This summer, we are reintroducing our listeners to the BEST OF SCFADP by playing our 10 most popular episodes. In this episode, we discuss the Mysterious Benedict Society series on Disney+ and the Extra TERRORestrial Adventure at Magic Kingdom.
Listen to us on your favorite podcast platform or at these links:
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/supercalifragilistic-awesome-disney-podcast/id1519529786
IHeartRadio: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-supercalifragilistic-aweso-68324055/
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7aEKXzO7tTCqZfnvJnzAPC
SCFADP on Twitter: https://twitter.com/scfadp
SCFADP on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/scfadp/
SCFADP on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/SuperCaliFragilisticAwesomeDisneyPodcast
All music for this episode is available through a creative commons license. The background music for the News segment was created by Kevin Macleod: Fuzzball Parade by Kevin MacLeodLink: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/5044-fuzzball-parade
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Show Notes:
Chris and Kelli discuss the upcoming Disney Plus series ‘The Mysterious Benedict Society,’ based on the book series by Trenton Lee Stewart. They highlight the show’s connection to an executive producer who passed away and their excitement about the diverse characters and moral lessons. They also analyze the characters and plot, introducing the unique abilities and personalities of the children in the society and the antagonist’s identical twin brother. Later, they discuss their personal experiences with the now-defunct ‘Alien Encounter’ ride at Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, including its original intent as a dark ride based on the Alien movie franchise and its transformation into a shooter game due to concerns about intensity. They also delve into the ride’s creation, including how it was changed to a new story involving the teleportation of an alien creature into a containment room for observation and study.
Outline
“The Mysterious Benedict Society” Disney+ series based on books by Trenton Lee Stewart.
- Chris and Kelli discuss the Mysterious Benedict society, an original series coming to Disney+ on June 25th.
- They talk about the book series and its adaptation, with Kelli reading the back cover and setting up the prop.
- Kelli and Chris discuss the upcoming TV adaptation of Trenton Lee Stewart’s book series, with a diverse cast and moral lessons.
- Rainey and Seth are two of the children in the series, each with unique talents and personalities.
A mysterious society of gifted orphans with a mission to save the world.
- Kate Weatherall, a 12-year-old runaway, is creative and optimistic.
- Kelli and Chris discuss a mysterious plot involving twin brothers, mind control, and a global crisis.
A former Disney attraction, Alien Encounter.
- Kelli and Chris discuss the upcoming season of a show and its similarity to a book, with Kelli expressing excitement and Chris expressing interest in reading it.
- Chris reminisces about the controversial and cult-following ride at Disney, Alien Encounter, and how it used special effects and trickery.
- Chris describes a theater in the round attraction where guests were close to an alien monster.
- The ride was closed for retooling due to CEO Michael Eisner’s dissatisfaction with its scariness.
- Chris describes a terrifying experience on a haunted house ride, including feeling alien saliva on his face and hot breath on his neck.
The former Disney attraction, Alien Encounter
- Chris shares a personal story about his grandmother’s experience on the Alien-themed ride at Disney World, and how it was originally intended to be a dark ride shooter game based on the Alien movie franchise.
- George Lucas was brought in to create a new story for the ride, which became a teleportation experiment gone wrong, with an intelligent alien rescuing the guests from the scientists in the room.
- Chris and Kelli discuss the movie “Howard the Duck” and its cast, including Tim Curry, Phil Hartman, and Tyra Banks.
- They also mention the podcast’s contest and encourage listeners to follow them on social media.
Episode Transcript:
NOTE: This transcript was produced using AI. Please excuse any errors.
Welcome aboard Disney fam. Hello out there to all of our Disney family. We are so happy to have you on our show with us. My name is Chris and
Kelli 0:38
I’m Kelly. And this week we are looking at our six most popular episode as we do our best of summer. This one originally aired May the 23rd. Honey, my birthday every day of 2021.
Chris 0:54
Oh, I was so young.
Kelli 0:57
I talked about the Mysterious Benedict society that was coming to Disney plus, and you looked back at the terrifying Extra Terrestrial Alien Encounters one
Chris 1:10
of the defunct Dr. Zona at Walt Disney World. But I can remember writing it and feeling that that scary alien running around the cockpit with you breathing on your neck and probably ripping somebody open and feeling their blood fall on your face. It
Kelli 1:24
was super scary. Yeah. And I did adventure. I liked the Disney plus mystery. Oh, it was good. It was very, very good. I thought it held true to the books and I thought it did
Chris 1:33
you know who else was going to enjoy it? I hope there’s all these people that listen to you talk about hope so.
