver. An opening day attraction at Islands of Adventure. May 28th, 1999. The world was changed

when Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls came on the scene. Forever changed the flume experience. Despite being right next to another flume with the Jurassic Park ride. Yeah, that's fine. There's a couple of flumes there, but they're not the better flume. This is a flume for the whole family. So, yeah. So, 1999, as you said, Islands of Adventure opens.

That's the second theme park in Universal Orlando. Right. It was designed to have different islands with different properties and characters. So, like, you would get a Marvel land and you would get a Dr. Seuss land. And, like, those to me make sense. Well, so here's the thing yes uh islands of adventure was supposed to be a very different park it was supposed to be called universal's cartoon world and it was supposed to be like a joint effort with warner brothers so that they could have

the looney tunes in there and uh the dc comics characters in there. They had Dr. Seuss on, it sounded like, from the beginning. And they had the Jay Ward right, so, like, Rockin' Bullwinkle, Dudley Do-Right, Peabody, and Sherman. And then the Warner Brothers stuff fell apart. So they had to scramble to, like, figure out what they were gonna do. Suddenly have some empty islands.

Yeah, and so, like, but then Jurassic Park like, hit really big at the box office so they're like well that's an island great you're in great that's in uh marvel the the comics the 90s comics bubble burst so like marvel's fortunes were quickly declining as we discussed with the stunt show yeah marvel is in dire straits this is pre uh pre-marvel cinematic universe yeah so they're far less valued. So a lot of necessity is the mother of invention.

The Lost Continent, which I do like. I think it's a neat area, but it's all public domain mythology and fables and stuff that you don't have to pay any rights. Sinbad. Sinbad. Sinbad. They call him Sinbad in case you don't know. Check out episode three, Stunt Show Showdown. But yeah, and call him Sinbad in case you don't know. Check out episode three. Don't show it. Show it down. But yeah, and Poseidon is in there.

Nobody owns Poseidon. Yeah. Nobody owns Poseidon. That was the sketch phrase. Supposedly, there is on another, one of our competitors, the season pass podcast. On a competitor? On a competitor. Shot fired across the bow at a different theme park podcast.

A guy named Phil Hedema. There's an episode with a guy named Phil Hedema, and he was one of the people who worked on the Island Park, and he seemed to imply that there's like Looney Tunes, there's a drawer somewhere with concept art for like Looney Tunes e-ticket attractions, like a Bugs Bunny ride, a Duck Dodgers ride. That sounds great. Yeah. Phil Hedema.

Look, we got great guests too. We got Mike Mitchell talking about the Ithaca Cafe. Yeah, come on. Get out of here, Phil Hedema. I also remember, and I couldn't find this, but I remember another theme park podcast where someone else who worked on it said when they were building the Toon Lagoon, which is where the Dudley Do-Right ride is, some days someone would just stick their head in and they're like, we're okay to use Kathy. We're good on Beetle Bailey. So they would just be adding stuff in last minute

so if you haven't been before you walk through the Marvel land you walk through the entrance and you get to Toon Lagoon which is where this Dudley Do-Right ride is and it is covered in pictures of comic strips yes it's just random assortments of comic strips

that were old for the time. Yeah. In the 90s, they were already like, your grandfather loved Beetle Bailey. Family Circus, Mark Trail. So, yeah. So, I was trying to find a list of all the different properties represented in Toon Lagoon, and I could not. But what I did is I went back to pictures I took in August when I was there. So... Did you hit them all?

So I tried to get them all just because I'm so fascinated by this and how bizarre it is, even for the 90s. Because the 90s was about extreme and attitude and Sonic the Hedgehog and the Noid. Those were like cool characters. And a lot of these characters were not cool. They're like families who argue over dinner. Yeah. Or don't. Or just have a nice dinner. Or like satire

that doesn't make any sense. Is there a Doonesbury? I also take these same, every time I am down there, I take these same pictures. Sure, no, we all have these pictures. We all have these pictures. I'm not saying I am unique to that. The upside down where if you tilt, you're the person taking the photo has to tilt it and you

hold a rope that's dangling down and it makes it look like you're sideways and Marmaduke is dragging you furiously across the yard. I have a couple different versions of that and different outfits. All ages, all times of your life. All ages. Happy and sad. Marmaduke was always there dragging you. I'm charted.

My height is charted on that ride. We mark it every time I go. Okay. So here we go. So there's Heathcliff. Heathcliff is in a mound of garbage, and he's got a fishing line, and he's trying to like, he's stealing a bone from the dog Spike.

You remember the Heathcliff strip and Spike, all those characters. Sure. By the way, now, you've just covered the most major character in the comics portion of Toon the Great. Well, Popeye. Popeye's kind of Toon the Great. Well, yeah. Well, Popeye. Popeye's kind of there.

Popeye was famous for cartoons. Popeye is there. Mickey Mouse. Also, a very early broadsheet comic strip. Oh, that's right. Before the cartoons. So he kind of hits a lot of, checks a lot of boxes. I think there's a couple arguments to be made.

Who's the most famous of all of these weird characters? We could spend all day arguing. If Betty Boop is more popular than Popeye, which I might argue that she is. That's right, Betty Boop is there. I think so, but from merch and saucy pajama pants. I think that's what she's known for. She's on, like, you know, I feel like she's always weirdly, it's always something about,, like a cherry or so.

There's always something suggestive with Betty Boop. It's all dirty. And she's like holding a big like heart-shaped candy box and it says like chocolate makes me horny. Yeah, they have gotten legitimately sexualizing of Betty Boop. Confusing because she is clearly from the 1940s and I think from her head, clearly a baby. Betty Boop is a baby and any sexualizing

of her is wrong. Her voice is a baby's voice. Yeah, that's right. It's an odd thing and she's lasted without having any sort of TV or movie. And she's always been, no matter the state of the culture, she's always been very thirsty. Well, that's her whole thing, yeah. Yeah, she's a thirst trap no matter the state of the culture, she's always been very thirsty. Well, that's her whole thing, yes. Yeah, she's a thirst trap.

She's a walking... What do you mean by thirsty? Horny. Horny. Oh, it's a young person's term for a horny. He's using a young person's term. Well, you're the one of us who's single, who's on the dating scene,

so you're going to learn these terms. I'm also the youngest, I believe. If I told my wife I was thirsty, she'd first say what, and then... Give you a glass of lemonade. Once I explained it, I'd be kicked out of the apartment for two weeks. I have some other properties. No, I mean...

You have more. I got them all. Yeah, okay. Well, not maybe all. So, Shoe. Do you remember Shoe, the comic strip Shoe about a bird who's an editor at a newspaper? We got Nerve? We got nerve. We got the nerve characters in their comics.

