Disney World has just dropped a promo video announcing its parks' phased reopening - and in all honesty it watches more like a horror movie trailer than the joyous message of hope that's probably intended.
Walt Disney World Resort theme parks began their phased reopening this weekend, starting with the opening of Magic Kingdom Park and Disney's Animal Kingdom Theme Park at its Florida resort on Saturday.
The reopening is attracting a lot of heat considering the number of coronavirus cases is still on the rise in Florida - so at least Disney is able to distract fans from the whole deadly global pandemic thing with a magical short film, right? Right?
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Wrong.
The minute-long promo video opens to shots of an empty theme park, followed by scenes of masked staff members spraying and polishing surfaces, preparing for opening. There's also some creepy waving thrown in for good measure, smiles concealed behind PPE.
We do get what Disney were trying to do with this video - dusting off the cobwebs and firing up the ovens, and all that - but instead, the terrifying empty theme park ends up feeling like the stuff of nightmares.
It's also the perfect example of how music can make *all* the difference.
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The joyous music which builds is the only thing saving this video from being pure horror movie fodder - as proved by a bunch of Internet folk who have hilariously been overlaying the promo vid with horror soundtracks.
"Disneyland. The happiest place on earth! (Shudder)," joked one fan on Twitter.
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A second joked: "I have watched that Disney World reopening commercial like 10 times and it is still the most dystopian thing I have ever seen. I think it's the repeated 'Welcome' while wearing surgical masks and it's so weirdly creepy."
In credit to Disney, it's pretty hard to balance messages of magic, excitement and hope alongside sterilised, social distanced and probably-shouldn't-be-opening-but-are-anyway.
On Saturday 11th July over 10,000 new cases were reported in Florida. The theme park's reopening will be followed by EPCOT and Disney's Hollywood Studios on 15th July.
Featured Image Credit: Disney