S.E.A. Here

Mostly, yes I think it’s good to be concerned about what potentially damaging ideas could be pushed by glorifying treasure hunters from the late 1800s till 1930s ish.

The information we have on Canon S.E.A is, however, extremely limited. The one group picture we have of them is from pre-1899 as Harrison Hightower III is present (and holding the stolen idol that will kill him). A lot could have changed since then. And I hope Disney chooses to explore a more modern look into what the S.E.A could be.

The only sort of modern character we have (considering the timeline) is Alberta Falls, Albert’s granddaughter who runs the Skipper Canteen (restaurant in WDW) and was responsible for the change from a river shipping company to the Skipper-focused Jungle Navigation Company. There is a lot of room for Disney to choose new members that were inducted, or maybe new ones who just found old documents and decided to be adventurers or researchers also! (and while it’ll likely never happen, I absolutely love the idea of new S.E.A. Members pulling reverse-missions from the old folks by robbing museums and returning stolen items back to the actual people they belong to)

While we can visit Henry Mystic in his Mansion, Harrison’s hotel, Mary’s oceanier lab on the cruise, and Indiana Jones on the rides/shows, all of those are out-of-time experiences. They are not current to an actual modern timeline. They have a lot of room to play with the timeline, even historically, about new members joining/getting recruited and telling new stories, or extending stories with new facts and characters… I just hope they do take that chance.

Also I am obligated to point out that, while a lot of people are of the belief that the Disney Parks are just for kids, they simply are not. Just my bone of contention here. A lot of rides could even be considered too thrilling or too intense for young kids, especially in the bigger parks. Yes, it’s a theme park with characters and fantasyland is definitely one of the more cutesy areas, but the parks are always for “the young and young at heart” (especially when you consider lands like epcot where you can drink around the world… ).

And following that often misplaced view of the parks, the Adventurer’s Club was an absolutely delightful location for fans of the S.E.A. in-park universe stuff. It was part of Pleasure Island and, especially after a certain time of night, was definitely an adult location. In fact, each of the buildings in Pleasure Island had little backstories that tied back into a wider park-universe of characters from the past. Sadly, that’s all demolished and removed now. It was rocky in the eyes of Canon anyways but it’ll still be missed.

Additionally, the few locations that reek with S.E.A. Vibes stateside are the Trader Sam’s Tiki Bar in the Disneyland area and the Skipper’s Canteen at Walt Disney World. I think there still is Jock Lindsey’s hangar bar in WDW Disney Springs too. One of these is straight up a bar. And I know Skipper’s Canteen is more popular among older kids and adults because the dishes are intentionally Adventureous and lil ones often shy away from those foods.

First, the upcoming novel series based on S.E.A and its first book “Shinji Takahashi and the Mark of the Coatl” This middle-grade series’s first book focuses on a boy who inexplicably ends up the conduit of an ancient guardian and now must team up with a tech wiz and a “venerable Society of Explorers and Adventurers and its ragtag cast of spelunkers, hackers, mapmakers, pilots, and mythology experts (among other things)” to return the guardian to its rightful home before it’s power accidentally kills the boy or even worse, falls into the hands of the Hightower Corporation and their nefarious intentions. Sounds pretty straight forward right? There’s nothing too judgemental or old-timey, but it still manages to hit the points that make S.E.A what it is, complete with a clear establishment of good/neutral/bad. Plus it sneaks in a bit of the darker tone that S.E.A can sometimes be.

Speaking of Disney media with sutle dark tones, the 2012-2016 TV show “Gravity Falls” shows exactly how to make a family-friendly piece of media with shades of dark comedy. It was a simple premise of two twins, one a believer of weird stuff and one that’s just weird, who get stuck at their con-artist great uncle’s tourist trap in a town in the middle of nowhere, who discover a journal that leads them to the discovery of several supernatural and cryptic things all over the seemingly normal town. Everything from classic cryptids to horrific curses to hidden cults to even the CIA was featured in this show! And it tackled some pretty serious topics on occasion (death, family, memories, etc).

So, yeah, if they’re going to tackle S.E.A, I fully agree that it should be modern-day, but not just modern-day. It should be as utterly wacky and crazy as a classic pirate film with all the humour of an old guy punching a pterodactyl with a pig attached to his chest, where the main cast is the biggest set of utter misfits that you will ever find outside of Goonies and the villains are either typical for-profit villains or supernatural entities or a mix of both.

But Agrabah has something that no other place in the world has .

Disneyland Secret #230

18 seconds. The cast member in the Enchanted Tiki Room pushes a button to start the program. From there, there is an 18 second wait until Jose wakes up. Often members of the audience are asked to wake Jose up or the cast member him/herself may do it. It is also a request you can make if the cast member is obliging. Walt Disney use to come a wake up Jose.

Disneyland Secret #229