Shoe is different from Mallard Fillmore. Yes. Mallard Fillmore is totally different than Shoe. What is Shoe? Explain the characters of Shoe. I mean, as far as I remember, he says a good editor never sleeps, and that's all I remember is that neither does his stuff. So he's just a bird who works at a newspaper?

That's all I really remember. He's like a bird George Saunders. Yeah, that's a good way to think of it. Great. Of course, we have Kathy. Kathy is the ice cream window. Right. She is, she's she has an ice cream cafe.

The thing that she wants to avoid it all because she stress eats. And now she has unlimited ice cream cafe, the thing that she wants to avoid. It all because she stress eats. And now she has unlimited ice cream. Now she's on a mountain. She's in a bathing suit sitting on top of a mountain of ice cream. She's got her legs spread open. It's weird. It's totally weird to have Kathy.

Holding a spoon like a food mad maniac. Poor Kathy. It's probably one of her trademark fantasies about surfing or sitting in a giant tub of ice cream. But why would you? You're in a bathing suit on an ice cream mountain. All right. We got to keep moving. We will be here for hours.

We still haven't talked about Dudley. Jason is upset because this is one of his fantasies. Being in a giant tub of ice cream and a bathing suit. I'm not upset. I'm excited. I'm just kidding. Jason in a one piece bathing suit like Donald Duck used to wear. Hey,

now everybody's getting thirsty. Uh huh. Uh, there's all these characters. I don't remember any of their names. There's just a redheaded woman who cries. Jason, do you know who this is?

I don't know who that is. Is she a specific character? Or is she just like a tribute to film noir to noir? Uh, uh, crime. Yeah. Jason, do you know who this is? I don't know who that is. Is she a specific character or is she just like a tribute to film noir? To noir, uh, crime. Yeah, there was a lot of, uh, serialized, like, crime. There was more adventure strips back in the day. Serious comics.

Like Dick Tracy, who they did not have the rights to. Um, I'm skipping over a few. Nancy and Sluggo. You can get a, there's a stand-up with Nancy and Sluggo, which I love. Like, Nancy and Sluggo. I was saving this for the with Nancy and Sluggo, which I love. I was saving this for the end because... Oh, okay. The grand finale. No, we'll go right to Nancy and Sluggo.

There's another weird thing. The bathrooms are themed to Gasoline Alley, which is a very old, old comic strip. I don't know a single one of these. Was Gasoline Alley about incontinent people? I think it was people who worked at a garage. They were mechanics, I believe. Here's Sluggo, Scott.

Oh, he's the little pale guy. I'm sorry, Sluggo. I'm sorry to insult Sluggo, but he looks like a human version of Curious George. He kind of looks like a... I've sent a picture of Sluggo to mutual friends of Jason and I, and they all go, oh, it's Jason. Sluggo is

Jason. Oh, no. I walked right into that. That's fine. I looked up, yeah, Sluggo is lovable, but here, so I looked up Sluggo's biography. This is a side note, but I feel like we needed to share, because when are we going to talk about Sluggo again on the show? Okay, so this is what the character, like his history to talk about sluggo again on the show okay so this is this is the bio this is what the character like his history and whatever sluggo smith is nancy's

best friend introduced in 1938 sluggo is nancy's agent is a poor ragamuffin type from the wrong side of the tracks he is sometimes described as nancy's boyfriend he is portrayed as lazy and his favorite pastime seems to be napping he lives at 720 Drab Street in an abandoned house he found. And according to a storyline in 2013 strips, is taken care of by his truck driver uncles, in parenthesis, less and more, who discovered that he

had lived in an orphanage. His mother died after he was born and his father died serving his country. Sluggo's uncle Vince is shady, and his rich aunt Maggie in California doesn't care about him because he reminds her of when she was poor. Sluggo ran away from the orphanage,

and his cousin Chauncey gave him $200, and he took the train as far as Three Rocks. This is the most 30s specific character you could imagine. Also, I feel like it's worth mentioning, the Nancy comic strip was originally very different. It mostly focused on her saucy, attractive aunt. And then they introduced Nancy, her lovable, funny niece. And everyone's like, we like Nancy more than just this

weird aunt character. So it's like when Fonzie kind of took over Happy Days. Yes, pretty much. Except Nancy perhaps not as dynamic as Fonzie or Urkel. Nancy, pretty dynamic. I mean, Nancy gets up to some real mischief.

You're talking to Jason's girlfriend Nancy. I'm talking about Jason's girlfriend, Nancy. I'm talking about Jason's girlfriend, Nancy. She's my nap buddy. There are like nice, like glossy collections of the

Nancy, like daily comic strips that Fantagraphics puts out like every year and they're like still pretty funny. Like,

it's hard to make humor that like holds up over decades and like the nancy strips are very odd like they're very weird um your love for nancy we may end up talking about we may i may be starting a nancy podcast on feral audio do a build your own theme park kind of thing maybe you you invent the entire nancy slugiverse oh yeah nancy and sluggo try to like catch some wily junkyard dogs or whatever people did back in the 30s um you get to listen to fdr's fireside chats with them

yeah experience politics as they did uh i i have a couple uh properties yeah i mean go maybe this is one of them. Is that the, oh, is that Nemo in Slumberland? Like, Nemo in Slumberland falling out?

Yeah, that's another, that's like a weird, I don't know what that is. I've never, Little Nemo in Slumberland? Little Nemo was,

I think, the very first newspaper comic strip and is like historic in the world of comics in general and he's just

falling off the roof of a building and there's a sinister moon looking at him in Islands of Adventure. And it says, he's saying there's a word balloon. He goes, oh, I'm falling out of bed. And that's it. That's the joke. And then the moon, yeah, the moon is just staring at him. In Toon Lagoon, see all of your favorite sad little boys.

Yeah. There's a Dagwood restaurant. Dagwoodwood the guy who makes real big sandwiches from the strip blondie that's from the strip also very 30s because that's like you want to live vicariously uh through uh adventures and comics and stuff imagine eating a giant sandwich sandwich with a whole fish with the head and tail sticking out of it. Only few people in the 30s get to eat a giant sandwich. I remember eating at that restaurant one of the first times my family went to Islands of Adventure and it is still to this day one of the

worst meals I have ever had. I ordered one of those giant sandwiches and it was bad. And you love theme park garbage food. Yeah, sure. I love it. I'm not saying I don't either. I'm saying it really must have been bad. It's bad.

Yeah, deli sandwiches are not a good pick at theme parks. I would avoid, usually, I would avoid lunch meats unless they're slicing it fresh. And they do not slice it fresh at Dagwood's Sandwich Shop in Islands of Adventure. The sandwich on the outside of the Dagwood restaurant is disgusting. I saw a photo of it. If that didn't turn you off, then maybe you deserve it. Yeah, I probably did. You should have known what you were getting yourself into.

