Trip #17 D23 Expo 2019
We talked about it and decided to try the D23 Expo again, (first try 2015) hoping that they might have gotten some of the bugs taken care of since then.
We left home on Thursday and spent Thursday night in Downtown Disney. This time we bought the full 3-day tickets for the Expo (Fri, Sat, Sun) and spent one day in each park, leaving to go back home on Wednesday.
About a week before we were to leave for the Expo we found out that Jim Shore was going to be there Thursday and Friday. (Thursday was a media/VIP kind of day and tickets were not available to us non-VIP's.) So fitting that into the schedule of where we wanted to go what we wanted to see and any panels we wanted to get into was interesting. My husband wanted to get into the Legends award ceremony so we decided to split up.
An hour before the doors were to be opened we arrived at the convention center. (I told my husband that that was the earliest I was willing to get up in the morning with also having to shower, get coffee/food, etc. and walk to the convention center.) This time we went through security, got our bags and went into the building right away. They sent us to the fungeon ("fun-dungeon, get it?" King Candy - Wreck It Ralph) aka the basement to wait in line in the air conditioning for an hour until the doors officially opened. (This was a nice change from 2015 when we were waiting out in the sun and 90 degrees.) As usual, we were talking to other people in line, checking out all the other cosplayers, looking at the D23 Expo app on the phone, etc.
At this point I should mention that we decided to cosplay all 3 days of the Expo and both days at the parks.
So cosplay day 1 was Muppetteers! My husband found someone to hand make a Kermit puppet for him so he was Jim Henson (not far off with the beard and the hair). I just found myself a Miss Piggy doll (I was not going to try to be Frank Oz). OMG! It was amazing the number of people who walked by us and said "I love Kermit!" And the smiles that were on people's faces after interacting with the puppet. (My husband does a pretty good Kermit voice.) We had Kylo Ren trying to get Kermit to the dark side. I think there was one person we saw with a Muppets t-shirt on and somebody with a Kermit hat and green t-shirt.
I mentioned that my husband wanted to go to the Legends award ceremony. While waiting in line numerous people told us that it was sold out/reached max capacity - and the doors hadn't even opened yet! (This was due to the new reservation system that D23 had set up.) So my husband went with me instead of getting turned away from the door (which we found out later that the room still had space for more people to attend! grrr) to wait in line for Jim Shore. I ran through the vendors to get something for him to sign as you couldn't bring something from home. I went to get the that-day-released doom buggy and they were sold out. Good thing I found the Mickey nutcracker in the vendor area! Once we got through the line to see Jim he was tickled to see our Muppets as were his handlers.
And speaking of the reservation system, I was a bit disappointed in that. If I remember correctly, you had to go through the app to get there but it didn't mark your app with your reservations or send you any reminders! I was so disappointed! It took me something like 2 or 3 hours just to get in then everything I wanted (but one) was booked solid. And because I was scheduling things randomly at that point I didn't take complete notes on everything I booked. Then I found there was nowhere to go back and find it.
I just want to say that there is still so much it is overwhelming. You can't make it to every panel/meet and greet/giveaway you want but I was really disappointed to miss the panel where they were talking about the new Jungle Cruise movie and Dwayne Johnson was there!
Probably the two best things we saw (seeing Jim Shore again being #3) was the Disney+ panel and the music of the live version of Aladdin. There were all kinds of stars that came out onto the stage for the Disney+ panel: Jeff Goldblum, Paul Bettany, and Ewan McGregor being some of them. My favorite was Jon Favreau and how he talked about the new show the Mandalorian, including all the actors from the show who came out on stage with him! The music of Aladdin panel was cool because they brought out the main voice actors from the animated version (plus the person who sang for the male lead as he couldn't sing) and some of the actors/dancers from the live action. Will Smith wasn't there but he had taped a video for it and they showed it on the large screen. We weren't far from the stage so we got to see everything.
I didn't get to go into the Disney Store the first time because the lines were ridiculous! We managed it this time and boy was I disappointed. They only had select items (bobble-heads and princess barbies were the big sellers) and nothing I was really interested in. I think I bought a masquerade mask just to have something for my 2 1/2 hours spent waiting in line. We were a little more successful at Mickey's of Glendale this time (even though we were in line over 2 hours there too) but they were out of stock on some sizes of things as well. I think I got 2 t-shirts this time. The Expo store was second to the Disney Store because they were the ones who sold out of the Jim Shore doom buggy and all I managed to get there was my Mickey balloons sippy cup.
Some of the vendors were great though. Besame cosmetics was there. I bought a lipstick just to get a bag. (They had just released their Sleeping Beauty collection and it was much more pink than I liked, but their reusable bags have great designs on them!) Sunglass Hut was awesome. They had glass cleaning kits that included a spritzer to clean and a designer cloth. I bought 3 kits and got 3 different patterns of cloths and as long as you keep it you can take the spritzer back to any Sunglass Hut and they will refill it for free! I bought a pen from Cross. They were selling their Star Wars collection. I thought it appropriate with Galaxy's Edge just recently opened. Then there were the vendors that sold pins and Loungefly and Jim Shore and resell stuff. We got some fun stuff from them too.
So we kind of got what we went for and kinda not. We kind of saw what we wanted to see and kinda not. It was fun but disappointing at the same time. Was I ticked off and said I was never going back again? You betcha. Will I relent and want to go again in 2021 (since it is held every other year) probably not. 2023? Maybe - I might forget why I was so mad and didn't want to go back but I might not.