Kelli 1:41
Okay, so
Chris 1:42
I brought a book. I’m ready for this. Okay, so
Kelli 1:46
I’m gonna read don’t look don’t look a little bit. Okay, I’m going to read the back of the book. Don’t look at it, it says Are you a gifted child looking for special opportunities. When this peculiar ad appears in the newspaper, dozens of children enrolled to take a series of mysterious mind bending test, and you dear reader contest your wits right alongside them. But in the end just for very special children will succeed. Their challenge to go on a secret mission that only the most intelligent and resourceful children could compete with their newfound friendship at stake? Will they be able to pass the most important test at all? Welcome to The Mysterious Benedict society.
Chris 2:25
Oh, boy.
Kelli 2:26
I’m going to just set this book here as a prop that I’ve seen. So yes, you can see it now we actually have the entire set. Okay. I’ll bring those up as well. Okay, so we’ve got the entire paperback set. So the reason we’re talking about the Mysterious Benedict society is because it is an original series that will start streaming on Disney plus June the 25th. Birthday to me. Yes. So interestingly, this was originally developed for Hulu, and it announced it was moving to Disney plus in November of 2020.
Chris 2:58
Very easy for them to do since they own all that. Yes, is based on
Kelli 3:02
the book series by Trenton Lee Stewart, and I’m gonna give you a one sentence thing what I read initially was the back of book number one, I will give you a one sentence plot and if we have time, I’ll go into a little bit more detail. Placed undercover at a boarding school known as the Institute, a group of orphans must foil a nefarious plot with global ramifications while creating a new sort of family along the way. One of the just side note here one of the executive producers Jamie Tarsus, also helped develop friends and Fraser unfortunately, she passed away from a cardiac event last fall, she was only 56. Just a quick shout out to Jamie she broke the glass ceiling for a female TV executive. She was the first woman to run a network entertainment division. And she was president of ABC Entertainment at age 32.
Chris 3:53
Oh my gosh.
Kelli 3:54
So she shattered that ceiling at a young age show.
Chris 3:56
And I hear stuff like that. And I feel like such a waste.
Kelli 4:01
So good job, Jamie. Let’s just celebrate January’s. I’m talking about ourselves. These are middle grade novels. That means they’re targeted towards like fourth to eighth grade. Right in my wheelhouse with a very Lemony Snicket vibe, won tons of Book Awards. But apparently it also has very strong moral lessons as well. So the cast I do love so first of all, the books are very diverse. The the folks in the book, the characters are diverse, it describes them. And so I think the casting was done really well. But so let me tell you a little bit about who is in it. So the first season that will come out on June 25 is eight episodes. I don’t know which book it’s going to be doing. Obviously it can skip around creative license or what have you. But it doesn’t like there’ll be more than one series or at least they’re setting it up that way. Good. I like that. So the eighth episode first season stars Tony Hey l Kristin Shaw, Ryan Hurst, Mommy. Yeah, Boffo, I’m so sorry, Gia Sundew, Seth Carr, me de Oliveira, Mystic in show and Marta, Timo fever and she actually changed her name. She is Marta Kessler now. So, in any case, I want to give you a little bit of background each of these especially the children in this series because I think they’re really going to make it. So the first one is Rainey Muldoon. And this one is character’s name. That’s the character’s name mystic Inc. in show is going to be playing Randy Muldoon. So Rainey is an 11 year old boy living at Stone Town orphanage. He is talented at problem solving, logical deduction, and perceiving people’s emotions. Rainey looks between the lines observing and questioning and solves most problems by looking for a puzzle within the situation. Right so these kids are unique and smart in very unexpected ways, is what I’ll say. The next one is Seth Carr and he is sticky Washington. Sticky is an 11 year old bald T skinned boy is how he’s described. He has a great memory everything sticks in his head which is where he gets the nickname and a talent for reading quickly. He is timid and nervous and resorts to polishing his glasses in stressful situations. He ran away from his parents because they forced him into an academic competition and he thought they no longer wanted him around. I would like to just take a moment and say that does not make sticky and orphan makes him a missing child
Chris 6:43
potentially a kidnap victim
Kelli 6:45
but whatever. We’re gonna we’re gonna go with this orphan. According to this, he’s not an orphan. He’s a runaway. Kate Weatherall. She is played by me Dale Avira 12 year old girl who is sporty, dexterous, strong, creative, cheerful and optimistic. After being orphaned she ran away to the circus. She has blond hair, blue eyes and fair skin she carries a red bucket containing various items which she thinks are useful, including an army knife flashlight, a pin a rope, a bag of marbles, slingshot spool of clear fishing twine, a horseshoe magnet and a spyglass disguised as a kaleidoscope
Chris 7:24
does absolutely feel very Lemony Snicket very Lemony Snicket doesn’t.
