New talking characters & Hook and Smee now face characters!

For those who have not heard, the new animated character heads have finally made it into WDW. These were first intorduced with the traveling Mickey's Magic Show (which made a stop at the Disney-MGM Studios last year).

The characters actually 'talk' along with their words. There mouths move, eyes blink etc. This past Wednesday (Jan 17) they made their debut on the Castle stage for Dream Along with Mickey. Capt. Hook and Mr. Smee were presented as face characters.

Disney is taking the new major step forward in character advancement. Expect to start seeing this in parades and other show. Who know. IN the future they may start talking for meet n greets! Wouldn't that be nice.

You can see some of the pics in my gallery:
http://www.disneyworldtrivia.com/pho...ry.php?cat=804

I will be posting video of it later as well.

Oooh...that's interesting. Thanks for the update Jason. I love interacting with these two, especially on DCL.

Any idea why they started with Hook and Smee? I'm not complaining, just curious what their thought process was on when to implement which characters.

Wow!!! Tey look wonderful! :yes: I can't wait to see them in person.

I can see it now, "Can we take that shot again? Mickey had his eyes shut.":wink:

Thanks for the news and photos! :thumbs:

Hook and Smee look a little creepy for me, but I like the VIP character heads!!

Yikes! I don't like the looks of Mr. Smee and Captain Hook at all! :no: Plus, my boys are used to seeing them the other way and they still believe in the magic so how do you explain that one to them??? I do however think it would be cool if they can someday make it so the characters can talk and interact with people during meet and greets! :yes:

omg that's amazing!!!

I was always wondering what the next stride in character costumes would be! This must clearly be it!

Oh I can't wait!

I am not sure about these guys. Eyes opening and closing, it may be scary to the kids?

I think they look great!

They look great.. but I think they're gonna be kind of creepy to little ones...

I'm just wondering for those of you who think these new ones will scare the kids....

Don't the current ones do their fair share of scaring kids now?

My family got to see the Mickey's Magic Show when it was at MGM Studios last summer. I didn't see or hear one kid get scared because the characters spoke/blinked. The fab 5 look almost exactly like the non-talking ones in terms of shape and size. If you look at the pictures on the Disneylive.com website, you'll see it's hard to tell the difference.

I think these will be a great addition to the shows and parades at the parks!

They look very cute. I like Hook, Smee is a little iffy. They probably figured to do them in face since Wendy and Peter are already face. Kinda rounds out the group.
The moving characters make the animation come more alive. I dont think the kids are going to be anymore frightened then they are already. The My Little Pony show we went to had the ponys eyes blinking, mouths moving, etc and the kids loved it. Thinking about it, probably the same technology. It was very cool looking and I would love to see the fab 5 do the same.

I'm scared of them...

You know, as I was walking past the stage, I kept on staring at the stage at Hook wondering what was different with him on Wednesday. Funny thing is, I never noticed until now. :wall:

Hook's chin isn't as long.