News Guardians of the Galaxy Cosmic Rewind attraction confirmed for Epcot

Andrew C

Andrew C

You know what's funny?
mandstaft said:
I can almost 100% bet the decision to add Guardians in this form went something like this:

Statisticians - “EPCOT needs an attendance boost.”
Public opinion poll - “ I think it needs a coaster”
Suits- “We’ve got to get Marvel in our Florida parks somehow.”
Suits - “What property can we use?”
Attorneys - “Guardians of the Galaxy”
Suits to Imagineers- “Build it as cheaply as possible.”
Click to expand...

100%? Hyperbole?
 
MickeyMinnieMom

MickeyMinnieMom

Well-Known Member
mandstaft said:
I can almost 100% bet the decision to add Guardians in this form went something like this:

Statisticians - “EPCOT needs an attendance boost.”
Public opinion poll - “ I think it needs a coaster”
Suits- “We’ve got to get Marvel in our Florida parks somehow.”
Suits - “What property can we use?”
Attorneys - “Guardians of the Galaxy”
Suits to Imagineers- “Build it as cheaply as possible.”
Click to expand...
Funny... this seems like an attempt to be pejorative, but except for the last item, it sounds an awful lot like sound business decision-making (paying attention to attendance numbers, responding to public feedback, looking to incorporate a popular franchise in WDW — presumably a fan-pleaser, identifying a way they can accomplish that).

And replace “cheaply” with “efficiently” or “within budget” or something similar, and the whole thing seems pretty reasonable.
 
GoofGoof

GoofGoof

Premium Member
mandstaft said:
I can almost 100% bet the decision to add Guardians in this form went something like this:

Statisticians - “EPCOT needs an attendance boost.”
Public opinion poll - “ I think it needs a coaster”
Suits- “We’ve got to get Marvel in our Florida parks somehow.”
Suits - “What property can we use?”
Attorneys - “Guardians of the Galaxy”
Suits to Imagineers- “Build it as cheaply as possible.”
Click to expand...
Wouldn’t as cheaply as possible have been Guardians of the Tower of Terror? Is this supposed to be a low budget project? I can’t imagine this thing has a small price tag. Seems like there would have been dozens of ways to get GoTG into a WDW park much cheaper than this. Look no further than Incredibles at DHS.
 
yensidtlaw1969

yensidtlaw1969

Well-Known Member
mandstaft said:
I can almost 100% bet the decision to add Guardians in this form went something like this:

Statisticians - “EPCOT needs an attendance boost.”
Public opinion poll - “ I think it needs a coaster”
Suits- “We’ve got to get Marvel in our Florida parks somehow.”
Suits - “What property can we use?”
Attorneys - “Guardians of the Galaxy”
Suits to Imagineers- “Build it as cheaply as possible.”
Click to expand...
What I don't get about this project (well, one of the things) is that this ride is purportedly costing somewhere in the ballpark of 300 Million dollars.

Contrast that with something like Expedition: Everest, which cost $100 Million:

For that money, they built a near-3 minute long high-speed indoor/outdoor roller coaster, with track switches and backwards section, a massive, intricate mountain exterior, a deeply themed and densely propped village queue, an enormous Yeti animatronic (which has not worked in a decade, but that didn't make it any cheaper to build), and multiple trips to Nepal for the design team.

Meanwhile Guardians is repurposing an old building for its queue, built a boxy warehouse to house its high-speed indoor coaster, has coaster cars that can spin to redirect themselves on the track, and . . . ???

The ride system I'm sure is costing a nice chunk of change, but what on earth is going to be happening inside that building that brings that cost to a number 3 times Everest? You'd think that even if you spent, say, 100 million on the inside and 100 million on the outside (which is ridiculous) that those numbers would buy you a tremendously stellar attraction on every level, AND there'd still be 100 million left over from what they're actually spending.

