Lost fans will still have to wait until 2010 before the can spend their well earned money on one of the many Lost items that will go up for Auction. Those visiting the San Diego Convention can run to booth 315 at the San Diego Comic Convention for a preview look at the collection of items that will go under the hammer next year. Some great and amazing stuff that will not go cheap.
The Walt Disney Family Museum will be opening in October as mentioned in one of the previous blog entries. To long to wait? No worries. The museum is sharing some great pictures in online previews first. Together with the preview they’ll share some information on what the expect in each gallery and we are happy to share the information (provided by the museum) and some selected photos in a “Gallery to Gallery” series. So here is the first part with information on the exhibit’s first gallery, the items that will be displayed and the specific period in Walt Disney’s life depicted in the first gallery:
On the 1st October 2009 the new Walt Disney Family Museum in the Presidio of San Francisco will open its doors to the general public and the many Disney fans. There will be over 1600 drawings, artwork and exhibits, telling Walt’s story starting from his childhood and of his most wonderful accomplished dreams.
You can follow the museum work and find all information related on the official website (Website will open as from 1st August). If you have a facebook account you can also check out the Museum page on Facebook and you can also visit their Twitter account.
This museum will be an amazing tribute to the man we all come to admire so much. This will be a place full of amazing Walt Disney Gems, something that should not be missed by any Disney fan. Read on for the Fact Sheet and more museum pictures…
The exclusive, limited edition Runaway Brain Mickey Mouse VCD by Medicom Toy, priced at $149.99, will be made available for Pre-Order at SideshowCollectibles.com and can be picked up in the Sideshow booth at the 2009 San Diego Comic-Con
Visitors of the San Diego Comic Convention (july 23-26) will have the possibility to buy and own some special limited Disney art print. One of the prints will be from the TRON movie.
The art print is taken from the original concept art and will be offered in a production run of only 82 pieces. The same amount as the date the movie was released. Price of this piece will be $79
The Princess and the Frog will also have a limited art print.
The piece will have a limited run of only 50 pieces, will be printed on Museum Fine Art Quality Watercolor paper, hand numbered and signed by the talent of the movie. Again offered at $79
If you want want of these make sure to be at the convention on the first day…
I have the sad obligation to write the second obituary on the Mousekingdom Blog in less than 24 hours as Michael Jackson, the King of Pop, died yesterday at the age of 50 in his home at Holmby Hills, Los Angeles, CA. While the cause of his death has not been confirmed and an autopsy is underway, speculations (also fueled by a statement of the families attorney apparently) indicate medication or maybe a misuse of such could have played a role. Michael Jackson was currently preparing for his comeback concerts planned in London but recent rumors had indicated that he had suffered various injuries and attacks of weakness hampering the rehearsals.
Michael Jackson is certainly remember for what most probably will stay forever the best selling pop album of all times, Thriller, but had various worldwide smash hits around the globe in the course of its career before it faltered in the last years. He started performing professional at the young age of five with his brothers as “Jackson 5″ (who had amongst others the hit “ABC”). Michael Jackson was also one of the best known Disney fans worldwide who frequently visited in particular the original Disneyland as well as the Disneyland Resort Paris, where he signed the underside of the couch table in the Sleeping Beauty suite. A visit of his to the Disneyland Resort Paris in 1992 (opening year) can be seen in the you-tube clip embedded below.
The second issue is out and has arrived at my doorstep. (Or should I say under my car porch as that’s where the postman left it). Although not being excited about it, after not liking the first one, I do had to open it immediately. It’s Disney after all and I couldn’t wait to see it, even if I thought it would not be any better then the first issue. But,… I was going to be pleasantly surprised.
Although I am a big fan of the parks and always hope for in dept park stories and secrets and hope to see something of the parks on the cover, I must admit that I was drawn to the nice Donald Duck cover first. “Donald Duck, 75 years of Mischief, mayhem & mirth!” was the appropriate title to the cover. But it was time to look inside and see if the book could change my mind… and somehow it did. It starts straight away with an article about the new Monster Inc. Attraction in Tokyo Disneyland and was followed with a look at the Disneyland Gallery in the next article. A very promising start.
If the money is gone, you have to start selling some of your things. It can happen to the best of us, even Michael Jackson, the king of pop. After already selling his ranch Michael has no other option to sell some of his private collection so he can pay his bills. In this collection, as was to be expected, are a lot of Disneyana to be found. Browsing the catalog some amazing Disney things popped up. So if you have a couple of left over dollars, maybe something is in the collection for you. Although, I must admit, I don’t think “left over dollars” will be enough as most of the items are big, some of them are very rare and all of them will go for top dollars.