We left home on Thursday and spent Thursday night in Downtown Disney. This time we bought the full 3-day tickets for the Expo (Fri, Sat, Sun) and spent one day in each park, leaving to go back home on Wednesday.
About a week before we were to leave for the Expo we found out that Jim Shore was going to be there Thursday and Friday. (Thursday was a media/VIP kind of day and tickets were not available to us non-VIP's.) So fitting that into the schedule of where we wanted to go what we wanted to see and any panels we wanted to get into was interesting. My husband wanted to get into the Legends award ceremony so we decided to split up.
An hour before the doors were to be opened we arrived at the convention center. (I told my husband that that was the earliest I was willing to get up in the morning with also having to shower, get coffee/food, etc. and walk to the convention center.) This time we went through security, got our bags and went into the building right away. They sent us to the fungeon ("fun-dungeon, get it?" King Candy - Wreck It Ralph) aka the basement to wait in line in the air conditioning for an hour until the doors officially opened. (This was a nice change from 2015 when we were waiting out in the sun and 90 degrees.) As usual, we were talking to other people in line, checking out all the other cosplayers, looking at the D23 Expo app on the phone, etc.
At this point I should mention that we decided to cosplay all 3 days of the Expo and both days at the parks.
So cosplay day 1 was Muppetteers! My husband found someone to hand make a Kermit puppet for him so he was Jim Henson (not far off with the beard and the hair). I just found myself a Miss Piggy doll (I was not going to try to be Frank Oz). OMG! It was amazing the number of people who walked by us and said "I love Kermit!" And the smiles that were on people's faces after interacting with the puppet. (My husband does a pretty good Kermit voice.) We had Kylo Ren trying to get Kermit to the dark side. I think there was one person we saw with a Muppets t-shirt on and somebody with a Kermit hat and green t-shirt.
I mentioned that my husband wanted to go to the Legends award ceremony. While waiting in line numerous people told us that it was sold out/reached max capacity - and the doors hadn't even opened yet! (This was due to the new reservation system that D23 had set up.) So my husband went with me instead of getting turned away from the door (which we found out later that the room still had space for more people to attend! grrr) to wait in line for Jim Shore. I ran through the vendors to get something for him to sign as you couldn't bring something from home. I went to get the that-day-released doom buggy and they were sold out. Good thing I found the Mickey nutcracker in the vendor area! Once we got through the line to see Jim he was tickled to see our Muppets as were his handlers.
And speaking of the reservation system, I was a bit disappointed in that. If I remember correctly, you had to go through the app to get there but it didn't mark your app with your reservations or send you any reminders! I was so disappointed! It took me something like 2 or 3 hours just to get in then everything I wanted (but one) was booked solid. And because I was scheduling things randomly at that point I didn't take complete notes on everything I booked. Then I found there was nowhere to go back and find it.
I just want to say that there is still so much it is overwhelming. You can't make it to every panel/meet and greet/giveaway you want but I was really disappointed to miss the panel where they were talking about the new Jungle Cruise movie and Dwayne Johnson was there!
Probably the two best things we saw (seeing Jim Shore again being #3) was the Disney+ panel and the music of the live version of Aladdin. There were all kinds of stars that came out onto the stage for the Disney+ panel: Jeff Goldblum, Paul Bettany, and Ewan McGregor being some of them. My favorite was Jon Favreau and how he talked about the new show the Mandalorian, including all the actors from the show who came out on stage with him! The music of Aladdin panel was cool because they brought out the main voice actors from the animated version (plus the person who sang for the male lead as he couldn't sing) and some of the actors/dancers from the live action. Will Smith wasn't there but he had taped a video for it and they showed it on the large screen. We weren't far from the stage so we got to see everything.
I didn't get to go into the Disney Store the first time because the lines were ridiculous! We managed it this time and boy was I disappointed. They only had select items (bobble-heads and princess barbies were the big sellers) and nothing I was really interested in. I think I bought a masquerade mask just to have something for my 2 1/2 hours spent waiting in line. We were a little more successful at Mickey's of Glendale this time (even though we were in line over 2 hours there too) but they were out of stock on some sizes of things as well. I think I got 2 t-shirts this time. The Expo store was second to the Disney Store because they were the ones who sold out of the Jim Shore doom buggy and all I managed to get there was my Mickey balloons sippy cup.
Some of the vendors were great though. Besame cosmetics was there. I bought a lipstick just to get a bag. (They had just released their Sleeping Beauty collection and it was much more pink than I liked, but their reusable bags have great designs on them!) Sunglass Hut was awesome. They had glass cleaning kits that included a spritzer to clean and a designer cloth. I bought 3 kits and got 3 different patterns of cloths and as long as you keep it you can take the spritzer back to any Sunglass Hut and they will refill it for free! I bought a pen from Cross. They were selling their Star Wars collection. I thought it appropriate with Galaxy's Edge just recently opened. Then there were the vendors that sold pins and Loungefly and Jim Shore and resell stuff. We got some fun stuff from them too.
So we kind of got what we went for and kinda not. We kind of saw what we wanted to see and kinda not. It was fun but disappointing at the same time. Was I ticked off and said I was never going back again? You betcha. Will I relent and want to go again in 2021 (since it is held every other year) probably not. 2023? Maybe - I might forget why I was so mad and didn't want to go back but I might not.
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