There was also the Wassamata U store. That is, of course, Bullwinkle's alma mater. He went to Wassamata U. That, when it first opened, sold course, Bullwinkle's alma mater. He went to Wassamata U. That, when it first opened, sold rockin' Bullwinkle merchandise, and from my memory, very quickly morphed into an internet cafe.

A popular trend in the early 2000s, a place where people would go and pay for internet access. Was it like a place at Islands of Adventure where you could go check AOL or whatever? Yeah, check your email, like that sort of thing. Which would have been, I think I went when I was like a pissed off teen in 2002 or something. I probably like, let me check my email.

Then my girlfriend emailed me. That's probably, yeah, that serves a function. And last time I was there, I think it sold phone cases and Minions t-shirts. Like most stores at Island of Adventure. So they have not determined that they needed a full-time Rocky and Bullwinkle specific store. No. The only real merch, or the most of the cartoon merch

that's sold there is Popeye stuff and Betty Boop stuff. And Betty Boop, yeah. In August, when we were there. And the Popeye stuff is straight-up bizarre. It's like Popeye Breaking Bad parody shirts. Oh, yeah. And the Popeye stuff is straight up bizarre. It's like Popeye Breaking Bad parody shirts. Oh, yeah. And it's like BR,

which is the symbol, which for what? One of the elements table. Spinach. It's a symbol for spinach. And then it's like bros and it's just Popeye

and Bluto. Is that Bluto is the character's name? Yeah. Pete is from Disney. Yeah, they're very, they're similar. But they're the same character.

Grumpy Sailors, yes. Yeah, Popeye and Wimpy. There's probably some Wimpy shirts. Wimpy's hamburger window was not open when I was there at the end of summer. Wimpy, another character that you've been compared to many times. Another character I've been compared to. He's kind of like a grown sluggo a little bit. Yeah, pretty much.

Fan theory. Sluggo is, sluggo grew up into Wimpy. By Pokemon rules, a sluggo evolves into a Wimpy. And finally, into a Jason. Into a Jason. The other Toon Lagoon thing that place that sells food is another Popeye character who I know you have a lot of affection for. It's Popeye's father? Poopdeck Pappy.

Yeah. Sometimes referred to as just Pappy. Sure. Popeye's father is named Poopdeck Pappy, in case anyone... I mean, obviously you guys all knew that, but in case you didn't know that... Just catching up, any weirdos who aren't up to speed. But you've done, Jason, I know you've done a lot of research on Poop Deck Pappy. And I'm not being facetious, right?

No. You wrote a sketch about Poop Deck Pappy at one point? Yeah, me and our past guest, Marissa Strickland, wrote and did a sketch once about a man whose sexual kink was Popeye. It was like being Popeye specifics. Like he had anchor tattoos and spinach was an aphrodisiac and wanted to be called Poop Deck Pappy. So we spent just hours reading about the Popeye mythos. And it's very weird.

I'm severely disturbed by all things Popeye. I find it so unpleasant. I hate every voice. The live action movie is very weird. Yeah, yeah, terrifying. Directed by Robert Altman, starring Robin Williams. Co-directed by cocaine. But an interesting Harry Nilsson score.

An interesting Harry Nilsson, yes. Reprised in Punch Drunk Love, sampled in Punch Drunk Love. So that would make you think it was fun and worth checking out again, right? But then I've tried. You put on five minutes of that thing and it's terrifying. I'm afraid of like sea stuff to like giant octopuses

and that kind of thing freak me out and it's a disturbing movie. But you know how they made people want to go and investigate Popeye? You build a rapids ride and you build a children's play area. The Popeye and Bluto's Bilge Rat Barges and the children's play area,

Me Ship the Olive. And that's one of the highlights of Toon Lagoon is you leave that part of the park drenching wet. Like you can just get soaking wet on all of the rides there in the Florida heat. The thing about Universal is they're not gentle with you in the water. Disney's a little more. Splash Mountain, you can still get pretty wet. But we went on a couple years ago, first to Popeye, then on to Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls.

And we were just soaked. It was like we got into a shower or we got into a tub filled with water, and we got out, and every part of you was soaked. It was impossible. They make you pay to get dry. It's this evil shit they do. There's these big dryers, and it's like $5 to get dry. And it's like, well, I don't want to pay.

It's still kind of hot, but then you're walking around miserable, and the dryer is only located outside those rides, and it's a very cruel thing they do to you getting wet at the theme park is something i may have retired from as an adult can you imagine that i don't want to walk around with like uh with a wet wallet oh my father yeah my father uh hates it like he's always like we're doing that last and i'm going back to the hotel like because he Because he doesn't like, I love it. Because I think, I love getting wet. He loves wet pants at a theme park.

A big sloppy sandwich after. I think it's really fun. Like, I think all, well, this park too, the way it was originally designed, like you would hit Toon Lagoon, do all these water rides, and then you would go around

the bend to Jurassic Park and another water ride. So it's kind of smart the way they put all of that stuff next to each other and get dried off by dueling dragons that uh yeah serve the air suction serves as a natural dryer and now there's a fucking air-conditioned kong kong ride right in the middle to make you very cold yes yeah yeah die of uh hypothermia um so so let's get to the unless do you have another thing

or do you want to get to the actual ride itself I have a question so now we've set the scene we've taken you all the way through Toon Lagoon up to our highlight ride but why did we all agree that Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls was worth an episode but not Popeye and Bluto's

Bilge Rat Barges Ripsaw Falls to me feels like it's the better ride it is the better ride was worth an episode, but not Popeye and Bluto's bilge rat barges. Ripsaw Falls, to me, feels like it's the better ride. It is the better ride. Yeah, I think it's got a more coherent story. I guess it is a more coherent story. I suppose that's true. I would like to hear the argument. I feel like they're both a little half-assed story-wise.

But I, although, I don't know if you guys caught this but i i was watching some making of video some behind the scenes video that that uh made the popeye story sound a lot more complicated than i knew which is that pop that's what apparently the story is that when you get on popeye is gonna like take you around a river like a nice river uh it's gonna be very calm and then bluto steals he like makes a false turn in the queue or something to where you don't know till you're on it that you're on bluto's bilge rat barges so he like absconds with you and then you're on a ride which they'd fail to convey right i don't know yeah i don't know i feel like i remember one or two signs that are like normal signs and then it has like a fake like shitty paint cross out.

Okay. And a fake like arrow this way. That's what's happening. So a little trick. Bluto is stealing you. So that, now you guys got to compete with them. Maybe that's my role on this podcast. I will argue Popeye versus Dudley Do-Right.

