Dickens World?!?

Oh God. A new theme park is just about to open in the southeast of England. It's...wait for it...Dickens World. Jesus. I can see the baying packs of schoolchildren - not to mention busloads of waddling North Americans on package tours - now.

I know plenty of historic places have cheeseball tourist attractions (the Loire's Parc des Mini-Chateaux, anyone?), and I suppose they have their place - after all, people have to take their kids somewhere. But a Dickens theme park just seems wrong - especially given that it's sited somewhere out in the wastes of Kent, wedged between a shopping mall and a multiplex cinema. A journo from The Guardian, visiting the site last week, was suitably appalled:

Dickens World feels like Disney gone to the dark side. In place of the Magic Kingdom there is Newgate Prison; instead of talking animals there will be shady characters loitering in dark corners. Although the attractions are all faithfully Dickensian, the larks are very much 21st century. The centrepiece is a boat ride which, loosely speaking, is Great Expectations presented as a log flume.

Flume??!?! It's especially galling given that (in my opinion) no one in the world does a better job of interpreting and presenting heritage than the Brits. They're really letting themselves down with something as naff as Dickens World.