Kelli 7:28
Kate’s mother died when she was a baby and believes her father left her when she was young because of her mother’s tragic death. So again, we don’t necessarily know that she’s an orphan. She loves to call herself the great Kate weather machine. It’s great. Constance contraire. This is Marta Kessler. So I introduced her as Marta with a different last name, and that’s because she is from Russia. Marta is from Russia. She has small, extremely intelligent and a stubborn girl. She has the ability to write clever and brutal poems, and her ultra sensitive mind is most affected by the Whisperer, which I will explain in just a bit. So then you’ve got the good guy. This is the guy that’s running the that has recruited them. Okay. His name is Mr. Nicolas Benedict. He’s Tony Hale, also known as forky. in Toy Story, four. Oh, among other things. He’s got a long line. Yeah. But I just thought the four key thing was really interesting. He’s a middle aged man who recruits the children he is the one who discovered the plans of his identical twin brother, hit remember his name is Nicholas Benedict, his identical twin brother is name led drop the curtain from whom he was separated just after birth because their parents had died. Mr. Benedict suffers from narcolepsy, which causes him to fall asleep when experienced strong emotions usually laughter So for example, when he’s laughing loud, he’s out. I can already see this as being just hilarious. Yeah. Okay. The bad guy is identical twin brother. Naturally Tony Hills plays both lead drops the curtain is the antagonist of the story in the head of the Learning Institute for the very enlightened l IV E. And the emergency. Our his did an air quotes podcast, folks are his tools for creating mass panic and destabilizing the world’s major governments. Wow, Mr. Curtin created the mind control and mind message transmitter device called the Whisperer, which utilizes children’s minds to spread propaganda and subliminal messages through television as part of a scheme to usurp control of the entire world and be declared minister and Secretary of all Earth regions in a s t e. R. He is also revealed to be Mr. Benedict’s long lost twin brother he uses a modified wheelchair to get around and where’s mirrored sunglasses in order to conceal his narcolepsy, which is triggered by anger as a foil to his twins laughter induced narcolepsy.
Chris 10:10
So, Sal is this sounds you know? Sounds fantastic sounds very the work yeah. Oh yeah. I really love the creativity of all of this.
Kelli 10:21
So here’s the plot from IMDB. Okay, after winning a scholarship competition for gifted orphans are recruited by the peculiar Mr. Benedict for a dangerous mission to save the world from a global crisis known as the emergency in capitals, rainy sticky Kate and Constance must infiltrate the mysterious li ve Institute to discover the truth behind the crisis. When the headmaster, the sophisticated Dr. Curtin appears to be behind this worldwide panic the kids of the Mysterious Benedict society must devise a plan to defeat him. Now, that’s the IMDB summary. So that’s what I expect to see in season one, which sounds a lot like book one here.
Chris 11:04
So when does it start? June? 25. Oh, my gosh. Oh, everybody time to read these June 25. I
Kelli 11:09
know. We just got them in this week.
Chris 11:14
Lucky that’s, I mean, I love that we’ve got these books.
Kelli 11:17
I know. I’m super excited about it. And I will say I glanced through them. They are middle grade, but they’re middle grade at you think I like them? Like a Harry Potter level? Yeah. No, they’re not. They’re not baby books. They’re good books.
Chris 11:31
Well, this is very interesting.
Kelli 11:33
I’m super excited about it. Super excited.
Chris 11:36
I think maybe we start this one tonight. You read me to sleep. Start reading that time you read that to me tonight.
Kelli 11:42
I’m in the middle of another book right now. Well, hello, when are and then I was gonna read Princess Bride after that. Okay, we’ll find I had this on myself for a minute.
