After-Action Report: Mickey's Toontown

Mickey's Toontown doesn't seem to have too many friends these days. It's one of the Disneyland fandom's most popular candidates for demolition, usually to make room for a much-desired Fantasyland expansion.* The justifications for deep-sixing an entire land usually fall along the lines of: There's nothing to do there/no good rides. It's only for little kids. It's tacky-looking. It's not a Disneyland-worthy concept. (Huh?)

Surprising no one, I am not on board with this idea. I don't visit Toontown every time I'm in the park, but I think it works. So I'm going to sit here and explain why the above arguments are wrong/misguided and why Toontown should stay, and you're going to read it.

Or, you know, visit some other website.

There's Nothing To Do There!

This complaint is not entirely without merit. Mickey's Toontown is small. It only has one ride of any substance, no unique shopping opportunities, and miserable food options. The emphasis on appealing to the eight-and-under set leaves not much of interest for their older chaperones (barring unusual tastes, about which I plead the Fifth). Once you've ambled through and read all the funny signs and pushed all the buttons, what else is there?

But you know something? Critter Country has a similar problem. Where's its anti-fandom? Is a long drop that gets you soaking wet that much more of a saving grace than a really slick interactive dark ride?** Moreover, if the problem with a land is that it's a little light on attractions, wouldn't simply adding attractions be a better solution than ripping out the whole thing and replacing it with something else...which, I would point out, also requires building attractions?

I mean...unless you think the premise of Mickey's Toontown is inherently too flawed to improve. I imagine some people think that. They are, of course, mistaken.

It's Only For Little Kids!

Again, not completely off the mark. Everything in Toontown is pretty child-friendly, even if the youngest can't read the puns. However...what's wrong with that, exactly? Yes, the park has diverged quite a bit from its initial mission of being “a place for parents and children to have fun together.” But it has just as often diverged in the opposite direction, adding rides with minimum height requirements, and hardly anyone complains about that.

I think the real issue is less that Toontown primarily caters to one end of the age spectrum, and more that the person making the complaint isn't part of the target audience. They don't like Toontown, so it should go. The fallacy here should speak for itself.

It's Tacky-Looking!

Is it?

Yeah, okay, you may have a point.

But is it inappropriate? To that I can only reply: Have you ever watched a classic cartoon short? Whatever complaints you might have about Mickey's Toontown, legitimate or not, you can't deny that it looks like its source material. Gaudy colors, unnaturally smooth or exaggerated textures, wacky architecture that couldn't possibly hold up in real life...you don't need an escape-proof Toon rope upon which to suspend your disbelief. This is good, consistent area theming. Disney theme parks need more of this, not less.

Which leads to what might be the most baffling of all the arguments in favor of wrecking Toontown...

It's Not a Disneyland-Worthy Concept!

I feel like this one can't possibly be serious. Can it? What could be more suitable for Disneyland than the place where Mickey Mouse lives? No, don't answer that. The anti-Toontown crowd, as a rule, can't wait for Star Wars Land to open and often expresses a wish to also have a Marvel Land toute de suite merci beaucoup pas de deux.***

If your argument is that the construction of Mickey's Toontown marks the point at which Disneyland became hopelessly self-referential...yeah, I can potentially see that. It's certainly the first land in any Disney theme Park to be based on a pre-existing Disney brand,**** and that kind of set the tone for the years to follow.

But in and of itself? Toontown is great for Disneyland. It came along at a point when Mickey Mouse cartoons qua Mickey Mouse cartoons had become a part of American culture as traditional and intergenerationally recognized as Westerns and fairy tales. The unfathomably excellent movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit mainstreamed the idea that a cartoon city could be an actual place that you could visit, and then Mickey's Toontown was built to prove it. That sort of thing is a theme park's greatest potential strength, and Disneyland is of course the gold standard in theme park design.

Okay, But Quit Acting Like Toontown is Perfect!

I know it's not perfect. Haven't I been making concessions to most of the common complaints about it? The important thing is that it is fixably imperfect, and that fixing it, rather than ripping it out and replacing it wholesale, is not only the more artistically valid but the more economically sound solution to its problems.

What does Toontown need? Let's see...

• More shade. The smooth artificiality of Toontown's buildings, and even some of its landscaping, provides a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of bringing across its presumed celluloid nature, but it combines with the area's overall bowl shape to turn it into a big solar reflector. The place could use more and fuller trees, especially in the central areas, to mitigate the effect.
• A new ride. The ride count is pretty dismal: one well-made dark ride based on an excellent, well-known movie...and one 45-second kiddie coaster with some of the most cramped seats I have personally experienced, referencing a character that few people are familiar with and fewer have any investment in these days. Granted, there is almost no space for additional developments in Toontown, and not much that can be removed without degrading the concept. But I doubt Gadget's Go-Coaster would be much of a loss, nor the adjacent Chip & Dale's Tree House since the “acorn ball crawl” has been closed for years. That would open up enough space for one or two carnival-level rides, maybe using trackless technology.

I also have a much more ambitious idea for a new Toontown ride, but I am well aware of how unfeasible it is. Then again, there's a well-publicized DuckTales reboot coming later this year, so who knows!

• Live entertainment. A few scheduled performances would go a long way toward bringing Toontown the lively energy that it ought to have, as well as possibly giving parents something to watch while their kids are running around yanking on rubber prison bars and setting off fake fireworks. The Pearly Band would look great here, with their outlandish and colorful costumes—and hey, think about where the Pearlies show up in Mary Poppins—in the cartoon world that the characters visit through Bert's chalk picture! Another excellent troupe to book for Toontown would be the Laughing Stock Co., assuming they have a wider repertoire than Wild West-themed scenarios.
• More promotion. When was the last time you felt like you were being invited to Mickey's Toontown? It barely even gets any play in Disneyland TV ads. For the uninitiated, it's a hard part of the park to discover, because it's all the way at the back, with only one entrance/exit, and a long walk through some of the most twee-looking real estate in the park before you get there. I imagine plenty of time-strapped vacationers never bother, especially when the most heavily promoted draw—meeting Mickey Mouse—is also possible within minutes of entering Disneyland. Taking more effort to point out that there's a good ride (and a not-so-good ride) back there could do a lot to improve traffic flow.

I don't have a good conclusion, so I'll close with an anecdote. Back when it was rumored that Mickey's Toontown would be sacrificed on the altar of Star Wars, my sister and I took the time to visit it as soon as it opened (an hour after the rest of the park), just to photograph everything. We had not witnessed the daily opening of Toontown before, that we could remember, so we were pretty unprepared when Mickey and Minnie came sauntering through the freshly opened gate, greeted the enthusiastic crowd of children with hugs and high-fives, and then...and then...each mouse took two children by the hand and led them under the railroad tracks and into the cheerful town like old friends.

How could anyone justify closing the final curtain on that?

* Also often up for grabs in this concept: the Fantasyland Theatre. These people...

** Answer: Apparently. These people...

*** These people...

**** Okay, technically Mickey's Birthdayland in the Magic Kingdom was the first. But hey, guess what that was functionally a prototype of?