Tokyo DisneySea begins 25th anniversary celebrations

Anybody who has visited Tokyo Disney Resort has probably come away and not stopped talking about Tokyo DisneySea. The park opened in September 2001, but has started celebrating its 25th anniversary this week and will run all the way through to the end of March 2027 - so plenty of time to get over and enjoy!

Also this week, we heard about Big Thunder Mountain railroad re-opening at Magic Kingdom, and the first real test of the D’Amaro era as the Wall Street Journal reports Disney is set to announce 1,000 positions to be laid off.

The popular Tokyo DisneySea theme park is turning 25, and a year-long celebration is starting across the resort. Featuring special decorations, shows and food items, this is a celebration that I feel we’ll be seeing a lot of as the year goes on. This celebration runs until March 31st 2027 so you’ve got plenty of time to get over to Japan to enjoy it. A visit to Tokyo DisneySea is always something very special, it’s worth the trip.

I’ve spent some time looking for the best videos of the celebration out so far, so that you can enjoy them in the same way I have:

• Sparkling Jubilee Celebration: A new show on the Mediterranean Harbor featuring Mickey & Friends. Video here.

• Dance the Globe!: A new show in the American Waterfront area of the park celebrating the different music and dance styles of the world. Video here

• Sparkling Jubilee Night: This projection show takes place in the Mediterranean Habor area and projects images onto the Hotel Miracosta. It’s very sweet and a fun happening. Video here

• Sparkling Jubilee Genie: Over at the Arabian Coast, a special musical moment with the Genie has been created especially for the Jubilee. Video here

• Special Decorations across the park: The Sparkling Jubilee blue colours are across the entire park and look pretty great:

  

• Not forgetting special merchandise and food and drink offerings across the parks and hotels.

And if you’re curious- you can read a lot more on the official Tokyo Disney Resort website’s special page celebrating the event right here. (In English).

Look, it’s a basic celebration, and has no big marquee new things like a nighttime show, or parade etc. But what they do have seems to fill a good gap and I’m sure it’ll be a fun time regardless.

Something I didn’t think I’d see was Disney releasing the Adventure Way background music. Now you can close your eyes and pretend to be in Disney Adventure World every day - and also enjoy one of the best background music loops that Disney have created. This Philippe Rombi score has earned a place in everybody’s music library - and is expertly performed by the London Symphony Orchestra.

Listen now:

Apple Music // Spotify // YouTube Music

The wildest ride in the wilderness returns to Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World Resort on May 3rd, 2026. The attraction, which closed in January 2025, has had an extensive refurbishment. As part of the refurbishment:

• The entire ride track was replaced.

• The attraction features all new vehicles and ride control system.

• With the new vehicles, comes brand new cushioned seating.

• …and the attraction height limit has been reduced from 40 inches, to 38 inches!

You can find out more in the Walt Disney World ambassador’s instagram post:

The Wall Street Journal this week reported that Disney is preparing to layoff as many as 1,000 positions in the coming weeks.

It comes as back in January, former CEO, Bob Iger consolidated Disney’s marketing efforts into new Chief Marketing Officer, Asad Ayaz. The idea was to bring the departments closer together and allowing marketing to take place across different functions of the business under a central leadership team.

The core aim, as Variety reported was:

In this upgraded role, Ayaz will lead a new internal organization comprised of all Disney marketing teams (including those in parks, sports and other sectors) meant to “support a more connected approach to how Disney reaches audiences, elevates its campaigns, and advances the business goals of each segment and the company as a whole”

Back then, Ayaz was due to report in to Bob Iger, as well as the, then, segment heads Josh D’Amaro, Dana Walden and Alan Bergman.

Now that this structure has bedded in, it seems like the inevitable is happening and that the consolidation of the teams is beginning. The Variety pull quote above does sound suspiciously like the “One Disney” concept that he rolled out as part of the Annual Meeting of Shareholders last month. However, much of this predates D’Amaro and so it’s not so simple to assign accountability to one individual person.

Iger, however, has a form of seeing trouble and quickly exiting. In 2020, he exited very quickly as the Covid-19 pandemic swept in. Here we are again with a big department merge, which would obviously result in layoffs and Iger very quickly has exited once again.

It’s easy to see the temptation as to why you would want to operate the marketing department as one division that can interconnect into all projects - and conceptually, it sounds like a good thing for the company. Layoffs are never nice to watch as fans of the company, however, and you don’t wish it on anybody. Let’s hope the D’Amaro leadership shows compassion to those impacted.

And finally, this Sunday marks the 34th anniversary of Disneyland Paris. This year is a much more quiet celebration given that Disney Adventure World opened just a couple of weeks ago and that next year will almost certainly be a bigger celebration. Having said all of that, it’s a time to reflect on how the resort has grown in the past year - there’s a clear sense that Disney Village is improving - but not at a significant pace - and that the second gate is finally on its way to something of clear quality. However, this week also marked 20 years since Buzz Lightyear opened in Disneyland Park, which is a park which is starting to feel the weight of this underinvestment.

That’s all for this week. Follow me on twitter (X), Instagram, Threads, or Facebook for more and please do subscribe if you like what you see - or drop a comment and let’s chat!