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The Transmedia Properties of

“Alice in Wonderland”

By: Danielle Nieman, Jenna Zwang, Kristi Mexia and Jennifer Chapski
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There have been many interpretations into the story of “Alice in Wonderland.”

Since 1903, there have been 24 direct film and television retellings, along with 18 comic

books that have been written. Alice’s adventures have also been expanded through 13

video and computer games.

This transmedia project will show how one umbrella company can unify the “Alice in

Wonderland” platform under a variety of transmedia branches. Our goal is to merge

Alice fans from different genres back into one mother ship. This transmedia paper will

address our ideas for a Web series, an online storybook, a collectible card game and a

theme park.

Since it has been shown that fans react well to transmedia properties that foster

immersion in the story world, one of our strategies will be a webseries that allows fans to

explore the backstories of some of the major characters Burton chooses to focus on in the

film. The webisodes will be targeted at the same demographic as the film—primarily

adults who grew up with the original Disney version of Alice in Wonderland. The

purpose is to introduce the characters from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and

Through the Looking Glass that the film will feature, but which general audiences might

not be familiar with—at least not in Burton’s darker incarnation. The webisodes would

also serve to establish the absurdity of Wonderland itself, setting the tone for the film.

Each webisode will focus on one character, but they will also show the connections

among characters that may not be readily apparent in the film, adding a degree of

richness to the Wonderland story world.

Burton’s film will function as a sort of sequel to the original Carroll stories; Alice

will be 19 years old, and she will not quite remember having visited Wonderland before.
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The characters Burton focuses on—and hires well-known actors to play—are the Mad

Hatter, the White Queen, the Red Queen, and the Knave of Hearts, played by Johnny

Depp, Anne Hathaway, Helena Bonham Carter, and Crispin Glover, respectively. These

actors, ideally, would also play their characters in the webisodes, but they would be

interacting with the young Alice of the Carroll stories rather than with Burton’s 19-year-

old Alice. The webisodes would function as small extensions of the movie, not unlike the

“deleted scenes” one might find on a DVD. This would allow fans to feel more connected

to the story world by encouraging greater engagement with the Alice franchise.

THE MAD HATTER: “THE MURDER OF TIME”

In the original Carroll stories, Alice’s interaction with the Mad Hatter explains the

Hatter’s connection to the Queen of Hearts (whom Burton, like others before him,

combines with the Red Queen) and also explains why it is always tea time for the Hatter.

Alice encounters the Mad hatter and the March Hare having tea at a table. The Hatter

speaks to Alice in absurd, riddle-like phrases, greatly frustrating her. He explains that he

once tried to sing at a celebration for the Red Queen, who accused him of murdering the

time. In retaliation, Time has halted itself for the Hatter, who is stuck at 6 o’clock

forever. Eventually the Hatter drives Alice away with his absurd remarks, nonsensical

poetry, and unanswerable riddles.

THE RED QUEEN: “BECOMING ROYALTY”

This webisode establishes Alice’s somewhat antagonistic relationship with the

Red Queen and also connects the viewer to Through the Looking Glass, the lesser-known
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Carroll story. Wandering through Wonderland, Alice encounters the Red Queen in a

garden. In front of them is an enormous chess board painted on the ground. The Red

Queen explains to Alice the rules of chess, telling her how to get promoted to a queen.

All she has to do is start out as a pawn and reach the eighth square on the other side of the

board. Despite this advice, the Red Queen and Alice do not get along, as Alice resents the

Queen for repeatedly asking absurd riddles and then chastising her for being unable to

answer them. Later, Alice is promoted to queen, but the celebration for her goes awry.

Alice accuses the Queen of being “the cause of all the mischief and captures her for a

checkmate. This webisode also introduces a recurring motif throughout the film and

throughout our webseries: card games and chess.

