Commented on another post about my 5 year old being able to finally ride transformers as his first "big kid" ride and it got me thinking.
This was his first true E ticket experience, yes I said E and you'll find out why. He's done other rides at the fair, local parks like Carowinds or Dollywood, but this was his first truly themed ride experience. In front of us we had a family from Brazil based upon what snippets of conversation I caught and some clothing logos. Behind us was another group speaking a language I didn't recognize. He was focused on the pre-ride videos asking questions, pressing the buttons on the que walls (even though they didn't do any thing). Nervous/high levels of anticipation before getting on the ride, just generally didn't know what he was getting into, but trusting me to get him through it.
As we rode I kept looking at him and he wasn't scared, he was enthralled by it all. About half way through he asked "Is this real?". He got off and it was clear he had just had the best 5 minutes ever. Kept asking to go again, wouldn't stop telling his mom about it, asked if his brother could go (sadly at 3 years old he was just too short), etc.
To see it for the first time through the eyes of a child, while simultaneously being surrounded by people who have literally traveled across continents to experience this ride, really put a new perspective on it all. We as theme park fans get caught up in the newest shiniest new ride tech, nit pick the tiniest theming detail, and generally hold things to a high standard. While forgetting to take a step back and look at these rides objectively, to my kid it was a whole new level of experience he didn't even know existed. To the group in front of us and behind us, it was worth travelling across continents to experience. While Transformers may be getting stale to some, its still got to be in the top 50 immersive rides on the planet, and here we are discussing replacing it.
I'm not saying we should forgive Transformers and other rides of all of their faults, its fair to hold these designers and companies to a high standard. I'm just saying that it never hurts to take a step back, and put things in a wider perspective. Pretend you're that 5 year old who's having his first theme park experience, If he's happy and excited then you should be too.