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ah, launch coasters. a genre which i dont think i will ever comfortably settle in with. i am always apprehensive about riding these things, just because they really give my nervous system something to chew on, even the "milder" ones such as these premier off-the-shelfers. i am always impressed at how, once into a LIM launch, my nervous system starts sending frantic distress signals to my brain - "attention! this is not right! evolution has not provided me with an adequate method of dealing with physics like this! abort! i do not approve!". i like it once the adrenalin kicks in, but man, LIM launches sure are goofy when they first hit you. that said, i enjoyed what JJ had to offer and it definitely doesnt have the silky smooth engineering of a B&M, which gives it character and some teeth, in my opinion. it is a visually garish and absurd sight from the ground, as if the designers at premier rides just scribbled a bunch of crap on a piece of paper and then told the steel manufacturers, "make it happen". it kind of feels that way too, because it is a very uneven ride, rippling out of the launch into the twisted inversions, then hitting a long dull spot, in which the train ambles around some high boring turns, and then it starts to snap back into g-force mode crashing through some gnarly transitions winding down to about a foot from the ground. finally you fly at high speed through a fantastic and disorienting corkscrew. that was the last thing i was expecting and the surprise felt wonderful. you go screaming into the brake run. the twisty finale of this coaster is pretty evil and probably the modern day equivalent of the ground hugging figure eight on travers cyclone triplets. its rough and tight and really brought this ride home for me. i think that the slow boring portion after the initial inversions is there simply to provide a visual balance to the "spagetti bowl". without it the ride would probably be too short and not have the electron cloud appearance they seemed to be going for. i really enjoyed jokers jinx and id like to see more compact cartoony launch coasters such as this.
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