News Tron coaster coming to the Magic Kingdom

[TrainsOfDisney]

and find some clever ways to replace the most expensive to run elements of the ride (the Fire and Live Actors) with new effects that are as thrilling but require less maintenance and fewer hourly-paid roles.

I get your bigger point and I agree with it but it’s pretty sad how dumbed down attractions have gotten. We can’t have any physical effects anymore it seems. :-/

 

[lazyboy97o]

Do you even goto Disney ? What other USA theme parks do you attend and how do you think they compare ?

I’ve been to Disneyworld Over Georgia many times thank you very much. I know that Disneyworld Florida is pretty much the same.

 

[Jrb1979]

Seen as the discussion has changed to how to make Disney better. This video I watched last night came to mind. The way Europa park updates their dark rides and all the small themed rides they have is the way all Theme parks should be run.

 

[J4546]

This is a big part of the issue they've run into - the habit of replacing attractions that should merely be upgraded results in them spending 5 times as much and taking 4 times as long to end up with an attraction that is often as good or marginally better than the original could have been with some love.

The poster child for this is turning The Great Movie Ride into Runaway Railway - the really, really obvious solution should have been to give GMR a big refresh, swap out a few sequences and imrpove show quality throughout, and find some clever ways to replace the most expensive to run elements of the ride (the Fire and Live Actors) with new effects that are as thrilling but require less maintenance and fewer hourly-paid roles. It's not like the premise of the ride wasn't evergreen. Tweak it to suit the newly revised mission of the park, which it has every opportunity to suit, and let it continue to be the heart of the park. Runaway Railway should have taken over the old Animation Tour building, which is terribly underused as Star Wars Launch Bay, and tweak the premise to give guests a tour of the working studio that culminates in a preview of the newest Mickey Short they've just completed. From there the ride can be exactly as built, only now you have two attractions to tout instead of one, and all the capacity that comes with them. You'd also breathe new life into Animation Courtyard, which needs it pretty badly.

I would also encourage them to get real serious about letting the theme of the parks dictate which properties go where instead of letting the theme bend to the whims of the attractions they want to build, but they're far enough down that road that I'm not sure they'd be willing to correct for it.

im guessing they didnt put the MMRR in the animation building because eventually that building will come down when they expand the park into the NW quadrant. That may be 10+ years away, but its still something that will eventually happen. This is all just me hoping of course.

 

[UNCgolf]

DAK and Epcot each only have one coaster while MK will have 5. If WDW ever wants to balance out intrapark attendance, the other three non-MK parks need more. (It was dumb to add anything to MK, IMO, until the others were beefed up in the ride count.)

Family coasters are always popular. And when you put them in a box, you can increase the theming in the ride and keep the ride running in rain and thunderstorms.

WDW just needs to get better at hiding the box. Or theming it so it 'fits.'

Building more family coasters like 7DMT (just make it 2-3x longer) makes sense. It's building more like Guardians/TRON that don't really seem like the best investment over other options.

 

[MisterPenguin]

Especially with Guardians, that box is so obvious and they could have just put a facade on it that looks Xandarian and would have fit fine among the various Future World / World Discover pavilions

Or, the Universal route...

 

[yensidtlaw1969]

I get your bigger point and I agree with it but it’s pretty sad how dumbed down attractions have gotten. We can’t have any physical effects anymore it seems. :-/

Oh for sure, I absolutely agree - I just know that these particular elements were considered a liability at The Great Movie Ride, and went some length towards deciding to close it. I certainly wouldn't want them to simply replace these elements with screens, or anything comparably lazy, but there was plenty of potential for creative practical effects that ride and I think it would have been smarter to try to implement something new rather than throw away the whole ride like they did.

 

[yensidtlaw1969]

I think they wanted to change the theme of DHS, they didn't want it to be about movies or the history of movies, they wanted it be about the worlds created in various movies and then the guests enter those worlds ...

Not saying that is a good or bad decision but given that decision / evolution, The Great Movie Ride really didn't fit - well, unless they really changed it up I guess and made it like traveling b/w those different "world's" or something

Yes, DHS seems to be an example of the thematic change leading the park's new direction rather than the park's theme being changed to suit ill-fitting attractions, although they sure went about it a weird way. For all the desire to do away with the Studio-theme, the park is still called "Disney's Hollywood Studios", and there are a handful of soundstage-based attractions and buildings that remain and don't deliver on the newer "you've stepped into this world!" concept. So I do think The Great Movie Ride could have still existed within that, but I also think it would have been easy enough to turn it into an exercise that introduced and clarified the new concept for the park to guests.

The ride always did act as the Mission Statement for the park, making clear to guests how Disney MGM differed from a real Hollywood Studio (or another fake studio up the road), so just revise the ride to state the new mission. I don't think it would have had to be taken down to the studs to do that, since it was always about letting you step into the magic of some of your favorite movies in ways that you can't get from the Silver Screen.

 

[No Name]

I think they wanted to change the theme of DHS, they didn't want it to be about movies or the history of movies, they wanted it be about the worlds created in various movies and then the guests enter those worlds ...

Not saying that is a good or bad decision but given that decision / evolution, The Great Movie Ride really didn't fit - well, unless they really changed it up I guess and made it like traveling b/w those different "world's" or something

That is quite literally what the premise was.

