With E:E, I think yes. E:E was meant to be a true E-ticket. Big footprint, big ride, big excitement, etc.

With the Pirates changes, I think they were just hyping big because they knew they had a short window for the changes to really drive any traffic. If they waited until now, for example, they really wouldn’t get that much interest, as evidenced by the return of the lines for Pirates to something close to pre-remake levels.

I think there’s two things going on here. One, this really is an attempt at Buzz 2.0, and no matter what Disney says, that’s how most people are going to view it going in. Maybe they’ve created something even better, but I doubt they’d be able to get people to buy into that until after it opens. People are a bit wary of Disney’s hype these days. Honestly, we’ve been burned at least as many times as we’ve had expectations met, so many are hesitant to get too worked up.

Second, I do not think Disney is truly confident this will “Wow” people, so they are hesitant to go overboard on the hype because if will make things all the worse if they fail to meet those elevated expectations.

Remember, that’s an unofficial line we are often fed by Disney, that we simply expect too much and if we just kept our expectations in check, things like DCA could have a chance to succeed.

That’s ridiculous of course, but maybe Disney has learned something from that kind of thinking and don’t want to have a repeat of that here.