Originally this was supposed to be “step II” of my D23 experience – and it in some way still is – but then fellow blog writer Andy muscled into “my” series with his post about his experience with the D23 “club” / “community” … so now I’ll have to call this step III ;- )
In my prior post in this series I commented on Disney most probably expecting us Europeans to be grateful for being allowed to join D23 even so they add a gross surcharge for international delivery. Afterall they never allowed Europeans to orde their (failed) Disney Yearbook. Andy chimed in reminding us that the extreme shipping is also tagged to any other orders international members place in the D23-shop – even if it is a small comparable affordable item such as a pin. I agree with him that this is really annoying. But – differen from him – I expected it. Afterall Disney always used to overcharge for shipping and handling with similar amounts such as 25$ – prior experience with the Disney Catalogue and the mailorder services of Walt Disney World and the Disneyland Resort Anaheim taught me that. In addition I never expected to place many orders for D23 exclusive merchandise. So while I think it is annoying it does not irk me as much as it does Andy. However, I think Disney should overthink this policy – even if international mailing results in extra work such as completing the custom forms (but more about that later). Also I think as an international member I also have the option to liump several orders of items together so to reduce the amount of shipping that applies to each separate item. However, I see that that might not work for limited items that sell out before the next item shows up one is interested in.
But Andy also wrote about him being disappointed with the D23 magazine and the surprise gift … I still can’t say anything about the magazine as it still has not arrived, but I got my surprise welcome gift today …
Pixar’s next big animation release will be “UP”, but analysts say that it was a bad choice. The movie isn’t commercial enough and young boys might not like the main character to much.
Also the toy manufactures aren’t to happy. Previous Pixar movies where not only a success in theaters but made big cash in the toy stores too. Especially “Cars” is a big success with its $5bn record sales so far. Cars merchandise is still going strong, even three years after its first release. Toy manufactures don’t see a repeat of that success with the movie “UP”.
OK, so before reading this entry make sure to read what Dirk thinks about the D23 club so far in D23 … Step by Step… Done? Good! Now here is what I think about D23…
I became member on day 1, mainly because I am a Disney geek and whatever Disney does I’ll go for it. I love Disney, especially the parks, and when Disney put something on the market they can be sure that my money will leave my pocket and end up in their account. It was no different with D23 and once the site got live (I gazed at the white screen for a couple of times before it did) I got myself the charter membership… Living in Europe it set me back the $120 Dirk already talks about, but I had big hope and wanted to get my hand on some of the exclusive merchandise. Once I got my login information I visited the D23 shop. As a collector of Disney things I wanted to make sure to get the special D23 Tinker Bell Pin. It was the first in a series of ten, a series I was going to collect myself. So I went to the site, clicked on the pin and started to go to the checkout procedure…
The welcome letter to D23 charter members and the charter members' membership card
Following a first of what might become a series of “step by step” reports about Disney’s Official Fan Community “D23″, which was subject of various posts in the past. Even so the pricing without question must be considered as “overpricing” for interested members outside the US (more than 120 $ including postage in Europe) I made – certainly just for the sake of reporting here on the Mousekingdom Blog – the decision to spend the money and bought a membership right away. Afterall I assume as an interested person living outside North America Disney would expect me to be grateful that they are selling me the membership in the first place, since they always turned international buyers down for their (funnily failed) attempt of the Disney yearbook … but back to our D23-topic … so what happened next?
Today Disney’s new club D23 has been revealed. It’s the first day you can become a member and order the magazine and its benefits via the D23 website (although some issues of the first magazine already found their way onto some news stands days before the official release date). You can read all about it on the official site: D23 – The Official Community for Disney Fans.
The membership will cost you $74,99, but if you live outside of the USA you have to add a heavy postage cost of $57,95 on top of that. There is also some exclusive collectables already on offer on the web. For example the very first pin of a special 10 pin charter year series. On the pin you’ll find Tinker Bell. The pin is priced at $19,95, but if you want Disney to send it to Europe it will cost you about $45 more for shipping. $45 for shipping one pin? (imagine paying that for 10 pin releases) That doesn’t sound like something anybody can justify. A real shame… Maybe some items will be sold inside the park too. Like that some of use can save on overrated postage costs.
Never the less, I am very excited about the magazine and the special welcome gift and hope to be part of one of the conventions in the future as I am D23… Are you?
D23 was a little secret project of Disney which was going to be revealed on 10 March, a little over 4 days when you check the countdown clock on the official site. Nothing much was know, but speculation took place on many blogs and forums. But the secret is out a little early as some fans where able to find out what D23 stands for. D23 start out as a magazine and will be released on March 10. The magazine will be available in shops, and that’s how people found out about what D23 is. Some shop already got the first issue, together with the issue they probably also got some information on the release date and when they are allowed to sell it. Not everybody reading this information, just putting the magazine on their shelves early, and fans lucky enough to be near one of those shops got an insight on D23 early.
Lost fans will still have to wait until 2010 before the can spend their well earned money on one of the many Lost items that will go up for Auction. Those visiting the San Diego Convention can run to booth 315 at the San Diego Comic Convention for a preview look at the collection of items that will go under the hammer next year. Some great and amazing stuff that will not go cheap.
Originally this was supposed to be “step II” of my D23 experience – and it in some way still is – but then fellow blog writer Andy muscled into “my” series with 