But look, you got a pretty big twist in that ride. Can the storytelling of Dudley Do-Right top the complexity of Bill Dredd Barges? I mean... Oh, I don't know. I just think it's charming. No, I'm holding you to the wall. This has to be complex storytelling or I'm out. Well, I remember being a kid and at some point Nickelodeon and Nick at Night were both showing

Rocky and Bullwinkle. Like they had this indication rights and they're like we're just going to show it on both. We're just going to show it on both. So I watched a lot of it a few summers. I do. I think probably it starts because I do have more affection for the Jay Ward stuff than I do for Popeye. Like I enjoyed

that as a kid more than I gave a shit about Popeye. I liked the game. I liked the old arcade game with Popeye. I liked going to get the spinach, but that's probably the thing of Popeye I like the most. I liked when Wimpy would eat a cheeseburger.

Did you like Dudley Do-Right? I feel like I have consumed very little Dudley Do-Right content in my life. That is the thing. I said Jay Ward specifically because it wasn't like Dudley was the one I liked the best of all the J. Ward-verse. But the general veneer where it is, I think Simpsons writers will drop Rocky and Bullwinkle especially and the J. Ward stuff. It's snarky and self-aware and kind of a little more adult than other kids' cartoons. They were prime time and a little smarter, a little bawdier. And more kind of clever and more levels than like Flintstones and Jetsons.

Yeah, for sure. Which are very like surface, I mean, like fine shows. But like, yeah, you'd see like pop culture references and parodies and stuff. Yeah. And like the kind of storytelling that knows, where they know it's a'd see like pop culture references and parodies and stuff. Yeah. And like, uh, the kind of storytelling that knows where they, they know it's a story and step outside of it and comment on it. And yeah,

I agree. I like the J. And, and like, uh, uh, what are the bad guys names in rock and bow? Winkle,

Boris and Natasha, Natasha, like much, uh, much better, uh, cold war, Russia jokes than the, Russia-based humor nowadays.

I don't know. It just seems more fun and more biting. It seems more biting to have these stupid cartoon spies just being incompetent at trying to kill a moose and a squirrel, like, just fucking that up every week. That's the problem. The myth of incompetent Russian spies. It's no longer applicable. That's true.

It wouldn't make sense now. They wouldn't hire Boris and Natasha these days. I guess. No, they need geniuses to buy shitty Facebook ads that five people click on. To fish Podesta's emails. Forrest could have fished Podesta.

John Podesta, I think. So the ride takes the form of one of these Dudley Do-Right shorts. There's some moose heads. There's some animatronic moose heads talking to you in the queue. There's a big movie strength nod.

to Catch a Bear? Yes. Can you read? A quick note about the heads. There's a bear and a beaver. Oh, excuse me.

Yeah. Right? Yeah, you're right. Yeah, it's a bear and a beaver. Voices of these two characters, Dom DeLuise, Charles

Nelson Riley. Wow. Awesome. Hey. So, already a Yeah, it's a bear. Voices of these two characters, Dom DeLuise, Charles Nelson Reilly. Wow. Awesome. Hey. So already a strike. Great. A good strike. Celebrity con, the Elizabeth Banks and Stanley Tucci of their day.

There's a big movie screen playing the like safety video. And that also kind of like sets up the story a little. And there's a lot of like theater-y. There's like a projector and then like a cartoonishly a projector prop and like oh yeah I like you're in the so you kind of this old time going into a movie theater silent movie

how is this like yeah and any Nickelodeon feel which yeah and that's the start of the ride is like the credits of right a little short if you don't know Dudley do right like he's basically a parody of old silent movies where there would be like old-timey piano music and like oh help help the woman is on the train tracks and like it's goofing on that which which is part of what i'm going to

talk about is just how bizarre it is to make this right in 1999 it's a parody of something from the early part of the 20th century already. In a land that is entirely Depression era. But yeah, that's where the whole, that's where it starts out, where they got the idea for Dudley Do-Right. And in general, this is I think the odd thing to me, but especially Toon Lagoon, they've added new things to Islands of Adventure, but a lot of Islands of Adventure has just not changed at all since 1999 in any way. There's been no way to evolve or mod out things like Dudley Do-Right or Popeye.

So now it's like locked in silent film era stuff via 1999. It has not changed in almost 20 years. And I'm wondering how much of that is money and how much of it is just like well people still like it it's still reviewed that is true you're not obliged to change up a theme park right if it's if it's working and people go on it i feel like dudley is is usually pretty consistent when i go on it like i think wait time uh no no just in terms of experience like stuff is usually working and And also just the ride system. It is a fast log float. You go pretty fast.

Splash Mountain, the last few years when I've ridden it, the logs back up a lot. And it kind of kills the energy. And that doesn't happen as much on Dudley because the flow of the water is fast. And you go down the drop fast. Yeah. I think that's why I won't go down the drop fast. Yeah, yeah. I think that's why I won't go on it again. I did it once, and yeah, it is a much more intense drop because then you get that second hill.

It gets pretty fast. I'm disturbed even recalling the memory. Because you're not. I don't want to out you, but you've talked about how you don't like these rides, these drop rides. I don't go on, yeah, I don't do drops. I'm not doing Dr. Doom's Fearfall. I'm not doing...

Well, I agree with you on that. You won't do a tower, but you'll do, I don't do Guardians. I don't do Tower of Terror. If I'm enclosed on a giant drop, I'm okay with it. But with my legs dangling and it's outside, I don't see the point. You feel too naked.

You feel too exposed. I feel like I'm going to slide out and it's too stressful. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If only I could go that way. You've tried to open the restraints. I've tried to open. I want to give myself to Dr. Doom and the kingdom of Latin America. I support your mission, Dr. Doom.

I support your mission. Take my fear juice. Yeah, that's true though I don't go on the drop ride so that's gonna that'll keep coming up in certain episodes yeah but I did go on this one

I did it is fun and decor but I was like terrified going up that hill I'm like I'm really freaked out

on drop hills yeah I feel legitimately torturous memories. Yeah, there's a few little drops too. So you're going up and down a lot.

Yeah, there's like three drops that have significance kind of like Splash Mountain. I mean, this is also obviously a parody of Splash Mountain. Yeah.

There's a lot of similar, like the ride setup is very similar and there's a couple different drops and before you get to the big one my voice cracking um but uh but hey you know you get to so so you're in a dudley do-right cartoon and you're meeting you're seeing all your favorite characters dudley do-right snidely whiplash uh the the mustache twirling villain nell nell his girlfriend or his would-be girlfriend who like kind of doesn't really like him oh yeah yeah that's the whole thing like she

doesn't he like likes her but she's like kind of just berates him and it's just pure necessity she needs him around right constant saving uh no nell fenwick perhaps the least bechdel test passing character in uh in cinema history but kind of self-referential to the fact that it's playing on the trope of the woman in peril as well yeah so maybe you could argue is is i wouldn't argue that by the way but maybe you could i'm not saying there's anything like particularly sexist about the character. Just when you think about it, that her only function is one man wants her to be one place and another one wants her to be another place. I feel like there are jokes every now and then where she's tied to the trade tracks. It's like, oh, this again.

