It’s been the talk of the town on Disney Parks social media: another E-Ticket made its way into the already jam-packed Disneyland… and while it’s a clone of a ride Disney World guests have known and loved (or loathed) since 2020, Disneyland’s version of Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway found a way to “plus” several scenes from Florida’s version of the ride…
Today, we’ll compare Disneyland and Disney World’s versions of this toon-tastic E-Ticket to point out several differences you’ve heard a lot about, and several you might not have picked up on… Are the changes between these two versions enough for you to prefer one over the other? Which “plusses” that Disneyland’s version made would you like to see sent back to the original in Florida? Let us know in the comments below and when you share this feature on social media!
1. The setting
Sometimes at Disney Parks, context is everything. That’s especially true with Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway, which is presented in two incredibly different contexts between Disney’s two stateside resorts.
At Walt Disney World, Runaway Railway can be found at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, where it’s located in the iconic Chinese Theater. As you can imagine, that’s controversial for a few reasons. The most noteworthy is that the Chinese Theater once housed the Lost Legend: The Great Movie Ride, an epic, 22-minute “Journey Into The Movies.”
A grand, classic dark ride akin to EPCOT Center’s legendary attractions, The Great Movie Ride sent guests traveling through the greatest scenes in cinema history, from Singin’ in the Rain to Casablanca; Alien to Raiders of the Lost Ark; Mary Poppins to The Wizard of Oz. It’s understandable that some fans grimace at the idea of a modern Mickey Mouse overtaking the park’s central structure and “thesis” attraction, instantly giving Runaway Railway an uphill battle to fight. See? Context!
At Disneyland, Runaway Railway found its way into the park in an unlikely place. Where most fans had imagined that Disneyland’s Toontown would eventually be leveled for a New Fantasyland, or a World of Frozen land, the surprise announcement of a West Coast version of the ride signaled that Toontown was here to stay. Especially in Disneyland – notorious for having very, very, very few square feet available for expansion – the addition of such a large ride was a shock. Entered via the “El Capitoon Theater” that feels right at home in the land’s “Downtown”, Runaway Railway also released the funds needed to update the rest of the land, too, strengthening a space that hadn’t really been touched since the ’90s.
It’s pretty wild that Disneyland – already packed with things to do and with very limited opportunities to grow – managed to squeeze in Runaway Railway without losing anything, while Disney World – with its often-celebrated “blessing of size” – closed a headlining ride to make room for it. Obviously, Disney World isn’t going to change its Chinese Theater into a cartoonish cinema. But separate from the frustration fans feel is inherent in Disney World’s version, frankly, both the Chinese and the El Capitoon Theaters are very compelling locations for the premier of a new Mickey Mouse short. The difference is how those theaters celebrate it…
2. The queue
Aside from Florida’s ride taking place in a regal, opulent, Chinese Theater on a historic Hollywood Blvd. and Disneyland’s taking place in the animated El Capitoon of Toontown, the biggest and clearest difference between the attractions is in their queues…
At Walt Disney World, much of the wait for Runaway Railway tends to happen in the concrete courtyards around the Chinese Theater. That makes sense since – as we saw in our jaw-dropping looks at how the layouts of Runaway Railway and the Great Movie Ride compare – the largest indoor space used as the former ride’s queue had instead been re-imagined as the new ride’s pre-show space.
The result is that Imagineers had to try to turn the narrow lobby and antechamber of the Chinese Theater into a queue. It’s rich and decadent, packed with Oriental patterns and ornate chandeliers and tapestries, just like the real Hollywood theater it’s recreating… But… that’s about it. Other than the occasional monitor displaying posters for Mickey Mouse shorts (including “Perfect Picnic,” above) the wait for Runaway Railway is basically just stanchions in an elaborate movie palace.
At Disneyland, Imagineers lucked out. By needing to connect the existing Toontown to a huge new auxiliary showbuilding, designers were able to build a custom-made queue for this trackless E-Ticket ride, packing the “El Captioon Theater” with tons and tons of space. Even better, to celebrate the premier of the new short “Perfect Picnic,” the El Capitoon has apparently been co-opted for an exhibit curated by the Toontown Hysterical Society: “Mickey Through the Ears: A Tribute to Our Hometown Hero,” curated by Minnie herself.
As anyone who’s so much at glanced at social media since January 27, 2023 will tell you, the queue for Disneyland’s version of the ride is truly an attraction in its own right. The “Mickey Through the Ears” exhibit tours past props, costumes, and interactives from throughout Mickey’s century-long career, creating a living timeline that begins in the ’20s with “Steamboat Willie” and “Plane Crazy” and advances up to the Paul Rudish shorts of today with “Perfect Picnic” as its conclusion.
