“Here you leave today and enter the worlds of yesterday, tomorrow, and fantasy.”
Since 1955, those words have been a sort of “thesis” of Disneyland and all major theme parks to come after. They exist to transport us to new worlds; different times; unexpected places. Over the decades since, the methods of transporting have changed from idealized, romanticized environments, to walking onto film sets, to stepping into movies themselves. And that got us thinking – which “lands” at Disney and Universal parks are the most successful at carrying us away?
Here, we’ve collected a countdown of the 10 most immersive theme park lands we know – lands that surround us and make us feel that we’ve truly become part of a new world. Take a look through our list (where we tried to represent each Disney or Universal park at least once) and let us know what you think. Which lands make you feel that you’ve entered a world of yesterday, tomorrow, or fantasy? And which do you think you’ll find on our look at the least immersive lands, instead?
10. Toy Story Land
Image: Disney / Pixar
Location: Walt Disney Studios, Hong Kong Disneyland, Shanghai Disneyland, and Disney’s Hollywood Studios
Toy Story Land wasn’t Disney’s first foray into “shrinking” guests and plopping them into a “backyard” littered with oversized things (in fact, Walt Disney World’s version is built mere steps away from where the “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: Movie Set Adventure” once lived), but it’s certainly the new agreed-upon standard at Imagineering, even if each installation has a unique set of attractions.
Image: Disney / Pixar
Interestingly, Toy Story Land is one of Disney’s most widely distributed lands; more than half of all Disney Resorts have one! But it’s not without its controversy. The land is widely considered to be a “cheap and cheerful” solution for quickly and inexpensively injecting new ride capacity into struggling parks, typically marked by two or three fairly standard carnival rides redressed to feature characters from the Toy Story franchise. Toy Story Land is immersive in the sense that it surrounds guests and absorbs them into a very particular world and scale…
Image: Disney / Pixar
But even in its most impressive form at Walt Disney World (earned by way of re-appropriating the park’s Toy Story Mania into its ride lineup and featuring an actual roller coaster), there’s still a disconnect for fans of Imagineering…
Image: Disney / Pixar
If the 21st century model of immersion is to pluck landscapes from the screen and allow guests to inhabit the recreated worlds they’ve seen there, Toy Story has some great options (like Andy’s bedroom or Sunnydale Daycare) where, theoretically, we would be the same size as Woody, Buzz and friends, and see them come alive. Walking around a backyard where static, unmoving Woody towers over us feels out of scale and doesn’t exactly bring the world of Toy Story to “life” so much as it shrinks guests to ant size and lets them wonder around a “backyard” of massive, static Toy Story characters.
But if Toy Story Land’s true purpose is to add ride capacity, family attractions, and fairly inexpensive flat rides to the parks it inhabits, it largely succeeds. And even if eagle-eyed fans will note the wonky scale and inconsistent message, Toy Story Land is a fun enough concept connected to a hit Disney / Pixar film that few guests flinch at its underlying issues.
9. Springfield, U.S.A.
Image: Universal / Fox
Location: Universal Studios Florida and Universal Studios Hollywood
In the 2000s, Universal Orlando began an aggressive updating plan for its “Studio” theme parks in both Florida and California. Remnants of a bygone era of “behind the scenes” parks populated by beige showbuildings and mashed-together intellectual properties, parks like Universal Studios Florida and Hollywood were quickly looking like cheap cop-outs in an era ruled by Animal Kingdom and Islands of Adventure. Thinking quickly, Universal shuttered its Lost Legends: Kongfrontation and Jaws, replacing them with new, hot intellectual properties, nostalgia be damned.
But then came the closure of the ride that had literally created the park – the Lost Legend: Back to the Future – The Ride. The ride system was re-used (one of the first examples of a simulator being adaptable by way of a new ride film) to create The Simpsons Ride, based on the long-running Fox cartoon series. The courtyard in front of the ride became a mini Krustyland carnival of boardwalk games, but Universal’s plans soon expanded. While The Simpsons Ride itself earned mixed reviews and hasn’t exactly become a new classic, it did inspire a creative change at the parks.
