ORLANDO, FL
Late last year, SeaWorld Orlando announced that they would be debuting a brand new roller coaster in 2020. Named Icebreaker, this brand new launch coaster for the Wild Arctic area of the park will blast guests through four different launches, both backwards and forwards, culminating in a reverse launch into the steepest beyond vertical drop in Florida — a 93-foot tall spike with 100-degree angle. However, though we're definitely excited for this new attraction, it looks like something else may be in development for 2021 at this park... FULL STORY
0 Comments
Disneyland is using what it is calling a virtual queue system to manage the crowd for Rise of the Resistance. Park guests must use the official Disneyland app to enter the queue, where they will be assigned a "boarding group" number that will be called via an app notification later in the day.
Guests must be inside the park to join the virtual queue, which opens at the park's published opening time. But guests are slamming the app as soon as the queue opens, resulting in all of the day's boarding groups being claimed within minutes. And it's getting worse each day. This morning, all the groups were gone for the day within just two minutes. In practice, this isn't a virtual queue if all the day's boarding spots are going that quickly. What Disneyland has for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance is really a lottery, instead. Disneyland is using the same system as its sister park, Disney's Hollywood Studios at the Walt Disney World Resort, adopted soon after Rise of the Resistance opened there last month. Initially, Hollywood Studios was using a more traditional virtual queue, which guests were allowed to join as soon as they entered the park. But that was leading to people crowding the park's entry plaza in the middle of the night, as they tried to get first dibs to enter the park as soon as Disney began admitting guests. FULL STORY MASON, OH
The newest addition to Kings Island’s lineup of roller coasters is set to open this spring. On Friday, it was announced that opening day for the 364-acre amusement park as well as its newest roller coaster, is set for April 11. That’s when park goers can take the first rides on Orion, the tallest, fastest, longest steel coaster at Kings Island. FULL STORY ORLANDO, FL
It's an open secret that Universal Orlando is working on a new attraction at Islands of Adventure. Construction is currently underway on a roller coaster in the park's Jurassic Park area. And although Universal hasn't officially announced the new attraction, it has now, at least, publicly acknowledged it. FULL STORY There are two dominant structures in the Disney theme parks, whether you’re in Florida, Tokyo, or Paris: castles and mountains. Each castle has its own story, and the same is true of each mountain. The Sleeping Beauty Castle in Disneyland is smaller than that of the Cinderella Castle at Walt Disney World — depending on how much size matters to you, that might make the original castle more or less impressive than the one in Orlando. But the castles at the Disney parks are largely visual icons. You can enjoy the novelty of, in Florida, eating inside a castle, but there’s no ride experience. The castles exist primarily as impressive landmarks.
The mountains are different. Just as actual mountains are challenges to climb up or down, the Disney mountains are exhilarating experiences intended as thrill rides. Though it wasn’t the first, Space Mountain is one of the most foundational and important to the overall modern experience at the Disney theme parks. FULL STORY JACKSON TOWNSHIP, NJ
A lawsuit filed against Six Flags Great Adventure contends the amusement park is responsible for a gruesome injury suffered by a patron after a roller-coaster ride. In the suit, a Pennsylvania man says he was at the entrance to the Kingda Ka ride when he was told he could not bring his cellphone on what's described as the world's tallest roller coaster. The patron, Steven Keim Jr., claims an employee of the Jackson park advised him to hide the phone under foliage in a bamboo grove behind a nearby smoking area. Keim quickly concealed the phone and completed his ride on Kingda Ka, the lawsuit says. FULL STORY ORLANDO, FL
Since even before the release of the films in 2001, there have been rumors of Lord of Rings heading to an Orlando theme park. Over the years, the rumors have solidified around Universal being the leading contender for the blockbuster franchise, with the park mentioning Lord of the Rings in a guest survey as early as 2010. Now the story has popped yet again, and this time it has some interesting corresponding data that seems to back it up. One of the leading sources of Universal rumors has been the well-respected Josh Young of Theme Park University. Earlier this month he shocked many when, after years of silence on the story, he announced that he had heard a Lord of the Rings attraction was possibly back in the cards for Universal. Like previously, it was still far from being a done deal. According to Young, the concept has moved from being a land in the now-announced Epic Universe park to now being a replacement to the less than popular Toon Lagoon area at Islands of Adventure, where it will reimagine the Popeye’s themed raft ride, Bluto’s Bilge-Rat Barges. Though the specific ride system has yet to be decided on, Young points to two options; one being an underwater rollercoaster-style track, while the other is a magnetic system similar to Shanghai’s Pirates of the Caribbean. He also notes that Universal Creative used a recent closure of Bluto’s to test some different styles of boats for the new attraction. FULL STORY ORLANDO, FL
This Friday, a new film opens at Epcot’s Canada pavilion! We were able to preview the new CircleVision film titled, Canada: Far & Wide! The film is presented on the same screen setup as its predecessor, O’Canada, but updated to include new scenes and features new narrators. Canada: Far & Wide is narrated by Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara, actors who have worked together on several projects over the years (any fellow Best in Show or Schitt’s Creek fans?). Their presence is refreshing, but the duo is never seen on-screen. They play the mostly-serious narration role well —you won’t find their typical bits and banter here. FULL STORY Let me put it in Disney-fied terms for ya (*Ernesto de la Cruz voice*): REMEMBER ME?!?! I'm back baby, and (pretending to be) better than ever!I want to assure you I still do this column even though my disappearing act has made it seem otherwise, an unexpected circumstance of going on vacation and coming down with a foreign strain of the flu (only somewhat bragging) before returning home and being rendered useless for a full nine days.
I went to Tokyo Disney Resort and Shanghai Disneyland for the second time and Universal Studios Japan and Puroland for the very first while overseas, all of which were informative and truly exceptional. While I continue to attempt to mentally process everything I saw — and how superior Tokyo Disney Resort is, wow, WOW — let's focus on all the domestic madness I missed while ignoring the entirety of theme park Twitter, because I missed a lot. Think of this as your inaugural 2020 "We Didn't Start The Fire" column. Will it rhyme? Maybe. (It won't, I have somewhere to be in a few hours and I don't have that kind of time.) Or do I!?!?! You'll have to read until the end to find out!!! FULL STORY GREENPORT, NY
The iconic Mitchell Park carousel has delighted visitors to Greenport Village for more than two decades. But its history dates back much farther and officials estimate it’s now 100 years old. The origins of the carousel have been shrouded in mystery even before it overlooked Greenport Harbor. A 1995 New York Times story noted Northrup Grumman, the carousel’s prior owner, had “cloaked its carousel in a mantle of mystery befitting a military secret.” FULL STORY |
Archives
November 2022
Categories
All
|