We’re talking about “real” props and costumes from Mickey’s best-known features, plus deep cuts from way back on his IMDB page. (During times when the ride itself is closed for refurbishment, we wouldn’t be surprised to see the queue stay open as a walkthrough.)
The El Capitoon experience is handled beautifully, including being a lot less “inflated” that the rest of Toontown. While fans worried that already being in the cartoon world might sap the jaw-dropping moment of stepping into “Perfect Picnic,” the El Capitoon largely plays it straight and avoids looking outrageously cartoony itself. Instead, it’s a decked out in chrome, teal, art deco accents, a mid-century snack bar, and more. Somehow managing the best of both worlds, the Disneyland queue leans into the Toontown style without going overboard, meaning it’s still a “wow” moment to step into the cartoon itself.
We get it – Disney World is somewhat limited here… But it would be nice to see a few glass cases with Mickey’s “costumes” placed in the Chinese Theater lobby, just costumes were on display during the Great Movie Ride era. Maybe Florida’s outdoor queue could also gain some larger-than-life props “too big” to fit into the theater, or something else to make the premier feel like it comes with an exhibit, too?
But if you think the differences between Disneyland and Walt Disney World’s versions of the ride are relegated only to the queue, you may be surprised to find what subtle and not-so-subtle changes have been made to the ride itself… Continue onto the next page…!
3. A re-paced introduction
Aboard Runaway Railway, the first scene sees Goofy’s train set off out of the train barn and into Runnamuck Park. Off in the distance, Mickey and Minnie in their red coupe can be seen winding along roadways before they enter a tunnel, with our train heading into a similar tunnel entry to rendezvous with them… And here, Imagineers made a serious upgrade to Disneyland’s ride. Entering the tunnel, we get out first in-person look at Mickey and Minnie as they drive up alongside us in their convertible.
At Walt Disney World (above), Mickey immediately drives to the tunnel’s end, parking with his front bumper against a “track switch.” From his parked position, Mickey carries on a conversation with “Engineer Goofy,” but if you happen to be in the third or fourth car, you’ll hear much more of Mickey than you’ll see of him, and you’ll entirely miss him driving in since he’ll already have reached the tunnel’s end by time you round the corner.
As our train finally catches up, the track switch he’s parked up against suddenly begins to teeter in place, then falls. The bad things about this are that anyone who’s not in the front car of the train basically only catches the very end of Mickey pulling into the tunnel, and that it doesn’t quite compute that out of the blue, the track switch suddenly just falls over without being pushed.
At Disneyland (above), the scene has been entirely re-paced. Now, Mickey and Minnie drive in alongside the train, carrying on their conversation with Goofy as they ride next to us. It’s only as we reach the end of the tunnel that they do, too. Now, instead of awkwardly parking against the track switch and then it falling 10 seconds later, Mickey drives his car into the switch, bumping it. And instead of falling to the side, this sends the track switch spinning, visibly pivoting an arrow that clearly indicates the direction of travel with a musical “ding” to draw attention to it.
Because the Disneyland scene has been re-paced, the entire train gets the experience of Mickey and Minnie driving alongside them, and it’s much clearer that the mouse duo’s actions result in the track switch being diverted. It’s a simple change done entirely through show programming, which makes us think that this update will likely come to Florida’s version when the ride’s next refurbishment period arrives.
4. Extended scenes
That idea of re-pacing the first scene was clearly done based on feedback that if you end up in the “wrong” seat in Florida, you’re likely to miss key moments or feel that you’re only getting half of the show. Because the ride’s vehicles break apart, change order, and rearrange throughout the ride, that means that at least one or two vehicles are going to get a less-than-ideal experience in each room. For example…
At Walt Disney World, if you’re unlucky enough to be in the third or fourth car when the ride begins, you’ll not only miss much of the “Tunnel” scene with Mickey and Minnie, but by time you “jump the track” and enter the Wild West scene, it’s nearly over! Sure, by design, the scenes in Runaway Railway aren’t heavily plotted or anything, but for guests in cars 3 and 4, before you can even register what’s happening in the Wild West scene, it’s “lights out” as the scene darkens and resets, with your car rushing off to try to get into the Carnival scene before the action starts.
The same things happens in the “Island” room. Here, Mickey & Minnie are tossed by the tornado, landing in a tropical fern that folds down as the two – via Audio-Animatronics – tell guests that “Nothing can stop us now!” just before a volcano erupts. Unfortunately, if you’re the third or fourth car into that scene, you won’t even see the Animatronics, as by time you arrive, the volcano eruption will have begun and the ferns fold back up to cover the figures. In fact, the last car into the room practically just pulls right into the last of the individual “projection domes” that sends guests over a waterfall, skipping the “Island” scene altogether.
