NEW! A Review of Disney Starlight: Dream the Night Away

This weekend Disney Starlight: Dream the Night Away kicked off its inaugural run with two nights of dress rehearsals and an opening on Sunday. This new parade, long awaited and hoped for by Walt Disney World fans is simply magical. It’s not perfect, but it’s simply beautiful and is what has been needed for so long since its ancestors, The Main Street Electrical Parade and SpectroMagic had long parted. We visit this parade and talk all the details of what makes it work–and at times, not so perfectly work. It’s a must-see event at Walt Disney World and a welcome tradition for years to come. And my belief is, that it will only get better over time. So join us as we review Disney Starlight: Dream the Night Away!

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Design Aesthetic & Music

Let’s talk about the design aesthetic. There is a difference in the look of this parade than in its predecessors. Perhaps that difference can be found in the title itself–Starlight. It’s not the Main Street Parade, but the Main Street Electrical Parade. SpectroMagic is about Spectro or Spectrum which focuses on color. Paint the night suggests doing something physical to the darkness of the night to light it up.

I may be reading too much into this, but I notice that many floats sit on a bed of stars, so to speak. That does two things I think intentionally. First it elevates the floats considerably. Unlike Casey Jr. in the electrical parade, it doesn’t run along the ground. It floats into the air, as if it was soaring through the stars. That creates a different aesthetic than what you see in the other nighttime parades. It also has elevated the floats considerably making them much easier to view from rows back in a crowd. And crowds are what you get at Walt Disney World. Just like design changes were made to Central Plaza to allow thousands more to see the nighttime fireworks. You have an elevated parade that makes it easier to see from wherever you are in the crowd.

With that comes a design choices you may not like. There is only one character that is walking on the ground, and that’s Tinker Bell. Everyone else is on a float. I’m not sure why Tinker Bell is the only one and why she’s not on a float. I almost feel that was a budget cut decision. I’ll come to that later. But the fact is, characters coming up to the guests like in the afternoon parade doesn’t occur here. There are some dancers and processionists as I refer to them, but not characters.

Every character in the parade has lights embedded in them. But they are not light bulbs. They are really little stars. It’s a much more subtle design. But it’s a design aligned with star light, not electrical. The contrast in this is especially seen between this parade and Paint the Night–an amazing parade in and of itself, because they went many different directions in utilizing sources of light in very clever ways. This is not that parade. And the contrast may leave you easily thinking Paint the Night is a much more of a “wow” than this parade. But I think it really is a different design choice, and one that may tie more to Happily Ever After, which focuses heavily on projection technology, lasers, and of course pyro.

In short, Disney Starlights suggests something more organic, as if the stars were the focus, not the lightbulbs in the parade.

If this dialogue is making you miss the old Main Street Electrical Parade or the symphonic sounds of SpectroMagic, take heart. If the Main Street Electrical Parade has an electro syncho-synthetic sound, and SpectroMagic had a more orchestral sound, this is the combination of both. The street is playing more the orchestral, and each float is playing more of electronic melody that accompanies each float. You really get the best of both worlds here, while generating a new sound of its own. And the finale float is the baroque hoedown, the title of the song played in the Main Street Electrical Parade. The experience musically is full and rich, and will make you wonder when the vinyl coming out–or at least the parade’s recording on Spotify.

Here’s a 30 second taste!

Here’s a link to the full parade.

Procession

From beginning to end, let’s walk through this new spectacle.

Blue Fairy From Pinocchio

This is the definitive call back to the Main Street Electrical Parade with its leading Blue Fairy float. But this one is much grander in size and scale and in the whimsical flow of lights. Moreover, it carries within the scrim of her dress train we find both Pinocchio and Geppetto characters, making it even more exceptional than before. We get to hear from the Blue Fairy herself, and all of it really speaks Walt Disney fantasy.

The song, When You Wish Upon a Star interplays with this float.

Only two very slight downsides and they are slight and minor ones…The Blue Fairy’s crown of stars seems like too much. Also, while it’s cool to see Pinocchio and Geppetto, they track lighting above them seems a little off in a Home Depot kind of way.

