Elliott, Pete and Swan Lake

Pete's Dragon is one of two floats that have changed very little from the original version of the Tokyo Disneyland's Electrical Parade.

The shot above was taken just as Pete is making Elliott "disappear."

The other float/unit that has changed very little since the original parade is the "Swan Lake" unit pictured below. I don't know the backstory for this unit, but Tokyo Disneyland has always had these Swans in their Electrical Parade. The music that plays at this point in the parade is from "Swan Lake".

Due to many requests......okay, one request....the parade posts will continue until we get to the end.

Beauty and the Beast

Tokyo Disneyland's Electrical Parade Dreamlights continues with the Beauty & the Beast unit. Lumiere is audio-animatronic. His body bends, he waves his arms around, and his mouth moves as he sings "Be Our Guest." Many of the lights in this parade, including the ones on this float, are flashing, twinkling, or "traveling."

Is anyone bored yet? I was going to only spotlight parts of this parade, but then somehow decided to show at least one shot of every float. Maybe it's taking too long to show the entire parade. It is a very long parade. The parade even has groups of performers that walk along in front of or behind many of the units (like the bees from the Winnie the Pooh unit), but they don't always photograph very well, so I'm not posting those pics. The Beauty and the Beast Unit has some performers dressed as "dinner plates" and others dressed in French maid-type costumes pushing light-up "dessert carts". Other units that have performers are the Alice unit which has dancing light-up "flowers" and "butterflies" and the Casey Jr. Circus Train float which has marching light-up "toy soldiers."

Want to see the rest of this parade or has everyone had enough of it for a while?

Buzz, Nemo and Crush!

Tokyo Disneyland's Electrical Parade Dreamlights continue's.........

Mike, Sully, Boo and Pooh!

These are the next units in Tokyo Disneyland's fabulous "Electrical Parade Dreamlights". Mike and Sully's eyes roll around and I believe that they are "projected" just like Buzz Lightyear's face on the Buzz Lightyear attractions.

Boo is wearing her monster disguise and is strapped onto Sully's back.

The pooh unit is followed by a team of "honeybees" on rollerskates.

Snow White and Peter Pan

These are the floats that follow the Alice In Wonderland unit in Tokyo Disneyland's "Electrical Parade Dreamlights." Enjoy!

"We dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, in a mine the whole day through...."

"Blast that Peter Pan.....feeding me hand to that crocodile!"

The Golden Afternoon

This is the second unit in Tokyo Disneyland's "Electrical Parade Dreamlights". Alice's mushroom float from the original parade has been replaced by a giant Chesire Cat. His head and tail rotate from side to side, his stripes blink in varying patterns and his head and body "disappear" leaving only his eyes, nose and mouth lit up. Why don't any of the other Disney parks have this???? I'm just asking........

"How very curious!" "Why today is MY un-birthday....and yours, and yours!"

"Why there's Mr. Snail...and there's a ladybug! Hello Mr. Snail! Hello ladybug!"

A Whole New Electrical Parade!

Tokyo Disneyland's original Electrical Parade ran from 1985 through 1995. It was replaced that same year with a new "light" parade called "Fantillusion", which ran until 2001. Less than one month after the final performance of "Fantillusion", Tokyo Disneyland debuted a new version of the Electrical Parade called, "Tokyo Disneyland Electrical Parade Dreamlights". This new version was bigger and better with more lights than ever before.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the globe....specifically Anaheim, we were told in 1996 to come see the Main St. Electrical Parade one last time before it GOES AWAY FOREVER! It was still very popular and park guests were still staking out their seats along the curb hours before the sun even went down. The whole thing was obviously a marketing ploy to get people to come to the park, purchase the "farewell" merchandise, and to buy the light bulbs. Let's face it, many of us were suckers and we fell for it. Well, just like certain performers that say it is their "farewell concert tour", Disney had lied to us. They brought the parade back five years later, but not back to Disneyland where it belonged. They put it in the failing California Adventure in a desperate attempt to try to get people into that park. The parade was also shorter now since a couple of the original floats did not return.

Since Tokyo Disneyland brought back their Electrical Parade seven years ago, they have already updated it by adding new floats in addition to creating a Christmas version of the parade for the holiday season. By the way, Anaheim's newest float is Elliot from "Pete's Dragon" which was added in 1977 when the movie premiered, but hey, I guess it's still better than what replaced the parade back in the summer of 1997......Light TRAGIC!

The front legs of these horses move up and down in a "trotting" motion. Did I mention that the parade is bigger and better than before?

Oh, and the parade's theme song, "Baroque Hoedown" was brought back as well. :-)

Stay tuned as the parade continues. Next time we'll take a look at the "Alice In Wonderland" unit of the parade and see what Alice is sitting on top of now!