Yeah, that must be where they're at, like episode two, right? What's another Dudley Do-Rightley do right plot that isn't? It's all the same. I watched one earlier today, and it's just the joke is that Snidely Whiplash keeps tricking him into being tied to a different woman on the track. So he's like, put your finger here. It would make me feel bad. He's like, he tries to convince him that he's rehabilitated, but then he just ties a woman

in the train track and Dudley gets stuck in it. And it keeps happening over and over again. I think they say like Snidely is like his pastime, tying women to the train tracks. What's his profession then? That's a good point. How does he make a living? I don't know.

How does he pay for these fancy hats and suits? That's the same suit and hat. Also, why are these kind of, we're in like canadian mountie world and then why is there this like fancy magician walking around like he's not particularly rustic i think he's like a baron or like a robber baron or a railroad baron sort of like sinister looking is he like a guy who would own the the loggery yeah and be siphoning money off of it or uh investing it in shell companies yeah

i assume he's doing like corporate plundering as well as literal yeah that's probably how he's getting his like living money so he's a he's a an evil he's a city corporate influence uh disrupting the beauty of nature which is why there's a general tension with the parks community. Yeah, yeah, no, yeah. That's the backdrop of it, which we set. Right. And there's also a horse. And a horse.

The horse is funny. The horse is like, you know, I think a joke in the Dudley cartoons, the horse is usually smarter than him. So socioeconomic messages and a funny horse. And a funny, yes. A horse. And Nell, like, usually sometimes swoons over the horse. More so than Dudley. The joke is that Nell wants to fuck the horse.

And not Dudley Durell. Which is, I mean, what it is. Like, they're not going to say that, but, like, it's like she kisses the horse at the end. At the end of the ride. And not Dudley. And, like, that's a common joke they do. And if you'll allow me just to, you guys keep talking. I'm going to see if there's any Rule 57. Oh, please don't.

Oh, no. Please. And you guys at home, look that up on your own. Because we're not going to sully our Twitter with such X-rated material. But if I see any, I'll describe it. So you ride through the ride. Yeah. Nell gets tied to the train tracks.

Dudley rides us off on the horse. There's a sassy narrator. The narrator in the Dudley Do-Right cartoons is very pointed. I could be wrong, but the original narrator, I believe, was Paul Freese. I think that's right. Who did the Haunted Mansion voiceover and Great Moments of Mission Lincoln. Ah, right, right. And also in the original, Hans Conrad,

who is, I think, the voice of Captain Hook and a lot of early Disney things. They got some of the really good early Disney voices. The Jay Ward Company responsible for the original design and creation of Captain Crunch. Yes, a lot of cereals. They did a lot of cereals as well. I don't remember the Quisp mascot, but he was a weird alien, maybe?

I think the Quisp mascot was a weird alien. We'll have to look that up. Yeah, so they did a lot of stuff what i do think is weird about is that the big ride they didn't pick they picked like the most the fifth most popular jay ward property because like a big rocky and bovinkle ride would have made sense because rocky and bovinkle still was pretty well known in the 90s had a revival on vhs yes i had a rocky doll like i one that translates the best i think yeah oh that was part of the the disney universal war there for a while because one of them bought the like home video rights for rocky and bullwinkle and they were like trying to they were like bidding over and trying to get

them back because universal had the theme park right and they're like well we want to put out we're going to sell the fucking videos oh really uh which once they got when universal got those theme park rides they ended up in the parks like that's that's the thing i remember loving from going to universal studios in like 1992 uh like really charming little rocky bullwinkle show street shows and walk to get your picture with them yeah i think my dad was handed a big bomb where the fuse was going. Oh, no. That was delightful, and he made it. He survived, everybody. Death in a theme park today as a large

cartoonish bomb went off. An understandable mix-up. He assumed it was a prop, and he made a wrong assumption. Yeah. Hey, by the way, I am looking at a gif of Nell getting double- by Dudley Stoss. Indeed I am.

I'll describe it no further, but I'll flip it your way. Oh my God. With some minimal animation. Whoa, it's moving. Yeah, you were right. It's a gif. Some fun little thrusts. Oh, Jesus Christ.

It does appear, though, that the horse is wearing a condom. So don't worry. They're playing it safe. Save it for you. Anyway, back to Rocky and Bullwinkle and how much we loved it as kids. Yeah, Rocky and Bullwinkle I liked a lot. Peabody and Sherman I feel like was more popular than Dudley Do-Right as well. They were very prominent on that show.

I even think maybe George of the Jungle. I knew the song better. Georgia the Jungle was well known. So it is kind of odd that they picked Dudley Do-Right. Now, I'm sure we were going to talk about this anyway. This is the same year, and I don't know if you have any information about this, this is the same year

that the Dudley Do-Right movie came out in theaters i bet i i have a feeling that was just fortuitous timing like that was just luck yes i mean i think that it was probably a luck because like they were not so good with the synergy like these days they're a little bit better about everybody's a bit better about having a ride or a thing coming right when when the movie starts. Getting that Avatar ride out 11 years before Avatar 2. Fair enough. That disproves what I just said.

But fine. They were trying to coordinate. Because of the sequels. Especially this part of the park. It seems like they were scrambling to get it done and open and to make a lick of sense. I learned that this ride

was going to be delayed and open a year after Islands of Adventure, but they cut budgets in order for it to be open in 99. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. I do think it's pretty slick, like as I was thinking about it. It's like, oh, Toon Lagoon.

And like the logo has like a lot of splashing water in it. And it like, yeah, it's all water. So they're like, they try to lean into the island, like the different, I feel like earlier on there was more like leaning into like the island part of islands of adventure like you know tokyo disney seaway where water is a component of a lot of the rides yeah and there used to be the skipper i really like the like junk boat the skipper island tours there used to be these like fake looking like junky boats that you could take from the port of entry across to jurassic park and that lasted i think barely two years like and it was

just for cost um i wonder if that's just a charm that's like a charm atmosphere kind of ride and not necessary to keep open. They also used to do like a big nighttime water show at Islands of Adventure. They used to do fireworks from there and that sort of thing. And that quickly got sent back over to Universal in Florida. This is a sidetrack, actually, but there was a video. I've talked to Mike about this. I don't know if I've talked to Mike about this. I don't know if I've talked to you about it. There's an Islands of Adventure promotional video where you meet a John Hammond, who's clearly a younger man with dyed white hair and beard. And he looks exactly like if you dyed yourself. I think Mike

sent me a photo of your dad. Of my father. Yes. Apparently, we should do a side by side here and see how accurate this is but apparently your dad looks like an off brand John Hammond yeah well every time we're at a universal park someone makes an employee goes like shouldn't you be at the Jurassic Park adventure like someone

makes a joke he's not dragged backstage and put on a clock is he? No get back to work Hammond it was only Half Con just thought He's not dragged backstage and put on the clock, is he? No. Get back to work, Hammond. It was only Hefcon just thought that we would end up comparing most of these characters to you and your family. To my family. We're up to number seven. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Well, I don't know. We haven't gotten mean with it. And you look like the horse, too. Damn it. Well, the horse is charming and funny. Yeah, you're right. If you're going to be anybody. Gets the girl.