Wish

That Disney included their 100th feature film Wish is in my view very cool. The float is a little scaled down do compared to the other, and the tree seems like it’s been cut of at the top. It’s just a strange shape. But Asha speaks to us as she comes down the street and we see both her goat friend, Valentino, but we also see within the bark of the tree, the Star all animated. Valentino didn’t seem to be animated, but that might be an issue with the soft opening. I love how the tree leaves–even the whole tree seems to change color.

This Wish is the song that accompanies this float and is probably why this float comes behind the Blue Fairy with its When You Wish Upon a Star song.

Wish is our own version of Sleeping Beauty. Both did not do well in the box office. Both had story problems. And while the film Wish is not quite the beautiful tapestry as Eyvind Earle’s, the music is really solid and the two lead characters, Asha and King Magnico, played by Chris Pine, are very solid. I think to the next generation this may be more of a classic than we give credit to. I’m glad they included it.

Encanto

The gloat is gorgeous with Mirabel surrounded by a ring of butterflies, Isabella riding as wing surrounded by a ring of flowers, and Bruno in the back. Bruno provides the narrative here, seemingly confused by everything going on. The centerpiece is a very large, very cool candle that lights from within and rotates.

The Family Madrigal is the song that accompanies this float. Mirabel plays along with maracas.

Leading Encanto are 3-5 dancers (?) largely dressed in black who each have hoist from which extends eight butterflies lit up above their heads. This might have looked better if we were looking down on them, but instead we are looking up at the butterflies. Not much dancing either, more like a procession.

Frozen

Like Encanto we have 5 dancers or processionists preceding the float for Frozen carrying lit up diamonds above their head. This doesn’t do much and seems like a last minute add on. That said, in the original art work sent out over a year ago, it really looked like Frozen and Peter Pan were going to be more of one part of the initial float similar to what we see in Festival of Fantasy. It’s great that these are two separate float experiences and not just a combination with the Blue Fairy.

And I have to say that the Frozen float however may be my favorite of the Frozen floats I’ve seen in other parades. We only have Elsa. There is no Anna. Elsa is in her ice kingdom (?) and she is in her Frozen 2 white dress, similar to the dress used in Fantasmic. But like pretty much every character outfit it lights up. What is really cool is how the ice sculptures light up from behind with images of family and characters from the film.

The music seems to go back and forth between “Show Yourself” and “Into the Unknown”

Princess Cavalcade

Leading the cavalcade are three couples dancing all with their own lights embedded in the costumes. Unlike the Electrical Parade, they’re a little more difficult to see as the canopy that is carried above them in Electrical doesn’t occur.

Music includes “Once Upon a Dream”, “A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes”, Beauty and the Beast”, and Ma Belle Evangeline”.

Of course the float includes the princes and princesses that are part of those songs. They all look great and the princes light up as well as the princesses. Most know that the predecessor to the Main Street Electrical Parade is the Electrical Water Pageant. But the predecessors to that was Disney on Parade. which was originally produced by Bob Jani, who then brought in the pageant and the parade after that. Why this Disney on Parade traveling stage show that went from one city to another matters is that in the original edition, Cinderella and the dancers all light up in the closing number, and this is the first time I know of where this concept of dancers lighting up in a Disney production began.

Three couples composing of six more dancers follow this cavalcade, very similar to the three couples prior to the cavalcade float.

Coco

This is a bright and colorful and ambitious float that you can’t help but love. You see Miguel with a guitar at the foot of the Marigold bridge to the land of the Muertos. Next to him is Dante, his dog as an alebrije, but in bigger form is Pepita, the spirit animal of Mama Imelda. And it’s impressive. And it probably moves as well, but we don’t see that yet in the dress rehearsal. Above all of that is a big “Bienvenidos” and above that are fireworks. Beyond it lies the Mexico City as seen in the film. The whole of this is really impressive. Coco The song here is “Remember Me”. I might have rather seen Miguel as a face character with face paint rather than a masked character. But make no mistake, there is little to find at fault about this float. The colors are so bright and beautiful. It really delivers well.

Moana

Six dancers carry lit up banners to suggest the waves of the sea as the Moana float approaches. This float is big and impressive as well, and carries the movement of the waves. Moana is sailing above all of this with Pua and Heihei both on board. The sail sparkles along the way, and changes along with everything else that is in constant movement on this float.