Image: Universal / Fox
In 2013 – five years after the ride’s cartoonification – the space around The Simpsons Ride was transformed from the nondescript World Expo to Springfield, literally bringing the world of the Simpsons to life. Perhaps getting the core of the formula right better than Toy Story Land, Springfield is packed with the food and drink of The Simpsons TV series, as guests chow down on Krustyburgers, buy Lard Lad Donuts, and drink specially brewed Duff Beer and Flaming Moes.
8. New Fantasyland
Image: Disney
Location: Magic Kingdom
When Magic Kingdom opened, its Fantasyland mirrored that of Disneyland’s: a sort of “Medieval Faire” courtyard of tournament tent awnings and pastel colors. Walt had never been pleased with the low-budget look of the land back in California, which led to the revitalization in the land in 1983, when the original dark rides and their tournament tent facades were reconfigured to create a sort of quaint, charming, European village that looked lived-in, possible, and real.
But even then, Magic Kingdom kept its faded pastel castle courtyard style… until Imagineers took a look at the massive parcel of land vacated by the Lost Legend: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Mickey’s Toontown Fair. In their place rose “New Fantasyland,” which, in that cinematic standard of the new millennium, brought to life the worlds of Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, Dumbo, and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in separate regions of a fairytale realm.
Image: Disney
New Fantasyland mostly gets the formula right, allowing guests to step into the animated worlds they’ve seen on screen; they can dine in the Ballroom of the Beast’s Castle, drink in Gaston’s Tavern, shop in the market of Prince Eric’s village, and explore a timeless, enchanted storybook circus. While fans balked that the “biggest expansion in Magic Kingdom history” added a net one new ride (and saw the closure of the Lost Legend: Snow White’s Scary Adventures), the new, forested, immersive overlay at least brought a bulk of the land up to date.
7. Port of Entry
Image: Universal
Location: Universal’s Islands of Adventure
Believe it or not, this is the first entry on our list not tied to any existing intellectual property – and for good reason. Port of Entry is the “main street” equivalent to Universal’s Islands of Adventure – the industry-changing IP park that opened in 1999. What kind of “main street” do you build for a park that seemingly unites completely dissimilar and disconnected lands from Marvel Super Hero Island and Jurassic Park to The Lost Continent and Seuss Landing?
Image: Universal
In this case, designers decided to do something far and above what anyone could’ve expected from Universal (who, again, operated exclusively “studio”-themed parks prior). Port of Entry is a fantastic, otherworldly, seaside port brought to life as if built by all corners of the globe coming together. Fanciful pagodas, ivy crawling across Moorish domes, wooden windmills, stone cathedrals, stained glass windows, sloped copper roofs, ancient bridges…
Designer Adrian Gorton explained, “I designed Port of Entry so that anybody entering Islands of Adventure could see something from their country or culture and say, ‘Hey! That’s where I’m from!’ … Western, Chinese, Portuguese, South Pacific, and many other influences.”
Image: Touring Plans
Port of Entry’s red-rock shore is home to docked sailboats and submarines as if from a storybook. And it’s all reigned over by the park’s icon, the Pharos Lighthouse, whose spectacular white beam encircles the resort each night, leading guests back to the port.
Port of Entry doesn’t feel like a “real” place, but that’s precisely the point. To the tune of chirping sea birds, ancient instruments, and ringing gongs, this mystical trading post feels like something from a dream, and something that – until 1999 – we would’ve thought only Disney could pull off.
6. Adventureland (Disneyland)
Image: Disney
Location: Disneyland
There’s perhaps no “land” at Disney Parks that tells the story of pop culture’s advance than Disneyland’s own Adventureland. When the park opened, the densely-jungled, African-themed land reflected exactly the kind of “adventure” that fascinated audiences of 1955, and its headlining Jungle Cruise is perhaps recognized as the ride that defined Disneyland in that time. When American’s definition of “adventure” changed to the South Pacific thanks to Hawaii’s 1959 statehood, Disneyland’s Adventureland pivoted to match, opening the Enchanted Tiki Room.
