"ONLY AT THE END DO YOU REALIZE THE POWER OF THE DARK SIDE"
After watching several minutes of the Hollywood Public Works, I made the short walk over to the Theater of the Stars to finally catch Warwick Davis'
An Ewok's Tale: My Short Story. This was probably one of the things I was looking forward to the most out of the experiences not just for that day, but out of all of the Weekends. Of all the celebrities and the shows and everything, for some strange reason, this was something I was really looking forward to seeing -- the only exception would be Frank Oz (I greatly admire that guy, he is brilliant!). Again, I am not
that big of a Star Wars fan, and I don't normally care for celebrities and all that; heck I won't say that I am some
die-hard Warwick fan or anything either
But I really have enjoyed several of his movies: Return of the Jedi/Wicket, his roles in the Harry Potter series, Willow (soo epic!), Leprechaun (guilty pleasure), and even his minor roles in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and Labyrinth. So I thought it would be cool check out why this show was popular, to catch a glimpse of a celeb and simply take in part of what makes Star Wars Weekends so great. If Disney goes through the great troubles and lengths to appease the fans by getting popular characters in, the least I could do is check it out right?
Again, not planning and not knowing procedure, I don't know if my plan was the right way to go about this, but I showed up at the start of a queue shortly before 5pm. If you are looking for tips on how to handle the Weekends, look elsewhere.... or maybe just do the opposite of me.
But I showed up with the thought, "as long as I have a seat in there..." which was summed up by this pic quite well...
I got in there rather painlessly (the queue was constantly moving), and was seated about halfway up on the right side; a decent view, although showing up an additional 15 minutes early probably would have been a little more ideal so that you could catch the details/facial expressions a little bit better. But I got the gist of it just fine and was happy with it all and was really excited for the show to get started!
I honestly do not want to 'cop out' in giving you details of the show, but there is just too much going on that written words cannot truly capture. Now if you are like me and don't want the show spoiled for you, if you plan on seeing it at some point, I would advise you to skip this video. But if you want a good laugh and to see what makes this show so great, I give you permission to make some popcorn, grab a soda and put the feet up for the next 45 minutes to watch this. No seriously, check it out; I just did and it was hilarious the second time around:
Honestly, even if you still have no clue who Warwick Davis is or don't care about Star Wars, this show has something for everyone. I was cheering and laughing and smiling the
ENTIRE time as the show is done quite brilliantly, interspersing facts of Davis' life with great comedy throughout. The crowd actors can be hit or miss, but even then Warwick is great at throwing in little quips. All around, I cannot recommend seeing this enough! Heck, if time and money weren't an issue, I would go back again next year just to see it again!
The one nice thing about being seated in the middle-right was that I was fairly close to an exit, which meant I got out of there pretty quick (I do believe the show was full to capacity or at least close to it?). My goal from then on out was to basically just wander around the park, soaking in the atmosphere and riding rides. I had lost a couple of FPs that morning and all day I had been trying to change them out on my phone. I don't know if it's my phone or the app itself but I have yet to truly figure out correcting FPs on my phone. I have had luck a few times, but generally not. So I went over to the FP kiosk to see if I could make some changes there, but it turns out that FPs were no longer available that day. I wasn't too surprised as it was now the evening time on a Star Wars Weekend, so I shrugged my shoulders not thinking it would affect things.
But for the next few hours, my experience was much the same as in the opening scene from the movie
Office Space...
Seriously, every time I would check a wait time and saw it was low, I would make my way over to it, only to find it had jumped up. Animation Academy, GMR, RR, The VotLM, and repeat. So I gave up and stood in a 50 minute wait for Star Tours because apparently there was nothing better to do. This, of course, was a bad assumption. Because of my lack of preparation and alertness, I could have tried to make it to
Obi-Wan and Beyond but by the time I had gotten off of Star Tours, I had missed that as well. Once again standing in a hot, long line wasn't something I particularly enjoyed doing, but for the sake of taking in the atmosphere, I figured this ride would help with that...
This picture always gets me to smile...
Unfortunately, this ride didn't do much to cheer me up. Don't get me wrong, this is a fantastic ride. I think the queue is tremendously detailed, the ride itself is a blast, and the repeat-ability is crazy good. But of all the days to go, on Star Wars Weekend no less, it just didn't do it for me. Perhaps it was my exhaustion. Perhaps I was sore. Perhaps I just didn't actually like Star Wars.... Or at least on that day I didn't feel like I did. So I decided to go check out Darth's Mall and see what all Disney/Star Wars was selling, knowing full well that I didn't care about merchandise. I made my way to the back of the park... only to find out that it had closed at 7:30pm!!! I was tired. I was still hungry. I was a little sore. I was sweaty. I was cursing my headache. I was frustrated on so many levels with Disney and myself. I was hating life at that moment. The world was coming to an end and I didn't care because I was soooo done with it!!!
Okay no way! Seriously I needed to get out of this funk! This TR is getting depressing and you really need to snap out of it!!!
*a brief pause for my feelings that day at Star Wars Weekends in emoji form* *phew* Okay so where was I? Apart from the Muppets, there is one surefire was to get me going.... a chocolate, peanut butter and jelly shake from the Tune-In Lounge! Most people stop at just ordering the PB&J, but I tell you, GO THE EXTRA MILE AND ADD THE CHOCOLATE. It's not on the menu, but they will add it. There is nothing "out-of-this-world" about it, but it is most definitely a tasty treat and one that I make sure to grab when I visit DHS (and constantly day-dream about when I am not actually there to have one). I generally don't care for the food options at DHS as I find most everything there (outside the Brown Derby) to be disappointing. But if you want a sugar-induced coma of tasty awesomeness, I would recommend grabbing the chocolate, PB&J shake and then getting a Butterfinger cupcake from Starring Rolls and letting all your cares drift away
Oh and say hi to David, the bartender if he is (still) there. The guy was awesome to talk to and I think paid me a little extra attention because I'm sure I had a miserable look on my face. But the Tune-In Lounge is a great place for a pick me up if you are looking for one at DHS!
After crying into my milkshake (I am being 95% facetious), I had realized I had done enough damage for the day. I resolved that I could either go back to the resort and take it easy for the rest of the evening or stick it out and "have a good show! A real Topical Serenade!" (just thinking happy thoughts here
) The only problem was that I had given myself a pretty bad headache throughout the day. Not sure if it was exhaustion, or dehydration, or anger or what, but as I sat out there by Echo Lake, I knew one thing that was certainly not helping... the techno, dance party music from DJ Lobot... For as far back and off to the side as I was, the pulsing music was wrecking havoc on me and certainly not helping the cause. So I made my way back to the Streets of America and just kind of sat around for awhile...
The problem was that the headache wasn't going away and was actually getting worse; and I was concerned about the rides and shows not exactly helping the cause any. The bigger problem was that I wasn't sure how I would handle the fireworks either; and seeing how they were the main reason for sticking around at this point, I was facing quite the dilemma. Not knowing what else to do besides going back to the resort and downing some asprin, I reluctantly gave up and started making my way out of the park....