Turtle Talk With Crush
Gather ’round a window to the ocean for a real-time Q-and-A session with your favorite totally tubular turtle. Righteous!
“Hey dude, nice shell you got there!”
Turtle Talk with Crush is found on the lower level of the Sea Base Alpha section of The Seas with Nemo & Friends and is arguably the highlight of the pavilion, at least in terms of crowds. Guests are ushered into what looks like a cross between a movie theater and a wall displaying a section of the aquarium itself. Children are encouraged to sit on the floor near the screen while some seating is provided for adults behind the carpet area. Once the show starts, an animated puppet version of the title character appears on the screen and carries on conversations with the audience, asks and answers questions in an unscripted manner, and entertains the crowd with silly jokes and quick-witted one-liners at an alarming speed. Everything is good, clean fun and younger members of the audience will enjoy the entire show and may use the word “Dude” repeatedly for the rest of the day.
Behind the Schemes:
The show’s appearance is quite like Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor at the Magic Kingdom as Crush is a high-tech combination of puppetry, computer animation, and a live actor bringing the character to life in front of guests’ eyes. The tone is always pleasant and upbeat, while some improvised dialogue may contain sly humor that only adults will catch.
There is no fully-formed show script for Crush to deliver; he just follows the whims of the crowd and keeps things rolling along at a brisk pace, so if guests are looking for a good attraction to grab a quick catnap, this may not be the one to pick as the room is constantly filled with laughter and conversations.
Reality Check:
Turtle Talk with Crush was updated in 2014 with extra characters from the film Finding Dory. These are all pre-recorded voices, which is probably the primary area where Crush must follow varying scripts in order for the scenes to make sense.
The original voice for Crush was provided by Andrew Stanton, who has won Oscars for directing the Pixar films Finding Nemo and WALL-E. He also co-wrote all four of the Toy Story films. Stanton won zero awards for directing the box office bomb John Carter.
When Crush comments on audience members’ shells, he’s making remarks about their clothes. If he asks, “Where’s your shell?”, it might mean that someone has disrobed, which is highly frowned upon in the parks.