THE WHITE QUEEN: “LEARNING WHAT’S WHITE”

The purpose of this webisode is to enrich the story world by demonstrating

absurdist, Carroll-esque behavior and to explain the contrast between the Red Queen and

White Queen and how they relate to Alice. Unlike the Red Queen, who antagonizes

Alice, the White Queen is portrayed as benevolent and on Alice’s side. Alice meets her

on the fifth square of the chess board. She gives Alice advice that, in keeping with the

absurdity of Wonderland, is slightly strange, but she is clearly trying to be helpful. These

bits of advice seem to illustrate the Carroll ethos: for example, the White Queen tells

Alice that her life will be enriched if she makes an effort to believe six impossible things

before breakfast. The White Queen also exhibits some odd, Carroll-esque behavior; for

example, she screams in pain before, not after, pricking her finger on her brooch.
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THE KNAVE OF HEARTS: “LAW AND DISORDER”

This webisode connects the Knave of Hearts to the Red Queen and the Mad

Hatter. It also reinforces the absurdity that runs through Wonderland while demonstrating

Alice’s important role in the story world. The Knave is on trial for stealing a tart. A large

crowd is present, including many of the minor characters seen in the film and associated

with some of our other transmedia properties. The Mad Hatter is called as a witness in the

trial, but he isn’t a very good one, responding in nonsense phrases and often unable to

remember information. The Knave also does a poor job of defending himself, at one point

insisting he didn’t write a particular letter but then revealing that he knows the letter isn’t

signed. The evidence against the Knave and the way the trial is conducted become

increasingly absurd, and Alice defends him when she is called as a witness.

The idea behind the virtual storybook is to connect participants and fans of the

Lewis Carroll novels to the upcoming Tim Burton film, while at the same time extending

their interest in and creating excitement for the world of Wonderland. The virtual

storybook will involve character back-stories. The character back-stories will take place

after the featured character’s initial encounter with Alice in the Alice’s Adventures in

Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass novels, but before the Tim Burton film

occurs. In this way, it will connect the early and most well known version of Alice with

the new, darker Burton interpretation by filling in the moments between these Alice

properties.

The stories will appear online and the participant will have three options of how

to engage with the property. First, they will have the choice to turn the pages at their own

convenience. This will allow the viewer to engage with the stories at their own pace. It
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also gives them a certain sense of control over the storybook by allowing them to choose

when they are ready to turn the page. Secondly, they will have the option of having the

story narrated for them, at an animated pace. By having the story read to them, it will

remind the participant of their childhood. It will also create a more leisure atmosphere in

which the viewer has only to look and listen to the story being told. Thirdly and lastly,

the viewer will have the option to download the stories. This last choice is the most

important. If the reader chooses to download the stories to read later or to even re-read

them, it shows the highest level of commitment. Downloading the stories takes the most

effort from the participant. They have to wait for the stories to download and then wait

again to either read them later or even print or possibly share them with others.

Therefore, this shows that these viewers have the highest level of commitment for this

part of the Alice extension.

The stories will be serialized and released bi-weekly on Tim Burton’s Alice

website in the weeks leading up to the premiere of the film in March. This serialized

format was chosen for its previous successes in other franchises and similar styles, which

can be seen in examples like the Heroes’ graphic novels. By having the stories serialized,

it will leave the viewer with cliff hangers and gaps of information that need to be filled.

This will essentially create a need to return to the stories in order to fill in the missing

pieces. In this way, the transmedia team will be able to gauge the storybook’s popularity

among fans by calculating how many people participate with the medium. If successful,

the stories can be lengthened because they are told in a serialized and chapter-based

format. It will also be easier to add to the Alice cannon if there are gaps that need to be

filled. At the same time, if the property does not find a large enough audience, it can be
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ended on a “to be continued” moment. This will leave viewers with anticipation for the

film in order to find out additional information about characters they have grown to love.

The opportunity to navigate and play in the Wonderland character’s world would

lend credibility and support to the stories as an Alice transmedia extension. The pictures

that appear on each story page will have the ability to be explored with the click of a

mouse. This could potentially open doors for more people to participate with the medium

by allowing them to play within it. By taking advantage of the technology at hand, the

storybook would be made to come alive for its viewers. It would be possible to explore

the world of Wonderland; a journey that is unavailable by just reading the original Carroll

novels. Participants would lift, look behind, and open objects present in the virtual story

world. This allows the reader to gain additional information and context for the land of

dark bliss that is being presented to them on a virtual page.

