In an era of screens, special effects, and projection mapping, there may still be nothing more sensational for theme park fans than an encounter with a good, old-fashioned animatronic. Since the technology’s debut in 1963, Audio-Animatronics have become industry-standard storytelling tools, bringing to life everything from pirates to princesses; dinosaurs to dragons. That’s why our must-read Countdown: 25 Best Animatronics on Earth feature is one of the most-read Extras here at Park Lore, celebrating the most astounding animatronic encounters on E-Ticket attractions the world over.
But for those who prefer to keep their feet on the ground, a number of well-known animatronic figures are scattered across theme park paths, simply there to expand the worlds of “yesterday, tomorrow, and fantasy” and present one-of-a-kind encounters outside of the parks’ rides and attractions.
Stories in the Extra Features and Special Features collections of Park Lore are all about connections – they’re the threads that interlace between the Lost Legends, Declassified Disasters, Modern Marvels, and Possibilitylands you’ll find in our Main Collections. In other words, these features are for people who really want to dig deep.
This article and hundreds more are available for Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members who help support this ad-free, clickbait-free, quality-over-quantity collection with a monthly membership. Park Lore Members can access more than a hundred Member-exclusive articles, unlock rare concept art and construction photos in every story, stream audio across the site, tune into podcast exclusives, and receive an annual member card and merch in the mail!
If you choose to join Park Lore’s community of Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members, you’ll instantly unlock this story (and of course, a lot more). You can learn more about joining and supporting Park Lore (and browse all the available Extras and Special Features) in the “Memberships & Perks” menu above. If you can’t afford a Pass, please contact us; we’ll make some magic happen.
Do you love to wait in line? If so, you’ve come to the right place.
Whether you know it or not, there’s one number that will make or break your day at any Disney Park: capacity. Tens of thousands of people visit each Disney Park, every day… and at some point, it will feel like most of them are in line ahead of you. That’s when capacity matters most. That’s when you’ll want to be in line for a Disney attraction with OUTRAGEOUSLY high capacity – “people-eaters” that can handle massive crowds with ease. Now, let’s take a look at the other side of the coin…
Stories in the Extra Features and Special Features collections of Park Lore are all about connections – they’re the threads that interlace between the Lost Legends, Declassified Disasters, Modern Marvels, and Possibilitylands you’ll find in our Main Collections. In other words, these features are for people who really want to dig deep.
This article and hundreds more are available for Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members who help support this ad-free, clickbait-free, quality-over-quantity collection with a monthly membership. Park Lore Members can access more than a hundred Member-exclusive articles, unlock rare concept art and construction photos in every story, stream audio across the site, tune into podcast exclusives, and receive an annual member card and merch in the mail!
If you choose to join Park Lore’s community of Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members, you’ll instantly unlock this story (and of course, a lot more). You can learn more about joining and supporting Park Lore (and browse all the available Extras and Special Features) in the “Memberships & Perks” menu above. If you can’t afford a Pass, please contact us; we’ll make some magic happen.
If you think cloning is a divisive topic in the fields of genetics and biology, you haven’t broached the subject with theme park fans! In fact, what theme park enthusiasts call “cloning” has a long and storied past with Disney Parks, at least dating back to the design of Magic Kingdom. There, many of Disneyland’s classics were merely “copied and pasted,” albeit in entirely new contexts and often with the kinds of minor (and sometimes major) changes dictated by hindsight and budgets.
Today, cloning is a touchy subject because – by and large – Imagineering fans are torn between two extremes. In short, everyone wants “their” resort to keep its coolest rides exclusive, but to get the coolest rides from every other resort! It’s why Disneyland fans bristle at the thought of Cars Land being “soullessly copied” to Florida, but relish in recieving Runaway Railway; why Disney World loyalists would sooner die than see Pandora plopped down in California, but really, really want Indiana Jones Adventure.
Image: Disney
For today’s Imagineers, “cloning” takes many forms. Often, it involves multiple parks sharing research and development costs to set functionally-identical rides down into several resorts at once. Even then, by the way, they may still be presented very differently, attuned to their location in each park. (Look at Toy Story Mania, STAR TOURS, Web-Slingers: A Spider-Man Adventure, and Little Mermaid dark rides.)
Sometimes, cloning is kicked off when a ride is a surprise hit, spreading one-by-one to other resorts who want a piece of the pie. (See, Big Thunder Mountain, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, Soarin’, or Frozen Ever After).
Image: Disney
Adding to the confusion, sometimes rides that are clones aren’t really clones at all (like how almost every Disneyland-style park has a Buzz Lightyear dark ride and a Winnie the Pooh dark ride, but none are actually identical to each other).
And even when attractions are “cloned,” they’re very rarely clones at all (though maybe it’s a little too nuanced to point out how Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge was painted entirely differently in Orlando to compensate for Floridian sun.)
In other words, all “cloning” is not equal. But one of the strangest “clone” relationships you’ll find in Disney Parks are clones that most guests – even those who’ve ridden both – would never think are duplicates. Below are six pairs of attractions that are practically identical on the inside but so different on the outside, you may not even notice it. Though these rides technically are (more or less) bolt-for-bolt duplicates of one another, their dressings make these clones disguised in plain sight…
Stories in the Extra Features and Special Features collections of Park Lore are all about connections – they’re the threads that interlace between the Lost Legends, Declassified Disasters, Modern Marvels, and Possibilitylands you’ll find in our Main Collections. In other words, these features are for people who really want to dig deep.