“We Know the Way is the predominant song playing along with this float.

From the waves comes a Stingray representing the spirit of Gramma Tala and she is the voice we hear. The stingray also impresses. It’s just really cool.

Peter Pan

Tinker bell leads the Peter Pan float, the only thing strange is she is walking alongside than flying. That there is a separate float for Peter Pan is totally cool, but the design is so similar to the Tokyo Disney “Dreaming Up” parade that it seems peculiar. Like that parade there is a Big Ben leading the float, followed by Wendy and Peter, and then a huge crescent moon that curves over Peter and Wendy. But in the daytime parade, that crescent moon allows wires to suspend both Peter and Wendy so they can fly. So far, I haven’t seen this happen, but it may be still occurring. They simply dance about on the float.

One of my favorite songs “Second Star to the Right” plays with it. Wendy and Peter speak to each other during the float.

The comparisons to the Japanese parade keep coming to my mind, though admittedly, not to most people. In that parade Mary Poppins is floating in front of Big Ben with kites flying around the clock, and penguins parading below it. That would have been cool as well. Or at least, Tinker Bell could have been on the hoist that Mary Poppins is on rather than walking the parade route. Again, it just feels incomplete. But I’m thrilled to have what we have.

Finale Cavalcade

Disney has a train float that brings along the final cavalcade for the parade. On board the train is Pluto and Goofy, Donald and Daisy. Beyond the train is Snow White and Dopy in a mine car, Rapunzel and Flynn Rider in a boat and Aladdin and Jasmine on a flying carpet.

Mickey and Minnie are the last characters we see high up on top, and they both speak to us reminding us about stars and wishes and dreams come true.

The name of the train character is Whimsy and he’s a very cute animation. But I would have been okay with Casey Jr. being that character. What makes this really wonderful is like SpectroMagic the float changes from a monochrome set of blues to full out color. It’s really beautiful, though not as long as the finale train that made up SpectroMagic, nor are there as many characters in this finale scene.

You hear the parade’s song with this float but you also hear the Baroque Hoedown from Main Street Electrical Parade. Very nice. Moreover, following this float, you have a final banner float where Jiminy Cricket can be found on the back in animated form. This hearkens to the SpectroMagic role that Jimmy plays.

Summary

In a previous podcast I mentioned that a parade like this has some 50 performers total, and in truth we had some 60. I predicted 30 characters, and the parade gave us 33 (plus Jimmy Cricket and Star in animated forms). That compares to 26 characters in the Electrical Parade (depending on which version of the show) and 45 in SpectroMagic (to include 5 ostriches but not the Spectromen). Conversely I predicted 24-30 dancers, and we had 27. But most were marching not dancing. They really did not do much to the parade, and I think I would rather see more characters. But that is a slight thing.

By the way Paint the Night is the one ardent Disney fans compare it to and they only have 18 Disney/Pixar characters. But they have way more dancers who have far better costumes lighting things up. Conversely, while some of their floats are amazing (Cars, Monsters Inc. Toy Story), others are meh (Princess and Mickey segments). Depending on the parade version they have some 76 performers total, which shows you the real delta–it’s in the dancers.

At any rate Disney Starlight builds on wonderful facets of both Main Street Electrical Parade and SpectroMagic. It remembers well its heritage. It’s interesting that this is entirely a Disney-led parade with only one exception–Coco. It’s a good exception, but one wonders why they added this one float and not anything else from Pixar. In truth, it becomes more of a comparison, as Paint the Night has Toy Story, Monsters Inc. Cars, and Incredibles (at DCA when Frozen isn’t being used).

By the way, none of these comparisons are as good as the Tokyo Disney Electrical Parade Dreamlights, which is above and beyond everything.

But all that said, I think this is a wonderful addition to Magic Kingdom and seems perfect for what follows or precedes–Happily Ever After. And no Disneyland fireworks show has come to compare with what they do with Cinderella Castle at Magic Kingdom. It is a two-punch wow! I should note that Tokyo’s fireworks are disappointing. And it is the perfect ending to a visit to the most Magical Place on Earth.

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