This is why you like Islands of Adventure so much, because it seems like home. Oh, yeah. Like you're looking in a mirror everywhere you go. I do have very, my family always had a great time and I've been, I think I talked about this before, the fact that Islands of Adventure hasn't changed is in such stark contrast to a lot of the theme park theme parks in the country that Islands of Adventure hasn't changed is in such stark contrast to a lot of the theme parks in the country

that change a lot more, especially the Disney parks in Florida. So it is weird to think about sometimes. It is trippy down there sometimes, being like, I was here when I was 13, and then 16, and then 20, and now uh recently uh 31 and it's like it gets it's uh uh trippy it's just odd to think soon enough all of as all of our ashes are thrown in toon lagoon

the trippiest thing of all i mean i would every time you go down there you go you know what i've gotten older but toon lagoon stayed the same like Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused I have to say the way the ride ends I always kind of like the line they use at the end

do you remember this? no like the narrator the Paul Freese-esque narrator goes like and it it's something along the lines of like

and it just goes to show you a mountie always gets his man but not always the girl and that's when you see she's kissing the horse and i'm like oh i'm always like oh that's that's cute that's she's kissing the horse though she's giving a little kiss on the cheek yeah no no it's not like in that picture you showed us or yeah it's not for your porno same for it for your porno podcast. Well, and they need to, in our more risque future, in 50 years, they're going to need to step it up.

They're going to have to get all these characters fucking. Because Toon Lagoon will still be standing. Certainly. In 50 years. Toon Lagoon will, God willing,

outlive us all. Toon Lagoon will probably outlive some of those comics. I mean, some of those comic strips do not run. Yeah, it already has. They already have. Little Nemo is not still publishing, is it? Dune Lagoon will probably outlive some of those comics. I mean, some of those comic strips do not run. They already have. Little Nemo is not still publishing, is it?

Every now and then there's tribute. There's tribute anthologies to it. Because it's very influential for a lot of comics artists. Have you been asked to collaborate on a Little Nemo? Yeah, but oddly enough, I slept through the conference call. So I should, like, look, we're talking so glowingly about it. I have some minor complaints about this ride. Sure, nothing's perfect. I know you're going to be upset.

You're going to be upset about this. I'll be fine. I'll live. Like, it's supposed to be a Splash Mountain parody, but there's no interior scenes at all. It's almost all outside. And the animatronics are very limited. It's like there's barely any movement. There's some dialogue.

But anytime, like on Splash Mountain, you do a cool like drop and all of a sudden you're in like the dark and you're in a forest and there's Br'er Bear and Br'er Rabbit. But like this, you're doing a cool drop and you're in just another piece of the barn. You're in a different barn

that's not decorated at all. These shrubs kind of. If I may give them too much credit, those Jay Ward cartoons had a more limited animation style. I don't think that's why.

So I think it works. I think it works for this ride. But there should be like a cool elaborate train tracks and the only reference we have to the train is a

Mr. Toad parody where they say something about, oh, watch out for the train and then the lights come at you like at the end of Mr. Toad where a train's gonna hit you. But we don't get a cool, big elaborate scene like on Splash Mountain with Snidely Whiplash and train tracks and a full-size train coming

at you. It just feels parts of this feel cheap. Yeah, yeah. That boat sequence at the end of Splash Mountain is one of the most expensive things that ever built in a day. It's crazy. There's a big riverboat at the end of Splash Mountain and all these 50 animatronics singing and dancing.

These things cost money. But there's a cool little trick with the train scene in this in that you think you're going through it. It's pitch black and then the train light and the train sounds and then you drop. There is a drop trick with the train scene in this, in that you think you're going through it, it's pitch black, and then the train light and the train sounds, and then you drop. There is a drop in the darkness. There is a drop, and it's not that it's not fun. I'm just saying you have to compare this to Splash Mountain, because it's built years after Splash Mountain, and it's supposed to be sort of a parody. But it lacks the depth of fun and characters and show scenes.

So it's like, it's a little disappointing in that regard because you never get some wow thing like you do on Splash Mountain. I find it a little chintzy. I think that is a little chintzy. It is a little my reservation about the ride in general. With Splash Mountain though, I don't know that we would ever see a big animatronic show scene like that again. Because part of that is the fact that they had a warehouse full of animatronic animals. Pictures taken out of another ride they'd closed or a show they'd closed.

But I think we're going to see that on Star Wars Land. They're going to build 150 robots and we're going to get to go through it every time. And it's going to be amazing. I hope so. That's in 2018. But that's a mega big ticket attraction. You know, this is just one of the many rides that's on Adventure. So it's never going to be.

Do you guys know about the, I barely caught this while researching on the way here. Do you guys know about like the big finale that was cut from this ride? I know. I don't know. I only barely caught it on a site called Theme Park University, which has some great live-by-the-scenes stories. Check out Theme Park University. Shout out to Theme Park University. Indeed.

They posted, they have not only this story but also some concept art that what was supposed to happen is that the entire ride was going to be two logs put next to each other, made to look like one log, and then when you got up to the final hill snidely whiplash was going to lower his big chainsaw into the water splitting wow logs in

half isn't that cool oh man and then you would have gone there like you would have split apart and gone into two slightly different flumes man yeah so that was kind of the big money thing that was that would have been that would have obviously upped the production value and given you something extra and fun. Oh man, that would have been cool. Isn't that cool? Yeah, and you can see they did drawings of how this was going to work, although you still can't really imagine how that would

work exactly. I mean, I guess maybe the thing would just dip and then you'd split at the point that the chainsaw is in the water, then you'd split the two different ways right very neat and I think that idea would make

it a great ride I think the cutting of that makes it a good solid ride yeah and to be fair whoever the people who made the ride probably had a hundred cool ideas that were cut this is true of so many rides nobody wants rides to be chintzy. When I'm saying, yeah, the things that I don't like,

I'm not going after the people who made it. I'm going after those tight-ass corporate penny pinchers. Yeah, especially when you have to open a whole park. Like, stuff starts to get scaled back, and there's like, we've got to open by this date. Yeah. And we've got to make this money back. Disneyland itself got to evolve so slowly.