We KNOW they didn't spend any meat-eating portion of 300 mil on the outside of the building. And I'm sure it cost money to gut Energy, but that has to have been cheaper than what it would have cost to start fresh or they wouldn't have taken over the building. So, where is all this money going? Are the show scenes just going to be unstoppably incredible? The insiders here haven't necessarily intoned that . . . Is the ride system prohibitively expensive? Is the queue literally going to take you to outer space? The inside of this ride is still a pretty big mystery, and it becomes even more of a nail-biter when you look at the money they're throwing at it.

I wonder when we'll hear more about what's going on inside. Disney's been surprisingly quiet about this one.
 
GoofGoof

GoofGoof

Premium Member
yensidtlaw1969 said:
What I don't get about this project (well, one of the things) is that this ride is purportedly costing somewhere in the ballpark of 300 Million dollars.

Contrast that with something like Expedition: Everest, which cost $100 Million:

For that money, they built a near-3 minute long high-speed indoor/outdoor roller coaster, with track switches and backwards section, a massive, intricate mountain exterior, a deeply themed and densely propped village queue, an enormous Yeti animatronic (which has not worked in a decade, but that didn't make it any cheaper to build), and multiple trips to Nepal for the design team.

Meanwhile Guardians is repurposing an old building for its queue, built a boxy warehouse to house its high-speed indoor coaster, has coaster cars that can spin to redirect themselves on the track, and . . . ???

The ride system I'm sure is costing a nice chunk of change, but what on earth is going to be happening inside that building that brings that cost to a number 3 times Everest? You'd think that even if you spent, say, 100 million on the inside and 100 million on the outside (which is ridiculous) that those numbers would buy you a tremendously stellar attraction on every level, AND there'd still be 100 million left over from what they're actually spending.

We KNOW they didn't spend any meat-eating portion of 300 mil on the outside of the building. And I'm sure it cost money to gut Energy, but that has to have been cheaper than what it would have cost to start fresh or they wouldn't have taken over the building. So, where is all this money going? Are the show scenes just going to be unstoppably incredible? The insiders here haven't necessarily intoned that . . . Is the ride system prohibitively expensive? Is the queue literally going to take you to outer space? The inside of this ride is still a pretty big mystery, and it becomes even more of a nail-biter when you look at the money they're throwing at it.

I wonder when we'll hear more about what's going on inside. Disney's been surprisingly quiet about this one.
Click to expand...
Isn’t $300M more than Radiator Springs Racers cost? With all that rockwork plus extensive indoor show scenes. I would say some of the increase between EE and now is just inflation of construction costs, but Carsland is pretty new. Something doesn’t add up on the numbers.
 
yensidtlaw1969

yensidtlaw1969

Well-Known Member
GoofGoof said:
Isn’t $300M more than Radiator Springs Racers cost? With all that rockwork plus extensive indoor show scenes. I would say some of the increase between EE and now is just inflation of construction costs, but Carsland is pretty new. Something doesn’t add up on the numbers.
Click to expand...
I agree, that's why I'm so curious. I remember several reports from Martin about how the numbers on this attraction just kept ballooning.

Radiator Springs Racers reportedly cost in the realm of $200M, but I recall hearing that they reported less than it actually cost. I also wonder if that's one of those weird cases where the cost of the rockwork is attributed to the budget of the land and not the attraction itself, or something like that.

This is to say, your assessment seems right - you would think with all the animatronics, the rockwork, the ride vehicles, that Radiator Springs Racers should easily cost more than something like Guardians. The interiors would have to be completely next level in unprecedented ways to explain this sort of expense. Inflation doesn't work fast enough to make sense of this ride costing as much as 3 Everests.
 
GoofGoof

GoofGoof

Premium Member
yensidtlaw1969 said:
I agree, that's why I'm so curious. I remember several reports from Martin about how the numbers on this attraction just kept ballooning.

Radiator Springs Racers reportedly cost in the realm of $200M, but I recall hearing that they reported less than it actually cost. I also wonder if that's one of those weird cases where the cost of the rockwork is attributed to the budget of the land and not the attraction itself, or something like that.