The characters that will be initially featured in the storybooks are The Duchess,

Humpty Dumpty, and the Talking Flower Garden. The Mock Turtle and White Knight

characters are to be added to the virtual storybook cannon if the series gains a significant

or dedicated fan base whom desire more content. All of the featured characters have brief

but imaginative encounters with Alice that could and should be more fully developed.

Although these characters are deemed as minor, it is important to explore their stories

because they add such rich context for Alice’s adventures in both the Alice’s Adventures

in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass novels. Therefore, it is pertinent to

expand upon them because it deepens and enriches the world of Wonderland. It also adds

drillability for the Alice fans.

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The stories themselves will fill in the gaps for fans and participants. This creates a

more personal and deep connection between them and the variety of characters that make

Wonderland such a rich and inviting fantasy. The character’s stories will be featured in a

real storybook. When the viewer clicks on the stories, they will be presented with a dark

brown hardcover novel with the words “Alice in Wonderland” etched beautifully into it.

The font for the title is an old-world calligraphy, lending an ancient and timely feel to the

stories. By titling the book “Alice in Wonderland” it encompasses both of the original

novels’ concepts and at the same time adds to them. When viewers click upon the virtual

novel it will flutter open to the middle of the book. Then participants will be presented

with the stories. Because the book opens in the middle, readers will feel that they just

missed these stories the first time they read the books.

The first character to be explored in the stories is the Duchess. The Duchess has

one of the most famous rhymes in the Alice novels. She is most remembered for beating

her baby when he sneezes! In the book, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Alice has two

encounters with the Duchess. Both of which, are unpleasant and shape the consequent

storybook tale for the Duchess. In the first, Alice sees the Duchess beating her baby when

he sneezes. Immediately horrified, Alice snatches the child and runs promptly away from

the small castle with the child in her arms. As she runs away, the baby turns into a pig

and is never seen again. In the second encounter, Alice saves the Duchess from being

beheaded by the Queen of Hearts, and the incident with the Duchess’ child is never

brought up again. Even though the Duchess knows Alice took her child, she suspects the

Queen is really the nasty culprit behind her misery. She blames the Queen of Hearts and

wants to seek revenge for her near beheading. Thus, begins the era of the Card Wars.
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The Card Wars stories will effectively set the stage for Burton’s dark

interpretation of the film. They are also one of the contributing reasons the world of

Wonderland is no longer bright and cheery for Alice when she returns to it in the film.

The Card Wars will also set the foundation for Burton’s plot about the Red Queen’s reign

of terror, which is a main element of the upcoming film. These reasons will ultimately

give deeper meaning to the world of Wonderland. It will offer the participants of the

storybook a deeper context of the inner workings of the wonders and horrors which

comprise Wonderland.

The second character that will be explored is Humpty Dumpty. Humpty Dumpty

was chosen because not only is he a recognizable character in the Alice books, but he is a

world-renown character known from many nursery rhymes. His story begins after Alice

meets him. Humpty Dumpty bravely brags, in a condescending tone, to Alice that even

he if does fall off his wall perch that the King has promised that “all of [his] horses and

all of [his] men will put Humpty Dumpty together again!” As many people already know,

this does not happen. In this story however, Humpty Dumpty is put together again, but

not by the King. Instead, the story tells how Humpty Dumpty is put together in a mystery

story that parallels aspects of Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein. The story will, at first,

explore the adventures and problems that come with putting Humpty Dumpty together

again through a series of laboratory experiments. After Humpty is fixed, the reader will

notice that he is not quite right. In fact, his new personality and appearance are rather

sinister. Humpty Dumpty will quite literally be stitched together. Similar to Mary

Shelley’s monster, Humpty Dumpty’s new appearance affects his actions as he develops

a tortured temperament. The mystery story will make Humpty Dumpty’s creator a secret
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until the end. This will keep readers guessing as they try to discover who the mastermind

behind this scheme is and whether or not their intentions are evil.

