EXPANSION POSSIBILITIES
Before we conclude our very thorough tour of DisneySky with a showing of the parkwide spectaculars, let us take a moment to discuss DisneySky’s expansion possibilities. Ideally, what has been presented here would more or less be DisneySky’s opening day lineup...with a few headliners and other components more likely to be part of DisneySky’s initial five-year-plan. Following the lackluster premier of the half-finished California Adventure, Disneyland Resort would benefit from its third gate opening in a much more completed form.
More realistically, however, this proposal better reflects DisneySky 10 years after first opening its gates. The park boasts a lineup of roughly 20 rides and 14 additional attractions. For contrast, Shanghai Disneyland a few years after opening enjoys 17 rides and roughly 18 additional attractions. Nineteen-year-old Tokyo DisneySea features 21 rides and roughly 11 additional attractions. Altogether, DisneySky’s roster numbers are realistic and attainable, fully in-line with a one-day park’s needs.
Even so, it is worthwhile to think ahead concerning DisneySky’s expansion possibilities. We shall ignore the possibility of existing attractions being replaced. Rather, let us examine undeveloped areas across DisneySky’s acreage and see how those pads might be filled in the future...while keeping in mind that our boxed-in Anaheim acreage offers very little opportunity for easy expansion.
Northeastern Pad
A stretch of underdeveloped acreage sits in DisneySky’s northeastern corner in the transition space between Mythic Realms and Pioneer Fields.
This forested area is presently a miniature subland called Clockwork Canyon, and its only feature is the Da Vinci Treats snack stand. The initial park brainstorm had pegged this space as a potential massive land expansion. Clockwork Canyon, as the hypothetical land would have been called, would have focused on Renaissance-era fantasies of flight, with a heavy emphasis on Da Vinci’s flying inventions and on an overall clockpunk aesthetic. This would have been a land of windmills, of aerial screw helicopters and leather gliders, of magnetically-powered flying continents like Bacon’s New Atlantis or Swift’s Laputa. Cultural elements on display would have fused influences from Renaissance Italy and Spain into a singular Mediterranean fantasy realm.
All of this was initially conceived when Disney Animation was still developing the now-canceled film Gigantic, whose proposed Iberian retelling of Jack & the Beanstalk would seem tailor-made for DisneySky. But without that intellectual property to anchor a hypothetical land, and without the acreage to begin with, a fully fleshed-out Clockwork Canyon shall forever remain a head-in-the-clouds pipe dream.
Nonetheless, here is a brief rundown of some Clockwork Canyon concepts which were briefly entertained:
A polercoaster (a vertically-oriented roller coaster) to be themed around Gigantic and called Jack’s Gigantic Journey. Coaster tracks would have resembled the towering beanstalk, while the ride’s storyline would have concerned an adventure to the cloudy sky city of the Storm Giants.
A Spanish windmill Ferris wheel ride
A C-ticket suspended family ride based on Da Vinci’s aerial screw helicopter, likely using the same ride system as Peter Pan’s Flight at Shanghai Disneyland. No specific storyline or theme had been identified, though design notes suggest that Cloudcuckooland, the floating island from Aristophanes’ The Birds, had been considered.
A walkthrough Spanish galleon. This and similar elements would have taken a fair amount of design inspiration from Tokyo DisneySea’s Mediterranean Harbor, in particular Fortress Explorations and Soaring Fantastic Flight (home to S.E.A.’s aviation expert Camelia Falco).
Live falconry streetmosphere displays.
A “Dragon Volante” glider ride, possibly a kinetic outdoors B-ticket.
But all this is irrelevant now. With the small space available, the likeliest expansion option is to simply add a new ride to Pioneer Fields.
Our future plan at present is to create Coco’s Fiesta de los Muertos. This planned attraction is to be a smaller-scale dark ride, something on par with Buzz Lightyear’s Astro Blasters in terms of size and ticket. Like that ride, Coco’s Fiesta de los Muertos would use a high-capacity, space-saving omnimover ride system, which is a ride type not yet featured in DisneySky.
The preexisting Cabildo facade in Pioneer Plaza would serve as the ride’s facade - with appropriate modifications. The ride building would cover the entirety of what is now Clockwork Canyon. The guest walkway which cuts through Clockwork Canyon is to be transformed into a dry city canal like those of Mexico’s Guanajuato, with the ride building on both sides and overhead sky bridges crossing the walkways secretly extending the ride’s square footage.
As for the ride itself, guests would board large omnimover Dia de los Muertos sugar skulls. They would go on a musical journey through the Land of the Dead as seen in Pixar’s Coco, with the queue likely covering the passage from the waking world of Pioneer Fields and across the marigold bridge into the afterlife.