Disneyland was probably, though revolutionary at the time, probably felt very chintzy until the 60s, until the major rides started showing up, to open a park out of the gate in the 90s that has to immediately compete with... With Disney. Yeah, yeah. That is a tall order. Although Islands of Adventure, God knows, did it way better than California Adventure, which took a very long time to catch up. For sure. compete with with disney yeah yeah that that is a tall order although islands of adventure god

knows did it way better than california adventure which took a very long time for sure although i did read a funny thing and i remembered this uh personally um there was confusion the first year or so of islands of adventure because they had done a marketing rebrand for the whole resort to call it universal escape oh yeah and and and didn't do a clear enough job of going we have a whole separate park now and two three hotels in city like everyone just thought oh islands of adventure it's a new land at universal okay and so then that the marketing changed to go like two parks and and an entertainment district and a hotel. Oh yeah, they really threw it at you. Two.

Also, a year and a half after this park opened, 9-11 happened and really Orlando tours, no one was traveling at all, let alone to Florida. I mean, Disney just shut down some of the hotels in Orlando for a while until attendance sort of went back up. That was a grim time in theme park world, and I think you probably felt the decay in that, can you guys name offhand a lot of good attractions built from 2002 to 2008? It was a pretty dry time. Right.

Yeah. I cannot name. The worst effect, obviously, of December 11th is the dearth of great theme park rides I was going to say I'm going to praise it for one thing here wonderful at the end after you're done

you go on this bridge and there are water cannons that if you pay 25 cents you can spray people spray a stranger that just finished the big drop on the ride so they think oh my gosh it's done it's over and you can strategically hit a button and hit them in the head with a burst of water now this might not this sounds cruel this might sound like it's not fun my girlfriend and i this is a couple years ago we actually didn't do that this time we We should have, I don't know why we didn't. We went over, we put the quarter in and we hit it. And the people reacted so like, ah, like they

freaked out so much and then started laughing. It was the most satisfying part of the whole ride. We both like squealed with the light that we had just done these to the stranger. I know this making it sounds like we're maniacs, but there is something so fun about giving like an extra little like scare now they're getting money out of us i know yeah to do it but it is a really nice little fun thing at the end of the ride that is uh that is like a universal creative has a term for something like that they call it j pops named after j stein, one of the former heads of Universal. The idea is that it's a big scare,

it's a big startling moment, but because you're sharing it with people you're with, or even strangers, you all go, ah! And then you all laugh. So it's a thing that is a trope in a lot of Universal rides. And I do think it is part of what's fun about this part of the park.

You get J-popped all over the place. Yeah, it's fun to see a stranger get soaked. J-pop's popping off all over. You laugh at a stranger getting a bucket of water dumped on them. And then you get your comeuppance immediately because then you get drenched on the rapids ride. We got J-popped and then you all start laughing. Shout out to J-Stein. Shout out to Jay Stein. Shout out to Jay Ward.

So many Jays bringing you the magic over at Dudley Dews, Ripsaw Falls. 2017. Almost 20 years after. High Away, 2017. That was our hip-hop-ish celebration of the ride Alright, should we wrap up this? Yeah, do we have anything else to add before we give it our scale? We figure out where it lands on the scale?

No, go for it Okay, so we have the scale, we assess the ride Do we want to keep the ride absolutely as it is? Don't change a thing about it, we love it Do we want to plus it up? Do we want to add stuff to the ride to make it better? Or do we want to burn it down for insurance purposes in a mysterious fire? So, Jason, would you like to go first?

Sure. I have a guess what you're going to say. You know, I would say after learning about that original ending, I say, like, yeah, keep the spirit of it, but, like, yeah, let's plus it up. Let's revamp it. We'll soon enough be at Islands of Adventure's 20-year anniversary. So I think it'd be cool if some of the stuff that's still there from the opening, they just, like, they just hyper, like, amped them up.

I think that would be really cool to do. And, I mean, I thought it was when they redid the footage on Spider-Man I mean, I thought it was, when they redid the footage on Spider-Man, I thought it really like, it's like, oh, this gave this ride. It practically feels like a brand new ride. All the beats are the same, but it just looks a lot better and still looks pretty good.

So yeah, I think keep this ride pretty similar, but yeah, put some new stuff in there. Put some new animatronics. Non-structural changing. Yeah. And it still has a double track. They did build it with that

and they cut the... They just run two logs at a time, but you could very easily put in the chainsaw at the end. I think that would step it up to the next level and make it a lot more exciting and unique. Yeah, the only thing is you have to commit to that. Like Radiator Springs Racers and California Adventure,

I feel like so often I've been on it where it's like there's a point where the cars are supposed to get to a starting line of a race and you're supposed to race. And so often it's just been one car or like one car goes like well before the other cars out of the previous seat. Rides give up on the racing very easily. So, yeah, look, it would create some operational challenges, but it'd be neat anyway. Yeah. Yeah.

But, you know, spend some of that Harry Potter money, guys. Spread the wealth. Back into the community, into Toon Lagoon. Well, you know, I have my suggestion of how to plus it up. It's a link that I can send them from, I believe the maker is Nope Porn. God damn it. It lays out perfectly what they should do that makes it edgier. I'll show it to you guys again.

You already have the animatronics. And it's very simple animation. Almost the level that the animatronics do already. So let's get these characters a little more intimate. It makes it a little more edgy for the youth of today. I'll send you the link, Islands of Adventure executives. How dare you. Jason is offended. I'm choice.

I guess I'm a little thirsty today. What can I say? Okay, so I also am going to say plus it up. I have a kind of a radical idea, though, because I think that there's too few robots on the ride, and I think there's not, look, they're not going to make this, they're not going to tear it down and rebuild it, because that's what I would want. I would want something where they totally build some cool

scenes where you feel like you're in the mountains of Canada, and you feel like there's an actual giant train coming at you. But I know that's not going to happen. So what can we do? We can put more robots on the ride. And what robots do I want? Not necessarily just the Jay Ward. I think we should put all the comic strip robots on this ride.

All the characters. We've seen pictures on the walls. I want Little Nemo on the ride. I want Dagwood and Blondie on the ride. I want Nancy and Sluggo waving hello. And then we can change this from Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls to just call it the Toon Lagoon Ripsaw Falls. Like, let's keep it simple here and have a very similar narrative. Like, it can still be sort of Snidely Whiplash's kidnap.