But perhaps the land’s most significant shift occured at the hands of Michael Eisner who, upon becoming CEO of Disney in the ’80s, decided that Disney Parks needed a wake-up call. Back in the ’50s, Walt had stocked his park with the settings, characters, and stories that mattered to mid-century audiences, but in the decades since, they’d stagnated. To Eisner’s thinking, Disney Parks needed a refresh by way of the stories modern audiences cared about – even if they weren’t Disney stories! Luckily, “adventure” had shifted once more thanks to George Lucas’ Indiana Jones.
Image: Disney
Beginning in 1994, a wave swept across Adventureland, uniting most of the land as a 1940s Southeast Asian remote jungle outpost. The land’s bazaar was aged; the Jungle Cruise’s boats were redesigned to be rusted with tattered canopies; and the newest E-Ticket to hit Disneyland – the Modern Marvel: Indiana Jones Adventure – brought it all together into one continuity. Now, guests are cast as European nouveau riche drawn to this remote outpost by black and white news reels promising that it’s an escape from our mundane upper class lives.
Paired with Magic Kingdom’s elaborate New Tomorrowland (home to Lost Legends: Alien Encounter, If You Had Wings, and The Timekeeper), Adventureland was one of Disney’s earliest stateside attempts at giving guests a “role” to play in an immersive land of connected stories. But arguably the first to test the formula is next on our list…
5. Frontierland (Disneyland Paris)
Image: Disney
Location: Disneyland Paris
Designers knew they had an uphill battle when it came to “EuroDisneyland,” but even Disney was surprised by the outright rage that the French media had toward a Disney Park in Paris – to their thinking, an invasion of American commercialism and consumerism in the “City of Lights.” That’s why designers quickly pivoted and worked to reimagine each of the tried-and-true Disneyland “lands” without the heavy emphasis on Americana and U.S. pop culture.
Back in Walt’s day, Frontierland was meant as a celebration of America’s heralded past and a complement to pop culture in the era, when Howdy Doody and Zorro were heroes for American kids. But Parisians wouldn’t care at all about Huckleberry Finn and The Lone Ranger, so Paris’ Frontierland was redesigned to emphasize the romance and drama of the Old West. The result was an early experiment in land-wide continuity, uniting all of the land’s rides, shows, and even restaurants into one giant overarching story.
image: Disney
In this case, it’s of the Ravenswood family who founded the town of Thunder Mesa and started up a mining business by way of the supposedly-cursed Big Thunder Mountain. But when the young Melanie Ravenswood fell in love with a lowly miner in her father’s business, Mr. Ravenswood plotted the man’s demise – and ultimately triggered the demise of the town. That’s the story that fuels the park’s Modern Marvel: Phantom Manor, a dark and dramatic take on the Haunted Mansion. By uniting so much of the land into the story of the Ravenswoods, evidence of their story follows guests throughout the land, creating a mystery-within-the-mystery for guests to solve.
4. Mysterious Island
Image: Disney
Location: Tokyo DisneySea
For decades, Disney Imagineers have been trying to find a way to incorporate the literary, science fantasy worlds of Jules Verne into Disney Parks. From the unbuilt Possibilityland: Discovery Bay and a never-finished scene on Disney-MGM Studios’ Declassified Disaster: Backstage Studio Tour to the closed classic Lost Legends: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Space Mountain – De la Terre à la Lune, for some reason Verne’s encyclopedic novels just can’t seem to stick around.
Except, of course at Tokyo DisneySea. The renowned park – considered by many to be the best theme park on Earth, and an international Mecca for theme park fans – contains nautical “ports” connected to the myths and legends of the ocean and the planet. Truthfully, any of DisneySea’s lands could make this countdown, from the sprawling Arabian Coast to the 21st century Adventureland of Lost River Delta, or the spectacular American Waterfront with its New-York-set Modern Marvel: Tower of Terror that ditches The Twilight Zone entirely. But by far, the park’s pinnacle lies beneath the peak of its icon, Mount Prometheus.
Image: Disney
There, in the collapsed caldera of the volcano lies Mysterious Island, named for and themed after the tropical secret hideaway of Verne’s notorious Captain Nemo. The land features two attractions: a new-age version of 20,000 Leagues and a ride considered by many to be the greatest modern dark ride on Earth – the Modern Marvel: Journey to the Center of the Earth.