The third character that will be explored is rather a set of characters—the Talking

Garden. What is intriguing about the Talking Garden is that it is set in a class system,

much like the English society Carroll existed in. Different flowers have different ranks

and are able to control or rather talk over others. When the flowers meet Alice they are

extremely disagreeable and pick and poke at her human appearance. This interaction

suggests a sense of snobbery and isolation among the flowers. Perhaps because they are

stationary, they do not meet many other creatures of Wonderland. With this in mind, the

story that evolves from the Talking Garden centers on their gardener who acts as a king

or God figure for the flowers of the Wonderland garden. Because the flowers did not

understand or agree with Alice’s appearance, the role will be reversed for them as the

gardener will similarly never be quite satisfied with the flowers in his garden. His

displeasure with his creations creates a tense atmosphere for the garden flowers of

Wonderland. When their gardener appears, simple actions like weeding and pruning

become terse and terrifying moments for the poor, pitiful flowers. As a new character to

the Wonderland collection, the story will revolve around the gardener, who is a green

thumb. It will also encompass the choices that he makes to either add to, or subtract from

the garden, which he so carefully watches over and cares for.

The target audience for these storybooks is males and females ages thirteen to

twenty-five. This demographic was carefully chosen for numerous reasons. Because the

format for these stories is indeed a life-like storybook, it will therefore appeal to more

young-minded and or, dedicated Wonderland audiences. Consequently, it will remind

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them of their childhood with the Lewis Carroll novels. While the books’ format might

attract a younger audience, its dark, sinister plot lines and content will appeal to an older

audience of teens and people in their twenties. It is also more plausible to direct the

virtual storybook towards these audiences because they are more likely to participate with

it. This demographic spends the most time online, so it is probable that they will

participate with this medium more than other younger demographics that might need their

parents’ permission to go online or not own their own computer. This makes the

storybook less accessible to them as a whole.

If the extension does find a large amount of support, the stories can be collected

together and released in a hard copy version. This would appeal to dedicated Alice, Tim

Burton, and the film’s fans. Additionally, since the stories are designed to be

exceptionally visual, like the Burton film, they could be added to the DVD extras. This

would act as another incentive to purchase the film once it is released for home

entertainment.

The story of “Alice in Wonderland” has so many interesting characters involved

that a collectible card game makes perfect sense. Developing a card game property

mirroring Tim Burton’s darker version of Alice’s adventures is a great way to attract the

attention of new and old fans. A card game is also a great starter property to produce

before Burton’s movie premieres in March 2010.

Anyone familiar with the story of “Alice in Wonderland” knows that there is a

reoccurring card theme throughout. We thought it would be fun to expand on the card

theme by making it into a playable card game for the public. The collectible card game is

a great way to give fans a chance to learn back stories about the characters of “Alice in
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Wonderland”, while also giving them the opportunity to have fun with a game that will

hopefully continue to grow once Burton’s movie is released.

The idea is to mirror the “Magic Gatherer” card game because it was a property

that was highly successful and popular with the public. For “Alice in Wonderland”, we

felt it would be a wise decision to make the card game a simpler version of the “Magic

Gatherer” so it would appeal to more fans, and in return, would also be more appealing

and marketable to stores like Target and Walmart. Being that we are not game experts,

we have not fully developed a playable game at this point, but we do have a basic outline

of what the cards would look like and what information would be included on them.

The cards will be introduced to fans four months before Burton’s film is released

in the spring, which is perfect considering the holidays would be right around the corner.

The game would target males and females starting at 12 years old and up. By appealing

to a wider audience we hope to be able to attract a bigger base of new and old fans. We

know that successful properties are often targeted to a more specific audience, but we

thought that a card game was something that people of all ages could gather around and

play. Adults may not be as interested in the collectible angle of the cards, but could

certainly become invested in the property if they were playing the game with their

children.

The first deck of cards released would be called a starter pack. This pack would

include 60 cards and would introduce four main characters. Alice, the Mad Hatter, the

Red Queen and the Cheshire Cat would be the first characters released in the starter pack.

Each character will have four cards in the deck. The Alice cards would always be worth

30 points and would always be a light blue color. The Mad Hatter’s cards would be
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green and worth 20 points. The Red Queen’s cards would be worth 50 points and would

always be the color red. The Cheshire Cat is worth 10 points and the card would be

orange in color. On the back of the cards there will be a back story included giving fans a

chance to discover things they would only have learned because they purchased the cards.

