I went Thursday to try to get a ride in on Fast and Furious. When coming into Lankershim around 9:30 in the morning, I wondered why traffic was so horrid. Then it occurred to me that I was going opening day of the addition. None of the passes were blacked out.
So after about waiting in line, I managed to get a ride in just in time and leave before work (Traffic on was terrible!). Just as soon as I left, I heard that they shut the park down due to capacity. But yeah, as for the ride....
I had fun There was some good and bad, but I really wish we could've gotten what we were supposed to get in the first place. Too bad that "defcon II" happened. First the good: The musion effects looked really cool and I loved how the screen was on as you were driving in to give the illusion you were driving into a parking garage. The immersion was great and the fog effects were pretty cool. I liked how the "takeoff" felt somewhat realistic. That was pretty fun.
The bad: Unfortunately, there is more bad than good here. First off, the set-up before you enter the building had SO much wrong in it. Plot-holes and bad acing galore. First, did they just pull some random guy off the street to be the security guard and have him say his lines in one take? Geez, he looked and sounded unconvincing. I could EASILY do much better than him in one take. Also, the FBI agent was.....eh......not exactly a Leanardo DeCaprio. Yeah, that video was annoying. Now, as for spotting the car, I don't think it works that well....not only that, but it's oddly placed before the Bates Motel. I love how our guide reports a car that really doesn't look that suspicious to begin with, yet, when being told by the FBI to report any further suspicious sightings, a guy with a freaking knife comes after us, and the guide shrugs it off like, "Yeah, stuff happens." Makes no sense at all.
The ride....oh boy.....even though I had somewhat enjoyed it, there were several flaws. Like what everyone else said, the graphics just screamed GTA. Heck, even the vehicles looked like they floated like they would in the games! Aside from the takeoff, I felt like the motion effects were weak. I wasn't convinced that we were going faster when we got hooked. Also, sitting in the second car, there was WAY too much going on around me. It's as if this ride were on some sort of Michael Bay fantasy on ADD. The length of the ride itself was okay, but if they're pushing this as a ride, it needs to AT LEAST be thirty seconds longer. I think two minutes is just right for something like this. Don't get me started with those dreadful one liners and mediocre acting. (I mean, "eat asphalt"? REALLY!??). I love how Shaw didn't sound like he gave a single crap he was going to be smashed to death as he was yelling, "send in the drones!" That brings me to another point, (SPOILER Furious 6): Didn't he die in the sixth movie? I guess something broke his fall from that plane.
How would I improve this? I mention this before, but something should happen in the first room. Have a shootout. Have Roman misfire a missile from one of the cars. Have the security guard agent walk in and apologize for his horrible acting while scratching his butt. SOMETHING. Put us into the experience. Fast and Furious is about action and explosions. SO MAKE IT THAT WAY FROM START TO FINISH. Also have something in the Musion room to make it more interesting. Take advantage of the missed opportunity and have the "material witness" on the tram screen as a random guest like the Rebel Spy in Star Tours. Big-time missed opportunity. Make the ride thirty seconds longer. Improve the graphics and have it set at night. Put those front-based projection systems you invested in to good use and put in the freaking helicopter on a KUKA arm in the theater. Have some heat effects when explosions occur or when Shaw has that flame thrower. Enhance the wind and motion effects. Put the smell of gasoline and burning rubber in there if you can. Most importantly, trim down and reshoot the video screen before the ride. No need for that "suspicious car" nonsense. Just cut to the chase as soon as you pass the WoTW sets and saw that Shaw is after the witness.
Whew, that was a long post. Although it sounded like I hated this, I did have some fun on there. I'm just disappointed that there was SO much potential for this to be AWESOME and instead we just got, "Eh, close enough." I really hope after the peak season end and HHN starts up, they'll give this ride a couple of months off to make it the way it was supposed to be. I mean, all of the filming can be off-site. Everything is already built. All of the stuff like adding/enhancing effects or that practical effect in the main room shouldn't take more than two or three months. Hopefully UC will go through with that redo. Hey, if they're just going to redo everything, why not just make a completely new ride out of it? Have a cross over ride: "Fast to the Future". Doc Brown zooms into the chase while Marty McFly stops Shaw from killing Doc from stealing his plutonium. Have the DeLoreon attatch to the tram and zap us back to the year 1990. I think that'd be more awesome than what we got, but I digress. So with that,
"Ride or die!"