Chris 11:52
Well, that was awesome. I love that. I cannot wait to read these and see how they put it on screen. Yeah, I’m excited about it. So sometimes I do wish we would talk about what we’re going to be talking about because this is a really tough turn. Okay. So recently, I don’t know why I’ve been on this kick lately of reminiscing, long lost, sometimes not too long lost attractions at Disney. But here we are again. I was listening to another podcast where they recently reviewed the movie Alien. And it made me think about first of all, it made me think about the section of the Great Movie Ride when we ride through the alien section. But then I thought about one of the most biggest cult following rides at Disney maybe has ever had sort of controversial, but absolutely. I loved it. Okay, this is the extra terror registerable Alien Encounter. Did you ever ride this? I didn’t Did did stitch takeovers took over the the stitches Great Escape took over this.
Kelli 13:09
Like once
Chris 13:11
and and used a lot of the same trickery. And and yeah, and special effects
Kelli 13:19
stitch was terrifying. Oh, really? Stitch was terrifying. Okay, well, that’s one of the scariest rides.
Chris 13:27
No, no, ma’am. No wasn’t the thing they had before that alien encounter was truly horrifying sometimes. Okay, so. So here’s a summary. This was a theater in the round theater in the round style attraction. That brought guests up close and personal with an alien. A vicious, monstrous alien. Okay. It opened for previews only on December the 16th 1994 having replaced the old mission to Mars ride. Okay, did you ever add that one did not write that. Okay, sure. It’s gonna be on a defunct ride. defaults right sector one, day two. It was then closed just a few weeks later, January 12. For retooling because mainly because CEO at the time Michael Eisner didn’t think it was scary enough. Oh, my goodness. Yes. So it officially opened again on June 20 95. In magic kingdom’s New Tomorrowland, you remember they did they sort of revamped Tomorrowland for them. It only lasted about eight years, which in Disney parlance that’s not a very long run for something especially for a ride of this caliber. It closed for good on October 12 2003. And then it was replaced the next year by stitches. Great Escape. Okay. So here’s the ride. It had to pre shows where leaders and scientists have access tech. Explain what we’re going to see which is a demo of their new tech. Knology a teleportation device. In this in this environment we’ve got people living in on other planets and we are now testing the ability to teleport from planet to planet. Excess tech. Their tagline was something along the lines of if you can’t do it with access, don’t do it at all. Just keep going. So we’re strapped in this in this round theater, strapped in strategy. Got bars strapped over you? Yes, you’re strapped in. And they’re these monitors up in the ceiling are showing the scientists that are on a planet across the galaxy, and they’re going to teleport one of us to them. But at the last minute, one of the scientists decide, you know, no, no, no, we’re going to just go ahead and teleport me from here to them. But something of course goes wrong. And instead of teleporting him to us, they teleport a vicious alien monster from another planet. To us. Yeah, as soon as it the smoke clears. He goes berserk and busts out of his cylinder. It’s in the middle of the room. All the power goes out. A live cast member starts walking around the top scaffolding with a flashlight saying things like don’t worry, everybody will have the lights back on shortly. And just about that time that cast member gets attacked by the alien. And all this screeching and noise and the cast members does this blood curdling scream. And that’s when you feel warm liquid fall on your face. Now, people over the years have said that that feels like the animal the alien saliva or I always thought it was the castmembers
Kelli 16:43
blood. That’s when you described it. I assumed it was the
Chris 16:47
blood. Yeah, that’s what it felt like. And then the aliens cast member legit screens, legit screens. And then they use this binaural sound system where you could hear things going from left to right and right to left creepy and the aliens running around the room your chairs rumbling like you can feel him running behind you. But then it all gets quiet Do you also hear like other guests on the ride screaming because you think that they’re being killed by the animal
Kelli 17:18
you put that in air quotes but I have heard other guests do screen other guests absolutely
Chris 17:22
screen. But there are there are clearly like recorded net like things that are people are saying and then then the ride sort of gets quiet and dark again. And you literally feel the animal that alien lit the top of your head. And then you feel his hot breath on your neck. That’s usually when people pee a little bit. And then somehow they get the animal back into the center cylinder. And they destroy it with one final air blast and I feel like I remember blood to the face. Blood to Aspen I feel like and then they open up the doors and you walk out. You run out your your run out. It was horrifying. People told story or there were all these stories of people having heart attacks on it. I remember my grandmother God bless her. Absolutely loved every minute of that ride.