The 46 cards that are left over in the deck will be called tea party cards. These

cards will have various points’ worth anywhere from 1 point up to 30 points. As

mentioned before, the card game is not completely playable at this point, but the idea

would be that pairing certain cards together would allow players to be able to take down

their opponents cards. For example, if a player had an Alice card and a Mad Hatter card

together they would be able to take down their opponents Red Queen card. In the starter

pack the tea party cards will include an initial back story, which will be explained later

on.

Once the movie premieres in March we would have a booster pack released that

would include more characters, but would also continue to expand on Alice’s back story.

The tea party cards would only be included in the starter pack because there is not a back

story that will be continued and there is no reason to add more of these cards to the deck.

A limited edition pack would be available to fans later on, which would include cards that

revealed more back story’s to the characters and would also stand out in appearance from

the starter or booster pack cards. This pack of cards would cost more money, but the idea

is that at this point fans would be so heavily invested in the collectible card game that

they would be willing to spend more money.

In the starter pack Alice fans will learn more about her home life. The back of the

card will reveal that Alice comes from an abusive and dysfunctional family. While
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Alice’s sister would escape by losing herself in a book, Alice would often let her own

imagination take her away so she could block out the reality of the yelling and fighting in

her home.

The booster pack will expand on Alice’s relationship with her sister. Fans will

learn that Alice’s older sister, Isabelle, was the only one who understood her need for a

self-created fantasy land. Her sister in fact realized it was Alice’s tool for coping with

the stress of their home life.

In the limited edition pack Alice’s relationship with her parents will be revealed.

The card will explain that Alice’s parents had never wanted a second child. Their older

daughter was the “perfect” child, just as they expected her to be. They showed Isabelle

off when it was convenient for them, and left her in the care of a nanny the rest of the

time. When Alice came along 8 years later her parents viewed her birth as a huge

inconvenience. Everything she did angered them, causing her to act up more. They

began to suspect and fear she had inherited a psychological disorder just like her mother’s

brother had who was now in a mental institution.

In the starter pack we would also learn who the Mad Hatter represented to Alice

in her real life outside of wonderland. The card would reveal that the Mad Hatter

originated from Alice’s real life uncle. When she was very little she had fond memories

of her Uncle Fred coming for tea with the family. She particularly liked the hats he

would wear. At some point Uncle Fred stopped coming. Alice overheard her parents

whispering that he had gone “mad.” Being so young, Alice thought he was mad at her

and it made her sad because she missed him.

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The Red Queen’s back story in the starter pack would reveal that her character

developed from Alice’s real life nanny, Queenie. Queenie, who was never kind to Alice,

always complained to Alice’s parents about her behavior. The nanny tolerated Alice’s

older sister, but seemed to “love” Alice’s older half-brother. Young Alice saw Queenie

as a magical witch figure, capable of turning from evil to good depending on who was

watching. She never understood why the nanny’s love for her brother, Charles had

turned to hate. Alice would often hear her say, “Your brother Charles is sly and evil like

a cat!”

In the starter pack fans will learn that the Cheshire Cat character represents to

Alice her older, half-brother Charles. Charles comes from Alice’s father’s first marriage.

Charles was always mean to Alice and Isabelle when he would come to visit. The girls

were always perplexed about the unusually close relationship he appeared to have with

their nanny, Queenie. The close “friendship” between Charles and Queenie came to an

end when Charles brought home the governor’s daughter and introduced her as his fiancé.

From that day forward Queenie seemed to despise him.

The initial story of the tea party cards that will be revealed to fans in the starter

pack will discuss what the tea party’s represented to Alice in her real life. The tea party

cards will feature Alice, the Mad Hatter and the white rabbit having tea. The game will

mostly consist of these cards.

When Alice was young the family’s butler, James, was the one kind adult in the

household. Butler James would warn the girls when their parents or the nanny was in a

tirade. He would help them hide from the constant uproars that would take place in their

home. Meanwhile, Butler James was also trying to serve Alice’s parents, but it seemed
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no matter how hard he tried he was always late. Young Alice had heard her mother tell

Butler James, “You move like a turtle; you need to be fast like a rabbit!” Alice saw

Butler James as the rabbit in her fantasy land guiding her to her next destination in

wonderland. The tea parties represented for Alice fond memories of Uncle Fred and

Butler James.

