What began as me getting word that Walt Disney Imagineering was holding a mysterious press conference with no topic specified ended with the surprise announcement of a new “Avatar” land coming to Walt Disney World’s Animal Kingdom theme park based on James Cameron’s hugely successful film. The surprise has been jokingly referred to as “out of the blue,” but that doesn’t even do it justice. Details are scarce about the project, as it’s still early in the “blue sky” phase, during which Disney doesn’t make a habit of announcing projects. But it seems they felt the need to announce this one early, perhaps before it had a chance to leak, as many major secrets seem to do. Rides, dining, shopping, and entertainment will be part of the Pandora-themed area of Animal Kingdom – but not much else is known.

And when the announcement hit, it took over two hours of my day, not only so I could properly write about it but also for the intense discussion that followed on Inside the Magic, Twitter, and Facebook. Hundreds upon hundreds of split opinions flew faster than I’d seen before. This was clearly a big story, drawing equal numbers of positive, negative, and indifferent replies.

My web server saw its heaviest traffic to date, bringing it to its digital knees at times. It was the most traffic Inside the Magic has seen since reports came in from the terrible earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan in March. Links passed around Twitter and Facebook sent thousands of visitors our way in a short amount of time. And less than 12 hours later, the story entered the top 5 most-commented articles of all time on the site, rivaling months of chatter about the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. It’s not all positive, but it is talk and they say any publicity is good publicity. And in this case, Disney’s surprise announcement spread wide and fast.

Though not everyone is thrilled with the idea of the world of “Avatar” being added to Disney’s Animal Kingdom, I’ll personally reserve judgement until I see actual plans for attractions and the whole themed area. I’m not a big Harry Potter fan, but I love Universal’s Wizarding World of Harry Potter. It’s an astounding achievement in themed entertainment. Likewise, James Cameron’s Terminator 2: 3D attraction is still one of my favorites, despite its age. So I have hope that Disney’s Imagineers, working with Cameron, will create an exciting theme park addition so entertaining and inventive that won’t be necessary to be a fan of the “Avatar” film (and its upcoming sequels) to enjoy it. In the meantime, I’m happy this crazy news day has concluded and I’m ready to return to Halloween season at the theme parks!

(I should also mention that while I was covering the announcement details as they were revealed, I was not personally at Walt Disney Imagineering in Glendale, Calif. today, so I did not take this photo of James Cameron, Bob Iger, Tom Staggs, and other creative team members. Disney released it.)