The American Chronicle
Every Disney Parks fan always greets news of a major Walt Disney World attraction refurbishment with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. Will a faded ride get a much needed upgrade into the 21st century or will a crowd favorite become an unrecognizable imitation of itself with garish updates that ruin the Disney magic? Thankfully, there was no need to fear over the fate of the Disney Park classic, The Haunted Mansion.
Walt Disney World closed the Haunted Mansion at the height of its 2007 summer season in order to undertake its long overdue refurbishment and have the attraction re-opened before the first Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party on September 14th. As scheduled, the "Re-Haunting" of the Haunted Mansion debuted on September 13th, 2007 with many eager Magic Kingdom attendees waiting in line for the early morning park rope-drop to experience the updated attraction. They weren't disappointed. The updates made to the Haunted Mansion constitute far more than just surface improvements. The attraction has been enhanced at every level with embellishments that maintain the original theme while introducing new spooky delights.
The Haunted Mansion has been masterfully updated to showcase all of the elements that have long made it such a favorite ride among Disney park-goers. Significant enhancements have been made to the special effects, as well as the audio and lighting. All of the audio narration by the Ghost Host has been re-mastered and a new sound system has been installed in the attraction so now you can hear the Ghost Host in true stereo with multi-positional sound effects. Lighting effects have also been deftly handled so the parts of the Haunted Mansion ride that had grown dim over the years now provide the frightful visual delights they were always meant to, but without over-brightening the dark ride aspects of the attraction that make riding it so entertaining.. In addition, many mechanical and cosmetic refurbishments have been made both inside and outside the attraction. The Stretching Portrait Gallery provides a more seamless experience of its visual effect and the Doom Buggies now move silently and no longer overwhelm the audio effects.
The best enhancements of the “Re-Haunting”, however, are the new features added to the Haunted Mansion. The demented Haunted Bride and her axe, as well as the fortune-teller Madame Leota’s head floating in mid-air, have both been imported from the Disneyland Haunted Mansion, but not before adding some additional improvements to them to amplify their fright potential. Even better though is the newest feature of the Walt Disney World Haunted Mansion. Replacing the long-boring spider scene is the brand new Staircase Room. Like an Escher print brought to life, the room is full of staircases built in random directions and ghostly footprints going nowhere. The Staircase Room is a stand-out presentation and exclusive to the Orlando park.
As with everything Disney does, they’ve also created a series of souvenirs to celebrate the “Re-Haunting” of the Haunted Mansion. Among the most popular are the limited edition Disney pins that they released exclusively in the Walt Disney World Parks. They created two individual pins, one featuring Madame Leota and one featuring Mickey Mouse, and both of these have been limited to 2000 pins each. The third release is a lenticular set of four pins which features the changing portraits in the Haunted Mansion gallery. Limited to only 750 sets, the Disney Haunted Mansion Re-Haunting pins are likely to be scarce, even on Ebay.