Kelli 18:19
Oh my goodness, she
Chris 18:20
has such a blast. Say that so so it was crazy cool like technology. But so but that was never the original idea. The original idea Michael Eisner legitimately wanted to bring the Alien movie franchises into the Magic Kingdom. Okay. And so they were going to do Disney franchise. It’s it’s not but although I think aliens was maybe 21st 20 Century Fox, which is now owned by but at the time, not so much. It was going to be a dark ride shooter game, okay, where you were riding through the Nostromo spaceship from the original Alien movie and you would shoot those aliens from that movie. They sort of split that idea. They didn’t like it at all. It’s too scary. Plus, it was it was an R rated movie. And at the time, they had a rule of thumb that they would only bring in attractions for movies from G through PG. Although they’ve had a couple of PG 13 movies now that have made attractions in Disney parks. The shooter portion of it became Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin where we shoot and I beat you every time.
Kelli 19:23
So that was all one ride. Well,
Chris 19:26
no, not necessarily. They just said well, let’s do a shooter. Okay, we’ll put it over here and then we’ll turn this into something else. I mean that little
Kelli 19:33
side sidebar comment that you made right there. I want you to know that I heard it. Okay. Oh, that’d be true every time truth. So you cheat every time
Chris 19:41
so once they decided okay, this is not going to be an Alien movie franchise attraction how much time I got you good. Day decided like we got to create a whole new story then. It’s got to be a new story. They got George Lucas. In fact, they had to use George Lucas to convince Michaelides not to do alien. Okay, their movie franchise. So George Lucas came up with a whole new story for this ride. This is not what they went with, but it’s very similar. Just this is George Lucas his take on it. Excess Tech has opened up their space labs to the public to shelter new technology, this teleportation device? Well, we don’t know is this is actually a trap. What they really want to do is test the destructive nature of this alien they got their eyes on. So they’re going to put all of us in this room, they’re going to teleport the alien in there showing off their teleporter. But then they’re going to be taking notes as they see how quickly the alien can kill all of us.
Kelli 20:41
Oh my goodness.
Chris 20:43
Right. So they teleport the alien in he goes berserk. And it’s all crazy. And he’s breathing on us and all that fun stuff. But then the surprise, he’s actually very intelligent, and he knows what’s happened. And so then the alien rescues us by killing some of the scientists in the room. We still get the blood on our face. And he opens up the doors and the chair it sits in the chair and lets us all out. And as we’re walking out, we hear him taking his revenge on the scientist abroad.
Kelli 21:15
Oh my goodness.
Chris 21:17
George Lucas is a freak. I know that’s what they decide. They decided that was dark. They felt like they could. They could.
Kelli 21:26
They could do they can add a little bit of skill, a couple of cast members.
Chris 21:30
They could add a couple they can make it a little more humorous and still kill some cast members. So that’s what they went with. What I found amazing. Another thing I found amazing about this tribe was the cast. Tim Curry was in it. I loved him. You loved him curry. The great late great Phil Hartman from SNL. Kathina Jimmy love played one of the scientists. Yes. Jeffrey Jones played the lead Chairman. Okay. He was the bad guy and Howard the Duck was also the principal and Ferris Bueller. Okay. Kevin Pollak, right he was was Kevin Pollak you know that is he plays one of the dads not miss Maysles dad but her ex husband’s dad can miss nasal Okay, along with a million other things he’s been in and Tyra Banks was in this thing as a scientist too. Yeah,
Kelli 22:21
good cast.
Chris 22:23
I know I mean, I love that they will reach out and grab these big names to do some very recognizable faces to be in such a dire and horrible route. It was an awesome ride. I was highly upset when they got rid of it. I loved it. I mean gene like oh my gosh, Gene. loved every second
Kelli 22:43
of it. She had a bit of a dark
Chris 22:45
man that it was an awesome ride. I hate that they got rid of it and I hate to they got rid of stitch no
Kelli 22:50
I’m not sad about stitch I have not been on that thing in years. It was terrifying.
Chris 22:57
Hey, folks, that is it for this week’s show. You know what to do now? Go out to your favorite podcast platform subscribe because then you don’t have to worry about downloading those episodes it comes to you automatically. And leave us a rating leave us a review to get that word out there for about our show. Definitely.
Kelli 23:17
And if you’re looking for more things Disney please visit SCF adp.com. That’s s for Super C for Cali and for friends. annalistic a for awesome D for Disney P for podcast. What you need to do this week is entered the contest. Yes. So if you haven’t already done so, this stuff is up for grabs. We got about two more weeks left on it and make it happen.
Chris 23:38
Yep, that’s right. Follow us on all the social medias instagram facebook twitter at SCF ADP. You can subscribe to our channel on YouTube Supercalifragilistic awesome Disney podcast. And the more the merrier. With that we hope to see you real soon.