This is to say, your assessment seems right - you would think with all the animatronics, the rockwork, the ride vehicles, that Radiator Springs Racers should easily cost more than something like Guardians. The interiors would have to be completely next level in unprecedented ways to explain this sort of expense. Inflation doesn't work fast enough to make sense of this ride costing as much as 3 Everests.
Click to expand...
Yeah, definitely not 3 times but it seems like everything has gone up dramatically in cost for big construction projects. Maybe closer to 50-100% increase due to time. Not 300% the cost.
 
RSoxNo1

RSoxNo1

Well-Known Member
Would we as fans have accepted a Mission: SPACE update that included Guardians of the Galaxy?

As for the actual attraction, those saying it's cheap apparently didn't see @marni1971 suggesting a budget of around $400 million. I'd also ask Martin if his quote/hint from June still holds true...

RSoxNo1 said:
A Xandarian aesthetic could fit, there is a futuristic look in those scenes.
marni1971 said:
That it could.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Mike S

Mike S

Well-Known Member
trainplane3 said:
That's the hilarious part. It's taking 4 years to build this thing. Meanwhile up the road, they tore down two coasters (or count them as one) and are building a thematically fitting ride featuring a dual drop setup, changing directions, and AA show scenes. In half the time it's taking to build this. I'm hoping this feels like a 4 year project when it opens.

Speaking of it, @marni1971, do you think the HP ride is going to live up to the hype (from what you heard)?
Click to expand...
Then building another huge coaster in Jurassic Park not quite as themed.

You win some you lose some.
 
lazyboy97o

lazyboy97o

Well-Known Member
GoofGoof said:
Wouldn’t as cheaply as possible have been Guardians of the Tower of Terror? Is this supposed to be a low budget project? I can’t imagine this thing has a small price tag. Seems like there would have been dozens of ways to get GoTG into a WDW park much cheaper than this. Look no further than Incredibles at DHS.
Click to expand...
There really isn’t anything contradictory about overall spending a huge sum of money while completely cheating out on certain areas.

yensidtlaw1969 said:
What I don't get about this project (well, one of the things) is that this ride is purportedly costing somewhere in the ballpark of 300 Million dollars.

Contrast that with something like Expedition: Everest, which cost $100 Million:

For that money, they built a near-3 minute long high-speed indoor/outdoor roller coaster, with track switches and backwards section, a massive, intricate mountain exterior, a deeply themed and densely propped village queue, an enormous Yeti animatronic (which has not worked in a decade, but that didn't make it any cheaper to build), and multiple trips to Nepal for the design team.

Meanwhile Guardians is repurposing an old building for its queue, built a boxy warehouse to house its high-speed indoor coaster, has coaster cars that can spin to redirect themselves on the track, and . . . ???

The ride system I'm sure is costing a nice chunk of change, but what on earth is going to be happening inside that building that brings that cost to a number 3 times Everest? You'd think that even if you spent, say, 100 million on the inside and 100 million on the outside (which is ridiculous) that those numbers would buy you a tremendously stellar attraction on every level, AND there'd still be 100 million left over from what they're actually spending.

We KNOW they didn't spend any meat-eating portion of 300 mil on the outside of the building. And I'm sure it cost money to gut Energy, but that has to have been cheaper than what it would have cost to start fresh or they wouldn't have taken over the building. So, where is all this money going? Are the show scenes just going to be unstoppably incredible? The insiders here haven't necessarily intoned that . . . Is the ride system prohibitively expensive? Is the queue literally going to take you to outer space? The inside of this ride is still a pretty big mystery, and it becomes even more of a nail-biter when you look at the money they're throwing at it.

I wonder when we'll hear more about what's going on inside. Disney's been surprisingly quiet about this one.
Click to expand...
These days Expedition Everest money gets you Pixar Pier. That isn’t a joke or hyperbole. Pixar Pier really cost a similar amount.
 

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