Image: Disney
But even ignoring its anchoring attractions, Mysterious Island is an E-Ticket in its own right, comprised of the oxidized catwalks clinging to the caldera’s interior. Still-cooling lava flows surround guests, seeping down the mountainside while immense metallic nets seem to have captured splattered magma. The steaming, rumbling volcano looms overhead at all times, with immense geothermal geysers bubbling and erupting from the sunken pool of water beneath. Completely surrounded in Prometheus’ 750,000 square feet of rockwork, completely and totally immersed in this literary land. Though Disney’s other attempts at bringing the world of Jules Verne to life have fallen to intellectual properties, Mysterious Island remains an absolute pinnacle of what Imagineering can do.
3. Pandora – The World of AVATAR
Image: Disney / Fox
Location: Disney’s Animal Kingdom
Fans practically rioted when Disney announced in 2010 that they’d acquired the worldwide, exclusive rights to build theme park attractions based on James Cameron’s AVATAR. Despite becoming the highest grossing film ever upon its release, Avatar infamously failed to leave a mark in pop culture. That made Avatar a mostly-forgotten, PG-13 sci-fi action movie about humans waging war on a peaceful alien civilization of the native feline-like Na’vi to harvest their moon’s resources… an odd fit for a Disney Park at all, much less Animal Kingdom, and especially on the expansion pad once set aside for the Possibilityland: Beastly Kingdom.
Image: Disney / Fox
But when Pandora – The World of AVATAR opened in 2017, fans’ hatred was instantly silenced. Smartly, designers severed the land from the film, outright skipping the action film’s militaristic human-led assault on Pandora and instead setting the land forward in time to (we imagine) hundreds of years after humans’ attempts to mine Pandora out of existence have been thwarted. In the land, guests play the role of thoughtful eco-tourists, visiting the verdant moon to gaze in awe at its flora and fauna, collectively rolling our eyes at some distant, anonymous ancestors who thought they ought to strip it for profit.
Image: Disney / Fox
The 12-acre Valley of Mo’ara that we can explore is stunning, with its surrounding rocky alien cliffs and the majestic and awe-inspiring “floating mountains” of Pandora all around. The land also contains two spectacular attractions – an anchroing Flight of Passage E-Ticket and a family dark ride called Na’vi River Journey – as well as acres of trails through alien jungles past bioluminescent plant life and the overgrown ruins of old military operations, beautifully reclaimed by the planet.
Pandora is a wonder that probably succeeds in spite of its intellectual property rather than because of it, simply using James Cameron’s film as a springboard for something with a life and story of its own. At the end of the day, this awe-inspiring land still lacks some of the “immersive IP land” formula since there’s not really a Butterbeer or “magic wand” must-have equivalent, and since – admittedly – James Cameron’s Avatar really isn’t a world people were clamoring to step into. But now that it’s here, there’s no denying that Pandora is beyond belief.
2. Cars Land
Image: Disney / Pixar
Location: Disney California Adventure
We traced the unthinkable story of Disney’s first theme park failure in its own two-part series – Disney’s California Adventure: Part I and Part II – but after spending twice as much to fix the park as they had spent to build it to begin with, Disneyland’s fledgling little sister ended up expanding from four lands to eight, with Cars Land as the highlight.
In the 2006 Disney / Pixar film Cars, hot rod racing legend Lightning McQueen finds himself driven off the road in the desert, where he cruises into the sleepy, neglected town of Radiator Springs. The quiet stretch of Route 66 is seemingly dotted with abandoned businesses, with the days of America’s “Mother Road” long since surpassed by the interstate. Naturally, the film follows McQueen’s growing affinity for the town and its eventual saving, transforming it into a neon paradise. That town is brought to life at Disney California Adventure as Cars Land, a to-scale replica in every way.
Image: Disney
The story of the land’s development is a roadtrip in and of itself, as we explored in a standalone feature about its one-of-a-kind E-Ticket and Modern Marvel: Radiator Springs Racers, but one need only step into the town to be in awe of it. And while fans initially revolted against the idea (notice a trend?), the opening of Cars Land left jaws on the floor, especially thanks to the stunning backdrop of Ornament Valley and its iconic Cadillac Range, stretching around and engulfing the desert town and earning a spot on our countdown of the Seven “Natural” Wonders of the Theme Park World. (Here’s a hint: if you’ve never been or are taking first-timers, enter Cars Land via the park’s Pacific Wharf land, where the sprawling, endless desert mountains appear before you and rival any real National Park.)