Since Pioneer Fields is period set circa 1928, this ride would be a prequel to Coco. Set shortly after Hector’s passing in 1921, the ride’s story would concern Hector’s early, happy-go-lucky days in the Land of the Dead. Guests would follow Hector as he crosses the threshold between worlds, seeking to visit his 10-year-old daughter Coco. This secret reunion between daughter and her deceased father is sure to carry Pixar’s trademark warmth & emotion. There would be plenty of musical fun as well, as guests’ journey through the Land of the Dead would expose them to a great cavalcade of musical Dia de los Muertos celebrations. To make the ride more unique and more interactive, guests’ sugar skull vehicles would include interactive keyboards, which could be used to play along with the skeletal mariachis and the dancing alebrijes.
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Of course this proposed ride concept is still quite underdeveloped. This is simply a proposal for future additions.
Avengers Airspace Pads
There are several possible expansion pads in Avengers Airspace. Happily, the MCU is ever-evolving, so there is no shortage of potential ideas.
The southwestern corner of DisneySky in particular is in great need of an anchor attraction. This is the section of Avengers Airspace which includes Liberty Isle, the Avengers Academy Boytique, and the lagoon shows’ backstage harbor. The potential attraction space is presently owned by a third party - a motel complex awkwardly wedged into the corner of the Disney-owned “Strawberry Fields” parking lot. Any future development in this corner assumes that Disney eventually acquires this plot.
The motel complex is large enough for a D- or C-ticket family dark ride. That is the sort of wide-appeal attraction which would provide nice balance in this corner of Avengers Airspace. Comparing the attraction roster throughout Disneyland Resort, versus Disney’s worldwide ride resume, the best option here is a shooter dark ride using the same ride system (and layout) as Shanghai Disneyland’s Buzz Lightyear Planet Rescue. This is an extremely modified evolution on the Astro Blasters model, one which if rethemed can feel like an all-new ride.
The likeliest Marvel theme is Ant-Man and the Wasp. In fact, Hong Kong Disneyland’s Buzz Lightyear shooter ride has already been rethemed to Ant-Man. The results, sadly, appear to be one of Imagineering’s more underwhelming recent efforts, so DisneySky’s proposed Ant-Man ride would need to be designed from the ground up. Rejecting Hong Kong’s Hydra & Zola premise, the DisneySky ride would favor exploration over action, with the ride storyline concerning a voyage into the Quantum Realm, and the interactive shooter elements concerning the collection of escaped Pym Particles. Marvel’s Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, scheduled for 2022, would be a likely source of inspiration.
An additional expansion pad exists in the space behind the Superhero Tryouts facade. This is an awkwardly-shaped expansion pad, one which is narrow and long, spanning the roadway frontage behind the Avengers: Infinity Gauntlet show building and the DisneySky JetRail route.
There are a few ways to activate this space. It is a good location for a future Marvel E-ticket, most likely a roller coaster (or similar thrill ride). The long straightaway shape lends itself well to a launch track. The rotating car system which Imagineering has developed for Epcot’s Cosmic Rewind would work well here, as would the motorcycles of TRON: LightCycle Power Run. Since the square footage is so limited, ride designers would need to get creative with their use of vertical space. (Doubling up and using the corner “Ant-Man” pad could help with spatial needs.)
While oh so many Marvel concepts lend themselves to this ride type - from Epcot’s Guardians of the Galaxy, to Black Widow, to Black Panther, to Captain Marvel - DisneySky’s design team has always felt Fantastic Four to be the best fit for the park’s themes. Reed Richards and his family are scientific explorers, which perfectly follows DisneySky’s story of technological exploration into new horizons. Heck, the illustrated park map already includes Fantastic Four details here! And since Marvel just recently made a future Fantastic Four feature film official, we hold out hope for an eventual adventure into the Negative Zone!
Alternatively, this pad could also serve as an in-park hotel - something which DisneySky lacks. This too would carry a Marvel theme, done with the same exclusivity and immersion as Walt Disney World’s Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser. Admittedly, this remains a vague idea. And while a hotel might appeal to Disney’s moneymen, it does nothing to provide an attraction anchor for a section of the park which desperately needs one.
Northwestern Pad (New Land)
Lastly, the largest remaining expansion pad in DisneySky is an area in the northwestern corner between Avengers Airspace and Runway One.
On opening day, this is backstage space. The DisneySky JetRail passes through; much like Universal Studios’ Hogwarts Express, on-ride screens keep riders from seeing backstage facilities. The nearby corner of Katella Ave. and Harbor Blvd. remains, at present, a complex of third party properties such as a Walgreens, a strip mall, and a Hyatt House. If Disney is unable to purchase this adjacent land, then this final expansion pad can simply be space for one more Avengers Airspace attraction. However, if Disney can obtain the acreage, then there is room enough here (just barely) for DisneySky’s eighth and final complete land!
Several Disney intellectual properties could potentially anchor this new land, as they are futuristic (fitting the park’s chronological organization) and they strongly feature flight. Some of these properties include:
However, for various reasons (redundancy, repetition), we are more interested in developing an original concept for this space...one which, to satisfy corporate Disney mandates, is capable of limited IP infusion, but isn’t dependent upon it.
That concept is Solar City.
(Tomorrow)