The “Alice in Wonderland” card game was a property that was developed to reach

out to old fans that loved the original story, but also to get a new generation of fans

involved as well. We felt that the cards would be a great way to establish excitement

about the upcoming Burton film, while also expanding on the story of Alice and the other

characters. The selling point about the game property is that it could be released before

the movie in order to bring a bigger audience out to the theaters when the movie

premieres in the spring of 2010.

The theme park would be the final step in expanding the Alice in Wonderland

franchise, to be completed after the other transmedia forms have proven successful and

established a loyal fanbase. The rides would be based after major turning points in the

stories of Through the Looking Glass as well as Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The

park itself will be laid out in a chronological manner, with earlier events in the stories

closer towards the entrance, although attendees will be free to ride the rides in any order.

The park would be geared towards teens and adults, as we are trying to follow

Tim Burton’s lead with our transmedia translations. We therefore are including a large

portion of exciting rides, such as coasters and other rides with dramatic drops. We are

upping the thrill factor on some of the rides, such as “Humpty Dumpty’s Great Fall” but

we are also including rides that will appeal to all. Several of our rides are milder,
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allowing adults who wish to attend to have options to bring their children on as well. The

park will have a darker feel, but will not be frightening like a haunted house. Instead it

will just depict the characters as Tim Burton does; edgier and not as “Disney-esque.”

For those adventurers wishing to experience the park the way Alice experienced

her journey, there would be white rabbit signs posted throughout the park that direct the

attendee to the next attraction. The rabbits would function as signage posted around the

park, as well as be on the ground itself to symbolize a path to the attractions.

The ride closest to the gate will be the “Down the Rabbit Hole” ride. This ride

will be exemplary of Alice’s original entrance into the world of Wonderland. The queue

will be shaped and decorated like a tunnel. The ride itself would be a descent into

Wonderland, set up similarly to the Haunted Mansion ride at Disneyland. Members

would step onto a platform that would drop down slowly, exposing the items that Alice

saw on her fall down the rabbit hole. Guests would then board a slow moving coaster that

would escort them through a series of Caroll-esque sites and short displays; such as

projected 3D films of characters that guests will later see more of.

The second ride that guests would encounter if they continued following the white

rabbit’s trail would by the “Pool of Tears.” The entrance to the “Pool of Tears” ride

would be decorated with paintings of a variety of different bottles, all painted with the

words “Drink Me” to represent the bottle that Alice drank from which altered her size.

The ride symbolizes the scene in the Alice stories where Alice drinks from the bottle and

becomes a giantess. She cries giant tears before drinking from the bottle again and

becoming a tiny version of herself. The tears she cried as a Goliath created a lake which

whisks her away in the bottle that she drank from. This ride, therefore, would be a water
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coaster. Guests would board a bottle-shaped car that would carry them through a fast-

moving water filled track, filled with plunges similar to those at Disneyland’s “Splash

Mountain.”

When guests disembarked from the “Pool of Tears,” they would be at the

“Talking Flower Garden.” The talking flowers in the Alice stories are incredibly

animated characters who provide a colorful backdrop for Alice’s journey. These flowers

would be animatronic and interact with guests as they walked by, similar to the Mr.

Potato Head character at Disney’s California Adventure. Mr. Potato Head is operated by

someone who has cameras trained on the guests as they walk by and is therefore able to

speak to them individually. The flowers would have this same ability, although they

would also have programmed skits to entertain visitors on their way to the next moving

attraction.

Guests would then encounter the next attraction on their journey around

Wonderland; the “Mad Hatter’s Fun House.” The Mad Hatter seems to be the essence of

Carroll-esque writing, with his nonsensical stories and slightly insane appearance. The

Fun House’s goal, therefore, would be simply to disorient; to bring guests into a world

that intrigues them but that they don’t necessarily understand. This seems to be the

relationship that Alice has with the Mad Hatter and is the relationship that we want the

guests to have with the fun house.

The next ride guests would encounter would by “Humpty Dumpty’s Great Fall.”