They wanted to have something new and cut labor costs.

 

[lazyboy97o]

im guessing they didnt put the MMRR in the animation building because eventually that building will come down when they expand the park into the NW quadrant. That may be 10+ years away, but its still something that will eventually happen. This is all just me hoping of course.

They’re not following some long term plan.

 

[TheMaxRebo]

That is quite literally what the premise was.

They wanted to have something new and cut labor costs.

But the premise was.abour those things being movies and showing scenes and talking about actors and the year movies came out - it was showing you scenes from movies, not saying you were part of them

Maybe it could be reworked more to make it fit - but I can also see why they felt it didn't fit the new direction of the park ... Not to mention wanting to get rid of scenes of IP they didn't own

 

[DCBaker]

 

[Surferboy567]

What’s the likelihood this is open during Wine & Dine half marathon weekend?

 

[larryz]

 

[Mr. Moderate]

What’s the likelihood this is open during Wine & Dine half marathon weekend?

Most likely it won't be ready until next spring and I can't see it being ready for guests by the fall. The pathetic pace that Disney is taking with this ride is disheartening for even the most diehard Disney park fan.

 

[DonaldDoleWhip]

Whenever there’s a negative post about Tron, it gets both praise and pushback.

Tron is really a tricky ride to address. Because there are triumphant victories and immense pitfalls.

It’s difficult to categorize Tron because of this, every complement must be attached to a quantifier.

Things Tron does really well:

• Beautiful nighttime aesthetic
• Gorgeous and incredibly aesthetically pleasing interior
• Creating ambiance and adding kinetic energy
• Smart in-coaster set elements

Areas Tron could use a boost:

• Length. Tron just isn’t long enough. It’s really fun, so you want more, but by the time it’s over, it leaves you wanting a little bit more
• Visible Blue-box show building. In Shanghai, I was never once bothered by it. I doubt I’d be too bothered by it in Orlando, but it is a lapse in theming
• Block-sections. The ride has way way way too many block-sections. The vehicles are long, so they’re very noticeable, and you’re not moving that fast through the block-sections so they cut up the pacing. Rides like VelociCoaster and Guardians avoid this issue by having mid-layout launches and rotational movement during block sections.

Tron is a great ride and I’m excited to experience it once again along with all that it adds to Tomorrowland, but I went to Shanghai before they announced Tron was coming stateside, and even still, I went on a ride within that same park four times more over three days. That ride was Pirates.

Tron isn’t a best in the world attraction by any metric, and that’s okay, but if you’re disappointed by Guardians (even with ignoring its placement) you will be disappointed by Tron. It’ll still be the best coaster in Magic Kingdom, but hardly the best in WDW or Orlando.

It’s a solid, imperfect ride. Orlando will love it. I love it. It’s not the best thing since sliced bread.

Perfect post IMO, having loved Tron in Shanghai. It doesn't come close to topping Guardians for me, but it'll still easily be in the top 3 as far as WDW's coasters go (behind Guardians and Everest).

It'll also be in my top 3 MK attractions, alongside Haunted Mansion and Splash Mountain. That's really not bad, as far as these things go.

The fantastic aesthetics it'll bring to Tomorrowland are icing on the cake - an easy net positive.

 

[Disgruntled Walt]

The fantastic aesthetics it'll bring to Tomorrowland are icing on the cake - an easy net positive.

I don't mind its presence, but I wish they could have figured out a way to make it more visible in Tomorrowland. Honestly, if they had taken out the Speedway (which I wouldn't miss) or redesigned that whole sector of Tomorrowland (combining Tron and the Speedway in an entirely new build) so that the Canopy is closer to Tomorrowland proper, this would have been cool as shown in the map below:

 

[mlayton144]

I don't mind its presence, but I wish they could have figured out a way to make it more visible in Tomorrowland. Honestly, if they had taken out the Speedway (which I wouldn't miss) or redesigned that whole sector of Tomorrowland (combining Tron and the Speedway in an entirely new build) so that the Canopy is closer to Tomorrowland proper, this would have been cool as shown in the map below:View attachment 647396

I would hope that the speedways days are numbered anyway , maybe they could replace cars with Tron themed motorcycles and extend the theme and overall aesthetic (even if it’s designed for kiddos)

 

[J4546]

I would hope that the speedways days are numbered anyway , maybe they could replace cars with trim themed motorcycles and extend the theme and overall aesthetic (even if it’s designed for kiddos)

I feel like a complete retheme of the speedway into electric futuristic cars is coming sooner than later. I really hope they replace the entire ride system with the 360 spinning/drifting setup like in duel gt at suzuka park

 

[Casper Gutman]

I would hope that the speedways days are numbered anyway , maybe they could replace cars with Tron themed motorcycles and extend the theme and overall aesthetic (even if it’s designed for kiddos)

The placement of Tron has severely limited the potential for replacing the cars, blocking off what was once a huge expanse of land that could have held multiple major attractions. It’s one of the reasons that doing nothing would have been better then adding the badly-placed, visually-obscured, barely-long-enough-to-be-called-a-ride, unlikely-to-help-much-with-crowding Tron. It’s the rare case in which the hope for possible future attractions is more appealing then the promise of an actual new attraction.