At Disneyland, the Wild West scene has been re-animated with a new extended sequence and an additional physical set. It’s not a radical change, and nothing new “of substance” was added… But simply by having Mickey and Minnie enter together rather than apart and hop around the room a bit more on their horses, the final cars to enter the scene actually get to take it in for a moment, and the scene ends just as they exit instead of several seconds before.
Likewise, Disneyland’s version of the ride has re-animated the “Island” scene so that it doesn’t really even begin into every vehicle has made into the room. Even if you’re in the last car to enter the scene, you’ll still see Minnie and Mickey land in the fern, hear their dialogue, and see the volcano erupt from the beginning.
(Curiously, even Disneyland’s version didn’t fix the simple continuity error here. When you turn into the projection dome as find yourself carried away on an island river, the sky should be red like it was in the scene you just exited! That would not only connect the two environments, but strengthen the dichotomy of the fiery island and the blue underwater scene that follows! Oh well…)
The “Alley” scene (with Mickey and Minnie looking down on guests from the Factory windows) has also been re-paced so that the last cars get a full experience with Minnie before she’s sucked into the Factory’s interior.
Like the re-paced introduction, we’d expect that when Disney World’s Runaway Railway … but we’ll see. Nothing’s as easy as it seems, especially since Disney World and Disneyland’s scenes do have significantly different layouts and thus, animations and motions.
5. The extra scenes
Early document filings suggested that Runaway Railway would recieve a few extra scenes in Disneyland, which wouldn’t at all be a surprise to the “Be Fair to Florida” constituency who’s pretty used to Disneyland getting the improved version of things. Then, insiders began to report that, yeah, kinda, but those extra scenes were really just to make up for the from-scratch California showbuilding necessitating different layouts for scenes (for example, you exit out the right of Daisy’s Dance Studio instead of the left) and the spaces needed to connect them.
Now we know that Disneyland’s version does indeed have two “extra” scenes.
The first occurs after the “Island” scene has become the “Ocean” scene. In it, the fan-favorite squid has gained a new job. Instead of just floating, dead-eyed, until it unexpectedly (and delightfully) pulls out a trumpet, the squid grips onto a rocky arch, bracing itself. That’s because – in a new “connector” room – the squid’s legs can be seen pulling a plug, leading into the draining sewers that ultimately deposit us in the “Big City.” It’s not a particularly essential moment nor really some cool new environment… instead, it’s a smart use of a necessary new “room” created by the ride’s reorganization to fit a few physical space.
Likewise, the second new “scene” occurs after the “Factory” has folded itself back into a starlit “Runnamuck Park.” Just as in Florida, riders escape the Smasher at the last second as a great choral symphony begins, pivoting as the factory reshapes itself and re-uniting with Engineer Goofy (who, of course, doesn’t seem to have noticed that we were gone at all). But rather than advancing directly into the finale where Mickey and Minnie finally get their “Perfect Picnic,” the physical layout of the building instead requires an additional hallway connecting the newly-folded park to the one where the finale awaits.
As a solution, a “Covered Bridge” works well. It’s a smart fix for the unintuitive, utilitarian need for a hallway to connect two halves of a park. But admittedly, it’s a little odd. Basically, the swirling symphony of music that clearly should lead into “Nothing Can Stop Us Now” (and does in Florida) instead quiets as Goofy awkwardly vamps. The “Covered Bridge” scene is a full 20 seconds, which is a lifetime in ride form. It would seem to us that a smart fix might be to have that orchestral symphony continue as we cross the bridge, with projections creating beautiful, flowing vines grow and bloom across the bridge’s interior as we pass. That would more naturally lead into Mickey & Minnie’s stirring musical finale than an awkward connector scene.
The thing is, if you haven’t ridden Florida’s version of the ride, you probably wouldn’t even notice anything odd here… but for those who’ve studied their POVs (or better yet, ridden both in person!), it’s clearly a gap of a scene where music and projections would probably be more effective than Goofy’s time-filling.
What changes did you notice between Disneyland Disney World’s versions of Runaway Railway? Do you prefer one to the other? Which setting and queue do you think are the stronger ones? Do you wish Disney has built the Toontown version of the ride in Hollywood Studios’ Animation Courtyard instead of the Chinese Theater? Which “plusses” from Disneyland’s version would you like to see in Florida?
