Not exactly...If it were a compelling original concept I'm sure the fans would have received the land betterso you are saying if there never was an avatar movie and disney designed the land exactly the same nobody would complain?
I think they would have done better...the world will never knowI've seen the old concept art for Beastly Kingdom and I'd take Avatar Land. Pandora is essentially what Beastly kingdom was going to have, dragons (banshees). Beastly Kingdom could've been really corny, not what AK is about.
I believe they saw how much money it made and said to the imagineers, "figure it out"...so yeah, knee jerkBTW, do people really believe Avatar Land was a "knee jerk" reaction. A billion dollar investment is going to be thoroughly examined. Sure, it was a move to compete with universal but to call it knee jerk is illogical. No company spends that much money without the input/thoughts of hundreds of professionals.