Image: Disney
Cars Land benefits, too, from giving life to the stores and eateries seen in the film, including Flo’s V8 Cafe (a rollickin’ diner playing mid-century jukebox tunes sung by proprietor Flo and her friends). Cars Land is absolutely stunning in execution, and perhaps exists as evidence of the heights of modern Imagineering.
1. The Wizarding World of Harry Potter
Click and expand for a larger and more detailed view. Image: Universal / Warner Bros.
Location: Universal Studios Florida and Universal’s Islands of Adventure
When the first phase of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter opened to the public on June 8, 2010, it acted as paradigm shift in themed entertainment design. Sure, “a bug’s land” at Disney California Adventure shrunk guests to the size of an ant, and DisneySea’s Arabian Coast felt like a habitable, real, immersive world that kinda-sorta also felt like Agrabah from Aladdin. But never before had anyone attempted to build a headlining land that would physically and literally bring to life a to-scale build of an actual place seen on screen.
Image: Universal / Warner Bros.
Add to it series creator J.K. Rowling’s firm (and founded) insistence that this Wizarding World be held to an unprecedented standard in the industry. Not only would the land be built to the “real” scale of the “real” Hogsmeade Village seen in the films (complete with cramped quarters not suited for theme park crowds), but those stores would be stocked only with items one might truly expect of a Scottish village outside of a magical school: robes, wands, scarves, Scottish food, pumpkin juice, and Butterbeer… with no LEGO set, Harry Potter action figure, or Coca-Cola in sight!
Image: Universal
Rowling had accidentally stumbled on the rules that govern the now de-facto M.O. for Disney and Universal: it’s not about a ride, it’s about a world; transporting guests to a world they want to inhabit. Though Disney’s arguably been doing that since 1955’s Frontierland, Adventureland, Fantasyland et al, the Wizarding World’s big screen breakthrough set the stage for Cars Land, Pandora, Toy Story Land, Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, and upcoming Marvel lands. It’s telling that each is often described in terms of its “Wizarding World level of detail” that’s now become an industry benchmark.
Image: Universal / Warner Bros.
What really elevates the Wizarding World to the pinnacle of immersive lands isn’t just its hard-fought commitment to being all-encompassing, masterfully scaled, and “real.” It’s that it expanded in 2014 with the opening of a second “half” – Diagon Alley – at Universal Studios Florida next door with the Hogwarts Express connecting them both. That means that, at Universal’s first park, you can buy your wands, visit Gringotts, then step into London’s Kings Cross Station and ride the train to the enchanted forests of Hogsmeade just like the heroes from the film. It’s a cross-park, massively-scaled, and lovingly crafted way to truly become part of the Wizarding World.
While the countdown is over, on the last page we’ll dissect some up-and-coming lands that just may rival the current “top 3” and be poised to overtake this list…
Though you’ve seen the lands in our top three slots, the story isn’t over. In fact, those three lands are perhaps the impetus that’s begun a second round of arms races around the world as Disney and Universal race each other to create the next totally-immersive land.
And following in the new cinematic model, each of these upcoming theme park areas are designed to transport guests into worlds they’ve seen on the big (or small) screen. Take a look at these up-and-coming lands and let us know – where do you think they’ll fall in the countdown of the most immersive themed lands on Earth?
TBD: Marvel Super Hero lands
Image: Disney / Marvel
Location: Disney California Adventure, Walt Disney Studios Park, and Hong Kong Disneyland
Opening: 2020
The inevitable rise of theme park lands dedicated to Marvel was all-but assured when Disney acquired the comic book giant for $4 billion in 2009, and cemented once the Marvel Cinematic Universe films grossed a cumulative $17 billion over the course of its first 19 releases. Unfortunately, the rollout of Marvel attractions at Disney Parks has been decidedly mixed, as Universal’s agreement with Marvel (pre-Disney-purchase) locks many Marvel heroes from use in Florida and dissuades the use of the Marvel brand even in California. The end result is that the first Marvel attraction was 2017’s Iron Man Experience at Hong Kong Disneyland.