The nursery rhyme of Humpty Dumpty appears as a fleshed out character in the Carroll

stories. The “Great Fall” ride will be a Tower of Terror style ride, with guests entering a

cage-like structure on the top of a “great wall.” Guests would enter a the cage structure
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and we strapped down. When they “fell” the cage would tilt so that the guests were

falling with their backs toward the ground instead of their feet.

Another attraction guests would find would be the “Queen’s Croquet.” This ride

would be set up similarly to both Toy Story rides in Disneyland and Disney’s California

Adventure. Guests would board a two-seater car which has two wii-like remotes attached

to it. As they travel through the ride, 3D video screens will appear during which players

would use the remotes as croquet mallets in an attempt to get the highest score.

A big part of creating another world within the theme park is making sure that all

elements correspond to the story we are trying tell. One major portion of this is the

concessions. We want to make sure the concessions come directly from Carroll’s tales so

that the attendees feel like they are experiencing what Alice and others who live in

Wonderland could experience. Drink stands around the park will be entitled “Drink Me,”

and will have beverages encased in antique-y looking bottles with tags labeling their

contents. Food stands around the park will bear the label “Eat Me,” and will serve food

that Alice herself might’ve eaten, such as pastries, meat pies, etc.

In the main concession area, there will be several restaurants with titles and

menus based off of the stories. One will be “The Walrus and the Carpenter’s,” which will

serve a variety of seafood, but specialize in oysters. Within Alice in Wonderland, there is

a tale within it which tells of how the Walrus and Carpenter lured oysters onto shore in

order to eat them. Therefore, a seafood restaurant seems especially appropriate. There

would also be a bakery entitled “The Queen of Hearts’ Tarts,” which would be inspired

by the trial of the Knave of Hearts for stealing the aforementioned tarts. The rest of the

concessions would also be themed to reflect the whimsical nature of Carroll’s stories.
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The décor in the park needs to be demonstrative of Carroll’s fanciful tales in order

to keep the story alive while guests travel through the theme park. The white rabbit will

be a motif throughout the park. While it will be utilized as a marker to direct people

throughout the park, it can also act as a hidden symbol. For younger guests taken with

their families, looking for the white rabbit can be a fun activity for all ages. The park will

establish that a certain number of white rabbits (not including the markers) are hidden

throughout the park. It is then up to guests to discover them.

The rest of the park will be decorated in a blended Burton-Carroll style. Carroll’s

unique characters will all make an appearance, influenced by Burton’s darker expression

of them. This park will be geared towards attracting teens and adults. However, we

understand that many adults have families, and being able to take their families to the

park would allow them to attend more often. Consequently, there will be attractions

included that allow for all-aged participation. The rides will not be scary in the

frightening sense; just the thrill factor would be increased.

The theme would act as a way to connect two groups of people to the Alice

franchise. The first would be the evangelical fans, who would travel to the park to be able

to connect with a story that they’d loved since childhood. This is the same audience that

the Wizarding World of Harry Potter is depending on; fans of the books and movies

making a pilgrimage to the park in order to act out what it would be like if they were part

of the fantasy world. The park would also act as a way to draw in new fans who had

previously not participated in other aspects of the franchise. A park such as Disneyland

holds appeal to those who aren’t huge fans of Disney movies because of the draw of the
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rides. We can bring new people into the franchise and turn them into hard core fans by

introducing them to the story of Alice in theme park form.

We do not know yet the exact direction Burton will take with his version of “Alice in

Wonderland”, but we are confident that the transmedia properties we have presented here

will successfully expand on the story of Alice and her wonderland. The web series, the

online storybook, the collectible card game and the theme park will all help to unify

Alice. The story of Alice is universal, and we hope our media will return the appeal to

adults and teens that have grown up with the story and are ready to learn about the 2010

Alice.
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Pictures of the “Alice in Wonderland”

Web Series

The front cover of the virtual

storybooks.
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After Alice left, things The Duchess began

just got worse for the rhyming her reasons for
Duchess. She missed revenge against the
her lost son. The Queen. And so began
Duchess knew Alice had the long years of the
taken him away, but Card Wars. …
she suspected the
Queen was truly
responsible.
An example of a page from the
storybook of the character, The
Duchess.
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Pictures of the “Alice in Wonderland”

Card Game
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