Disney on Ice's Road Trip Features a Terrifying Take on Forky (original) (raw)

Disney Theme Parks generate the company billions of dollars a year, but with ticket prices reaching record highs of more than $200 a day, and with parks at near capacity with three hour waits for rides, not every family can or wants to fork out that kind of cash to meet Mickey in person. Enter the reasonably priced and easily accessible Disney on Ice series, a long-running touring production that's also part of Disney's parks, experiences, and products division, formerly overseen by new CEO Bob Chapek. Tickets for this year's iteration, Disney on Ice: Road Trip Adventures, start at just 15 bucks.

That's not to say you'll end the night on the cheap. Once in the arena, you can shell out extra for face painting, pictures with characters who will be added in digitally later, 32light−upElsawands,and32 light-up Elsa wands, and 32light−upElsawands,and18 souvenir cups in which your child can eat crushed ice out of Olaf's head. Everything Disney is done with two goals in mind: make as much money as possible while maintaining brand integrity, or Disney Magic. For north of $100 a ticket, you can purchase a seat in the Extra Magic Zone, from which Mascots in skates pull audience participants. As long as you're comfortable explaining why that family got to ride in the car with Goofy and drink slushies out of Olaf's brain while yours didn't, budget Disney is possible.

The stands are mostly populated with toddler girls in flimsy Velcro princess gowns, accompanied by their overwhelmed guardians. But look harder, and you'll spot kids clad in Lion King and Incredibles gear. While Disney seems content to make bank by introducing a new strong female character to its stable of licensed princesses every few years, Moana and Frozen preach to the choir of Disney diehards. The real trick is to create franchises that appeal to all ages, races, and genders, and usher them into the fandom. No Disney property has done that quite so well as Toy Story. After four beloved films and its own immersive "land" at Walt Disney World, it was only a matter of time before Toy Story mania hit the ice. And no Toy Story character has broader appeal - sincere and ironic - than Forky.

Road Trip Adventures relies heavily on Forky in its marketing campaign, which makes sense. Disney+ streams a delightful series of shorts in which the piece of trash-turned-sentient toy friend learns the meaning of concepts that are already well-understood by most preschoolers. Mere months after the service's debut, the elementary set has probably watched Forky Asks a Question: What is Love? a gajillion times. But featuring this Forky so prominently is also a risk, not least of all because the transition from pixels to polyester wasn't kind to the character, who was already struggling with existential dread. It was also a risk because this Forky is destined to leave Toy Story fans disappointed.

Let's rewind. Road Trip Adventures goes all-in on the studio's most recent films, which is another risk. The road trip starts with Mickey and Minnie teasing what the advertising has us expecting to be Bonnie's RV from Toy Story 4. Instead, we get a light-up convertible that can go anywhere, because... magic. At once, it's clear the road trip plot of this traveling show will be thin at best, and more like completely irrelevant. But it served its purpose and got boys ages 2-9 in the seats.

The audience is then whisked away to the UK, and to the perfectly fine chimney sweep scene from Mary Poppins Returns. One doubts any families bought tickets just to see Mary Poppins fly in on an umbrella reinforced with cables the girth of light posts, as the update wasn't a huge box office hit. However, the number lends itself well to the choreography of figure skating, and becomes even more impressive when aerial acrobatics and somersaulting bikes are involved. This will not be the last time our favorite characters go airborne, though conspicuously well-harnessed.

Disney on Ice is slowly evolving into something resembling a more narrative-driven, less-death-defying Cirque Du Soleil for young kids. It's a smart move on the company's part. The shows, of which there are usually four touring the country at a time, can be pretty indistinguishable from each other. The use of vertical space and increased thrill factor sets Road Trip Adventures apart, and garnered genuine "oohs" from spectators.

Before anyone else takes to a trapeze, the Incredibles family skate laps long enough for the cast to change into their Moana costumes. The condensed retelling is the most faithful to its source material in spirit, featuring a tribe of human Mata'nuians and a lone skater in a ridiculously proportioned Maui suit.

Then we're off to Africa, and The Lion King. Disney seems not to have made a choice here and puts forth a perplexing mix of characters from both the 1994 and 2019 versions, as well as the Broadway musical. Original Timon and Pumba glide alongside a hybrid Rafiki with a pronounced blue butt, theatrical puppets of zebras and giraffes, and underwhelming lions that looked more like naked people with bad haircuts. Even the music (which is dubbed, freeing up performers to skate, stunt, and overact) comes from different soundtracks. But monkeys swing upon hanging vines, and Simba spins Nahla in dangerously fast circles, much to everyone's amusement.

The road trip continues to Arendelle, where Elsa and four anthropomorphized snowflakes flip and twist on five hoops suspended fifty feet above the ground, as the requisite "Let it Go" blares. Adults are impressed, but the girls in the crowd seem annoyed that their favorite princesses haven't gotten their sequel glow-ups. This is likely a financial decision, as Disney must have had plenty of sets, costumes, and effects leftover from Frozen on Ice.

After an intermission almost long enough to get everyone through the $18 cotton candy line, it's finally time for the headliner: Toy Story. From the very beginning of the fifteen-ish minute-long segment, Woody and Buzz are asking, "Where's Forky?" Finding Forky (who's still trying to throw himself away in this timeline, post the events of Toy Story 4) is the entire plot of the whole act. But there's no rush to save our friend from his identity crisis. First, Woody has to skate to "Old Town Road," then Duke Ca-Boom has to crash from the rafters, then we (well, people with good seats) have to play an interactive game of get-the-ball-in-the-trash-can. It's clear to everyone that Forky's already in the trash can.

Sure enough, Forky pops up from the trash can. From this angle, the costume almost looks normal, except the shape of his pipe cleaner hands create the impression he's giving everybody the finger. Once he's free, the overall effect is more disturbing, as if Gumby has an unwell, albino evil twin. Forky smiles in the promotional images, but live, the googly eyes and drawn on mouth are in a permanent state of surprise and/or repulsion. After maybe 20 seconds of ice time, Forky asks Woody to carry him. The poor probably-former Olympic hopeful cast as Woody struggles to lift the awkward, life-sized piece of cutlery, and then they're gone.

Anyone hoping for a Forky-centric evening, out of morbid curiosity or real affection for the character, is left wanting. Kids are starting to whine and fuss; it's time to wrap things up with a tribute to Aladdin (2019). The movie earned mostly lukewarm reviews, but it made loads of money worldwide, and this generation of children might prefer their Genie in the form of Will Smith. Luckily, that's exactly what they get: a ten-minute video of Will Smith projected upon multiple jumbotrons as extras in vaguely Middle Eastern garb dance, almost unnoticed. But before everyone rushed to their non-magic vehicles, more than likely in hopes of beating traffic, Jasmine performs the show's routine with the highest level of difficulty, a mix of skating skills and aerial gymnastics that - no question - steals the show.

For $15 plus food and parking, Disney on Ice is fine family fun, and an encapsulation of where the brand is artistically. It's a heady concoction of contrasting flavors: nostalgia and of-the-moment references, live-action and cartoonishness, stunts and grace, social consciousness and unbridled capitalism... the recipe of which works but hasn't been perfect. And in the middle, however briefly, the very symbol of the tension between disposability and lasting cultural influence. As the lights come up, if you glance to the far corner, you see Forky reappear, only to wave goodbye.

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