Image: Disney / Marvel
Then, in May 2017, Disney California Adventure was changed forever when its headlining Lost Legend: The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror was condemned, with the 1920s art deco hotel transforming into a “warehouse prison powerplant” “based on the beauty of an oil rig” (Disney’s words, not ours) looming over the California-themed park. In isolation, Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: BREAKOUT! is a legitimate hit in its own right (if a short-sighted one), even though as a whole, it’s a wildly distracting feature that actually withdraws from California Adventure’s immersion and storytelling. But its appearance signaled what was long rumored: that an entire Marvel themed land would soon come to Disney California Adventure.
Troublingly, rumors suggested that it would overtake the park’s Hollywoodland, effectively replacing one of its newly-redesigned Californian lands to resemble an East Coast metropolis with the New-York-set Avengers Tower reigning overhead. The announcement was made official in 2018 (alongside the announcement of similar lands coming to Hong Kong and Paris, albeit with all Marvel lands featuring a different ride lineup). Hollywood Land was saved, and California Adventure’s Marvel land will instead replace “A Bug’s Land,” disappearing at the end of summer 2018.
Image: Disney / Marvel
The jury’s still very much out on what exactly California’s Marvel land will include besides the looming sci-fi super hero drop tower, but early rumors suggest that – in order to appease growing concerns that there’s very little California left in California Adventure – the land will be themed as a Southern Californian headquarters and training campus for the Avengers. Okay, so it’s clumsy and contrived, but no more than the Guardians of the Galaxy tower it’ll house, or the strange new Pixar Pier we explored in Disney’s California Adventure: Part II. Insiders say it’ll probably open with an interactive family dark ride (perhaps based on Spider-Man) before expanding to include a technological E-Ticket based on the Avengers.
How successful this Marvel-themed land is will probably depend on Disney coming through with a reasonable budget for the project, and a sturdy vision that will make the land feel relevent once the era of super hero films inevitably passes. We won’t hold our breath (as, admittedly, California Adventure has become the resort’s “studio-style dumping grounds” for intellectual property too flavor-of-the-week to reasonably put in the storied Disneyland next door), but it will be interesting to see.
TBD: Frozen lands
Location: Walt Disney Studios Park, Tokyo DisneySea, and Hong Kong Disneyland
Image: Disney
No one seemed more caught off guard by the runaway success of Frozen (now the highest grossing animated film ever) than Disney. After the film’s breakout success, they raced to incorporate the icy fairytale into their parks, beginning with the infamous conversion of Epcot’s Lost Legend: Maelstrom into the Modern Marvel: Frozen Ever After.
Image: Disney
Shortly after, it was announced that an upcoming expansion to the underbuilt Hong Kong Disneyland’s Fantasyland would include a mini Frozen area of its own, reportedly duplicating Epcot’s dark ride as its anchor attraction and adding a Seven Dwarfs Mine Train style family coaster.
Image: Disney
Then, in a surprise announcement in 2018, Disney came out with an exciting plan to fix their most pitiful park ever – subject of the Declassified Disaster: Walt Disney Studios Park. The tiny second gate at Disneyland Paris would recieve a complete, floor-to-ceiling, California Adventure sized rebuild including at least three immersive new lands, with an entire Frozen land acting as the park’s new icon.
Tokyo DisneySea announced its own Scandanavian land with Frozen accents (just as its Arabian Coast feels grounded and real with some Aladdin accents) in 2015, but quietly walked back the plans before ground was broken.
Image: Disney
That’s because they were thinking bigger, returning to the drawing board and countering in 2018 with a new “fantasy” themed port at the park, with areas dedicated to Tangled, Frozen, and Peter Pan. Built to an immense scale, DisneySea’s new port will likely be a contender on our list, taking that “New Fantasyland” formula and amping it up even bigger, with three boat-led dark rides in the new land (which is also rumored to connect to next-door Tokyo Disneyland’s Fantasyland, creating a land that seamlessly fuses both parks).
