Like ten million other Disney fans, I signed up for Disney +. If you are still wondering if you should too, hopefully this breakdown will help you to make a decision.
The Good
- Massive catalog of all things Disney, and more. There is only one thing missing and I'll get into that later.
- Overall decent quality. Pretty surprising for a new service. When compared to other new online services at roll out, this one has been rather solid. It's not perfect, but it's good.
- The value is very good. Beyond just the back catalog, the new shows are very good.
- The Imagineering show is exceptional and inspiring.
- The Madalorian is the best Star Wars thing Disney has ever done. The only one that comes close is Rogue One. It's far better than The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi.
The Bad
- The search function is not good. If you search "rock climbing" you will not get Free Solo. How? That's just an example of some of the odd results, or lack of results, that you will find.
- It's missing some titles, for now. Just and example - the Matterhorn. I remember seeing it as a kid. I looked for it. If it is there, the search is too broken to find it.
- Things are not organized well. You really have to go digging into the menus to find anything that Disney does not have on the main page. Even then, a lot of things can only be found via the search function.
- Adding things to your watch list is straight forward. Removing them is not. The only way I found to remove it, is to open the item, check the + like you would to add it, then click the check box that appears. It's just odd.
The Ugly
- The racist double standard. It's no surprise that Song of the South is not available to stream, but with Disney +, Disney just undermined it's biggest reason for not having it.
I have seen and I own a copy of Song of the South. Parts of it are racist. There is no arguing that. But, here is the problem - Davy Crockett is much worse. I saw it a few times as a kid. Now watching it as an adult, I was shocked. I didn't remember how racist it was. It's depiction of Native Americans, and the terms used for them, is utterly offensive.
Disney knows it has a lot of offensive content. To handle this, they provide a warning on some titles. I applaud this. Too often Disney approach has been to sweep things under the rug and pretend something never happened. This is not a healthy approach. It takes away any opportunity to learn from those mistakes and use them as teaching tools for future generations.
Will Disney release Song of the South? No. Davy Crockett is worse, but it does not have the notoriety of Song of the South.
- No vacation videos. I'm talking about the Stacy videos, the promotional videos, and the vacation planning videos. Maybe they are hidden by the bad search, but I don't think they are there. I will admit that this one is personal. Disney + has so much nostalgia on it, that this would push it over the top. Imagine being able to see the parks as they were when you first went. This seems like a big missed opportunity.
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