Maybe he kidnaps Nancy and Sluggo has to get,, he's kidnapping different women tying them to train tracks. Sluggo goes to a pawn shop and buys a gun. That's fine. I love that. That's a great idea too. I want you to pack these sides with robots of all these characters because kids are wondering why can't we ride a ride with Heathcliff on it? They see Heathcliff on the wall

and they go, where's the Heathcliff ride? They don't know. I want to see him fishing for a grabbing a fish bone out of the banks of the two lagoon waters. So as you're rising up on that and they go, where's the Heathcliff ride? They don't know. I want to see him fishing for a... Exactly. Grabbing a fish bone out of the banks of the two lagoon waters. So as you're rising up on the big drop, you see Heathcliff and he's fishing and you're like, there he is. There's Heathcliff and you're satisfied

because we've teased all these characters and then you don't pay him off. I want Mary Worth to say a passive-aggressive thing to me at the end. That's right. That's perfect. That's exactly... Now you're thinking,

this is what I want. I want to pay off the end. That's right. That's perfect. That's exactly... Now you're thinking. Yeah. And this is what I want. I want to pay off the fact that we see all these characters. Now we actually get to experience them on a ride. So I think that... PJ, Family Circus PJ running around with a dotted line, leaving a dotted line trail. That's right. No, that's where I draw the line. PJ is a menace.

Jason hates PJ. I hate PJ. His arch rival grow up kid learn some respect ghost grandpa is just like they're stewing like oh I wish

I could still give him a a whipping I want I want Jason on the ride I want a robot of Jason on the ride

hello eating a sandwich and not liking it I want I want all of that like a statue that is a fountain where you're watching the ill effects

of the sandwich flowing through Jason yes this is perfect why are there whole olives on this your famous catchphrase that will ring through the new Ripsaw Falls not into them why are there olives on this

everyone's got a shirt that says why are there olives on this? Everyone's got a shirt that says, why are there olives on this? Alright, picture everybody. Everybody say, why are there olives on this? We're all plussed it up. We're all plussed it up. We can maybe combine all three of these. We can add the log, we can add the horrible sex act, and we can add all of my characters on it too

jason uh a fountain of jason diarrheaing this is a wild ride i love the ride we've invented these are some rips falls that are truly rip roaring and on that note we'll be right back so uh to close podcast the ride uh it's kind of a sad note actually that we're going to end on um because it was just announced that disney is building a big new hotel in disneyland um but the problem is there's limited space at disney so you know that real estate comes at a cost so there are some businesses um that we're going to unfortunately have to say goodbye to and we would like to do that now in the most serious way possible.

So long, Downtown Disney AMC Theater. Sure, some people said, why would I waste time in a movie theater when Disneyland is mere feet away? But those people were haters. I, of course, loved you. I can't tell you the amount of times I've been at Disneyland riding an exciting classic ride and thought, man, this is boring. I wish I was sitting in an empty movie theater right now. I'd stroll down to your inviting doors and catch a matinee of Vince Vaughn and Kevin James' wonderful comedy, The Dilemma,

or take in an early morning viewing of Johnny Depp's lizard movie, Rango. You know, the nice thing about your theater was how much room there was. Never before in a movie theater could I answer the question, You know, the nice thing about your theater was how much room there was. Never before in a movie theater could I answer the question, if I was using movie seats to measure the length of my body, how many movie seats long would I be?

The answer might surprise you. Six. I am six movie seats long. So goodbye, Downtown Disney AMC Theater. I will truly miss you. Oh, and also, I used to get free parking at Downtown Disney by buying a movie ticket electronically, going inside to get my parking validated, and then using the Fandango app to cancel

the ticket. A pretty sweet hack. Anyway, so long. By the way, lovely of you to score that with such a lush lullaby version of Every Breath You Take. I believe we've all prepared versions of respectful funereal songs. And Jason, I look forward to yours.

Sure. What is there to say about the Rainforest Cafe? You know, my family always enjoyed the Rainforest Cafe, the animatronic animals, the fun sound effects, the super powerful air conditioner at the Orlando location. And most importantly, everyone could agree that it was pretty good. I remember ordering fun, fruity drinks as a kid and fun appetizers. But I have no memory of entrees, which is probably not a great sign of a restaurant that I've eaten at that much. On a personal note, the Anaheim location is

notable for being the first place I had a beer with my father after I turned 21. It was mid-October, at night, and about 50 degrees degrees and they opted to seat us on the balcony. I believe one of the locations was also the first place I had coconut curry, a food I'm now very fond of. Is this really a eulogy or am I just naming food and beverage memories I have? Who cares? Anyway, I do think rainforest cafes are fun sadly the walt disney company is better at making hotels than the landry restaurant group is at making restaurants so it's time to go but if you're fond of the rainforest cafe please visit any one of their 26 other worldwide locations locations. Beautiful. So beautiful. Alright.

And from your piano, Wiz Khalifa, to my piano, Sarah McLachlan. A great zone once said, get in the zone at this temple of all things ESPN. But now, this truly fine temple, the ESPN Zone, is due to be de-erected, the 120

HDTVs unplugged, including the ones in the bathroom. And so, ESPN zone is due to be de-erected, the 120 HDTVs unplugged, including the ones in the bathroom. And so ESPN zone, I reflect on my memories of you truly a zone for all seasons. I remember when I first stepped inside your walls, which of course are covered in creepy bobbing athlete heads. It was 2002. I just finished touring nearby Chapman, where I was considering enrolling.

My meal at you helped me decide that going to college in Anaheim would probably be very boring. Thank you, Zone, for shaping my academic career. I visited you again 15 years later, purely for parking validation reasons. We learned that alcohol doesn't actually count towards validation, so we had to buy one of your desserts, an off-brand pizookie that we deemed acceptable. Today, I cherish these two memories that we shared, and I honor them

by pouring one out. Specifically, your signature drink, the Espy, the world's finest beverage made of peach schnapps and Sprite. To zone with love. Beautiful. Beautiful. You guys okay? Are we going to be able to

get it together and end the episode? Okay, I think so, but there's word though that these might be relocated. Yeah, they're going to put chops underneath the restaurant. There's a chance there might be... Forgot one thing. I also validated

parking at the Rainforest Cafe. A strong reason for the mall to exist. The hat trick of parking validation. None of us had anything to say

about the Earl of Sandwich. No. Fuck you, Earl of Sandwich. Yeah, go to hell, Earl. Where you already are the actual Earl of Sandwich. Well, I hope you enjoyed us talking about one of the most popular rides ever,

Dudley Do-Right, Ripsaw Falls. A trip to Dubai, a trip to Toon Lagoon, a trip to the 30s, and a trip to hell with the Earl of Sandwich. Thanks for joining us. Follow us on Twitter at PodcastTheRide. Email us at PodcastTheRide at gmail.com

and if you've been enjoying the show, please rate and review on iTunes. That's right. Hey, thanks for joining us. You survived Podcast the Ride. We'll see you next time. Bye-bye. Bye.

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