Image: Disney
From the (relatively meager) reclaimed rivers of Maelstrom in Epcot’s Norway to entire, stand-alone land in Paris, it’s interesting that each resort’s Frozen appears unique in its layout, attractions, and even aesthetics. While it remains to be seen which (if any) of the upcoming Frozen-inspired regions become stand-outs to break the top three on our list, it’s at least interesting to see Disney adapt the property in different ways.
TBD: Super Nintendo World
Image: Universal / Nintendo
Location: Universal Orlando Resort and Universal Studios Hollywood
Opening: Unknown
When Universal announced that it had acquired the worldwide rights to build theme park attractions based on Nintendo’s catalogue of characters, industry insiders suggested it may be a coup even greater than Potter or Star Wars, securing Universal a beloved, multi-generational brand, and one that’s continuously self-refreshing with new media.
Image: Universal / Nintendo
The first “Super Nintendo World” announced is headed for Universal Studios Japan, but additional lands dedicated to the video game juggernaut are also officially on the docket for Universal Orlando and Hollywood. And most excitingly, plans for the brand in Florida appear to be in a state of growth. While reports initially suggested that the Mario-centered land would simply replace the aging Woody Woodpecker’s KidZone at the Studio park, insiders say that plans have expanded…
Now, separate lands dedicated to Mario and Donkey Kong, Zelda, and Pokémon are rumored to be on the way to Universal Studios Florida, Universal’s Islands of Adventure, and the yet-unannounced third Universal Orlando theme park, respectively. That, of course, would best even the Wizarding World’s dual-lands to create an interconnected trio of Nintendo stories spread across three parks.
Image: Universal / Nintendo
Naturally, we just can’t yet say exactly how Universal plans to transport guests into the video game worlds of Nintendo’s greatest stories, but all sources indicate that Universal and Nintendo and working closely to emulate the “Wizarding World” formula, and that a particular emphasis has been made to exclude screens from Nintendo World’s attractions – admittedly odd given its video game origins, but much-needed in Universal Parks. Especially given the rise of technology in RFID bands, mobile devices, apps, and the success of Universal’s own interactive wand model, just imagine how worlds based on Pokémon or the Legend of Zelda could come alive…
TBD: Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge
Image: Disney / Lucasfilm
Location: Disneyland and Disney’s Hollywood Studios
Opening: Summer 2018 (California) and Fall 2018 (Florida)
Though the Wizarding World kicked off – and to our thinking, reigns supreme in – the next generation of “immersive” lands, one has to wonder… with the Boy Who Lived be dethroned by a galaxy far, far away? That remains to be seen, but one thing we do know is that Disney’s taking a somewhat different approach with the Star Wars themed lands coming to Disneyland and Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
Image: Disney / Lucasfilm
Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge won’t take place on any alien planet we’ve seen on-screen. Rather, it’ll be set on the remote outpost planet of Batuu – a sort of last-stop before the endlessness of deep space, where thieves, villains, and heroes collide.
Given the (literal) galaxy of settings we’ve seen in the dozen or more Star Wars films, it’s fair that only a new, original creation could please everyone. But in so doing, will Disney latch onto “Wizarding World” style appeal? Can they successfully find the “Butterbeer and wand” equivalent that will make guests truly feel that they’re a part of the Star Wars world… even on a world they’ve never seen on film?
Image: Disney / Lucasfilm
It seems that Disney did learn its lesson from Potter, though, and seems dutifully committed to keeping Coca-Cola out, promising that the food, drink, and even store attendants will be decidedly alien. Both installations of Star Wars’ lands will be hidden away from the rest of their respective parks’ areas by way of earthen berms and protective portals. As for the timeline? At least so far, it seems that the land will be set in the timeline of Disney’s newest triology (Episodes 7 – 9) which means – if they’re as committed to consistancy as they say – Darth Vader won’t make an appearance…
Obviously, Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge will be a groundbreaking, showstopping, spectacular display of Imagineering prowess that will build upon the Wizarding World’s industry-changing standard… But at the end of the day, which will be better as transporting guests into a new world? We’ll find out in Summer 2019.
Don’t forget to make the jump to our list of the least immersive Disney Parks lands to see the carnivals, boardwalks, and backlots that stand out as opposites to the lands on this list.
