Sunday, March 07, 2010

"Captain Eo Tribute" at Disneyland -- 05Mar2010

We went to Disneyland to check out the "Captain Eo" movie that they revived because of Michael Jackson's death. Actually, it's billed as a "Captian Eo" *Tribute*, which I guess means that this is not the real Michael Jackson, but a impersonator. He sure looked like the real one though, and I'd'a bet it was really him, until he delivered his first uber-dramatic line, "We're going in!", and it was dubbed in by a 10-year-old girl -- probably Dakota Fanning. That kind shattered the illusion.

Anyway, Michael/Dakota is the pilot of a little egg-shaped ship, with a crew of robots stolen from that lame "Wizard of Oz" sequel, a two-headed muppet, an untidy blue elephant (cast to deliver the requisite amount of vaguely not-quite-fart jokes), and a cute little flying thing with a human-wrist-shaped blank spot where he sits.

They get yelled at by Admiral Bushy-brows over Princess Leia's video phone, who tells them to go fly through some recycled Death Star tunnels to find a green "beacon" light, despite their actual goal being the Wicked Witch of the West's "throne room", where she's gotten herself tangled up in a bunch of industrial tubing that's inexplicably dangling from the ceiling. She's been up there so long that her fingernails are four inches long, and she's pretty grumpy about it.

Michael/Dakota and crew show up and she immediately tries to throw them in the dungeon, but they insist on putting on a show first. Queen Giger-Makeup can't really stop them, since she's still stuck to the ceiling, and her guards keep getting their half-a-mile-of-industrial-tubing costumes turned into brightly-colored shredded Flashdance Lycra by some rainbow beams that inexplicably come from a few inches left-and-above of Michael's palms, like he's some kind of fabulous-costume-and-makeup spewing gay Spiderman.

But he's not, he's Tribute to Michael Jackson, so he gets all the newly-costumed Not-Zombies into a Not-a-Triangle diamond-shaped arrangement, and does a Not-the-Thriller dance, to a hoppin' beat laid down by Gumby versions of his robot friends who have transformed into a set of self-playing metal drums, a synth played by the Flatulephant, and Spock's stand-up bass played by the rear-end-less flying butterfly-monkey. The theater itself tries to get in on the action, thumping the seats up and down just a quarter beat off the actual rhythm.

Queen Cargo-Net-Accident is apparently even more sick of Michael's crotch-thrusts than the rest of us, so she starts screaming and swinging back and forth in her nightmare-hammock, until Michael send out one more blast of Gay Power from his almost-palms, which transforms her steam-factory palace into a Greek temple, breaks her down from the ceiling, and turns her into Aurora, Bringer of the Dawn from Fantasia.

This was apparently Michael/Dakota's mission from the beginning -- bringing Fabulousness to the non-Fabulous -- so he gathers up his de-transformed crew/band, and while misusing the definite article in the first decipherable lyrics of the whole show, departs with "We are here to chaaaaange the wuuuuurld".

Fortunately, this Star Wars/Thriller mash-up/rip-off was perpetrated by the actual rights-holders of those properties, so lawsuits don't ensue as Michael/Dakota flies off in his Space-Combi into a twinkling starfield.

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