This article and hundreds more are available for Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members who help support this ad-free, clickbait-free, quality-over-quantity collection with a monthly membership. Park Lore Members can access more than a hundred Member-exclusive articles, unlock rare concept art and construction photos in every story, stream audio across the site, tune into podcast exclusives, and receive an annual member card and merch in the mail!
If you choose to join Park Lore’s community of Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members, you’ll instantly unlock this story (and of course, a lot more). You can learn more about joining and supporting Park Lore (and browse all the available Extras and Special Features) in the “Memberships & Perks” menu above. If you can’t afford a Pass, please contact us; we’ll make some magic happen.
There’s something unusual about the jagged, snow-capped peak that lords over Anandapur… As train after train of travelers ascend into the heights of the Himalayas, a distant roar echoes among the windchimes. It must be the wind… and yet, signs throughout the village warn of something spectacular said to be hidden away in the snow… an ancient guardian fiercely protecting the sacred summit… Are you brave enough to tackle one of Disney’s most thrilling rides ever?
Our Modern Marvels series is growing, with each entry dedicated to telling the complete behind-the-scenes story of some of the industry’s most spectacular attractions. We’ve watched a monkey, music, and magic come to life on the unbelievable Mystic Manor, faced the fury of an ancient curse on Revenge of the Mummy, gotten the “scoop” on The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man, toured the halls of Disneyland Paris’ one-of-a-kind Phantom Manor, trekked through one of Disney’s best rides ever, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and so many more.
Image: Disney
Brought to life through astounding storytelling, unbelievable sets, innovative technologies, and one (record-)breaking Audio-Animatronics figure, Expedition Everest: Legend of the Forbidden Mountain joins our Modern Marvels library, and today we’ll ascend into the mysteries of Everest, look back on the making of Disney’s Animal Kingdom and its promise of “imagined” creatures, go for a wild ride through the legend of the Forbidden Mountain, and take a peek behind the legendary mists… And today, our story begins with a little evidence…
In more than 60 years of Disney Parks history, the only thing to stay the same has been change. From the blacklight cut-out classics of the ’50s to the epic and cinematic dark rides of the ’60s; the ’70s thrill rides to the “ride the movies” favorites of the ’80s and ’90s. Today, it’s IP that powers…
Stories in the Extra Features and Special Features collections of Park Lore are all about connections – they’re the threads that interlace between the Lost Legends, Declassified Disasters, Modern Marvels, and Possibilitylands you’ll find in our Main Collections. In other words, these features are for people who really want to dig deep.
This article and hundreds more are available for Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members who help support this ad-free, clickbait-free, quality-over-quantity collection with a monthly membership. Park Lore Members can access more than a hundred Member-exclusive articles, unlock rare concept art and construction photos in every story, stream audio across the site, tune into podcast exclusives, and receive an annual member card and merch in the mail!
If you choose to join Park Lore’s community of Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members, you’ll instantly unlock this story (and of course, a lot more). You can learn more about joining and supporting Park Lore (and browse all the available Extras and Special Features) in the “Memberships & Perks” menu above. If you can’t afford a Pass, please contact us; we’ll make some magic happen.
If you’re a big theme park fan, chances are that you’ve found yourself in more than a few messes in your day… To name just a few, perhaps you’ve had your journey through the streets of New York co-opted by supervillains, ruined a run-of-the-mill temple tour by looking into a lost god’s cursed eyes, stumbled upon an…
Stories in the Extra Features and Special Features collections of Park Lore are all about connections – they’re the threads that interlace between the Lost Legends, Declassified Disasters, Modern Marvels, and Possibilitylands you’ll find in our Main Collections. In other words, these features are for people who really want to dig deep.
This article and hundreds more are available for Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members who help support this ad-free, clickbait-free, quality-over-quantity collection with a monthly membership. Park Lore Members can access more than a hundred Member-exclusive articles, unlock rare concept art and construction photos in every story, stream audio across the site, tune into podcast exclusives, and receive an annual member card and merch in the mail!
If you choose to join Park Lore’s community of Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum Members, you’ll instantly unlock this story (and of course, a lot more). You can learn more about joining and supporting Park Lore (and browse all the available Extras and Special Features) in the “Memberships & Perks” menu above. If you can’t afford a Pass, please contact us; we’ll make some magic happen.
UNDER REFURBISHMENT! You know I love to keep things fresh around here, and as a result, this feature is currently under construction! As I finish up edits over the next few days, you may encounter outdated information, repeated or disjointed sections, or “past perspectives” that refer to current events in the future tense. If you don’t mind sifting through some rough edges, I think you’ll still enjoy it… and check back soon for a fully refurbished story!
If you ask Universal Orlando, the 2019 opening of Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure at Universal’s Islands of Adventure represents not just a reset (ending Universal’s long-time dependence on screens and simulators), but the dawn of a new era: the age of the “story coaster.” Is the new Wizarding World E-Ticket the first? Well…
If you were to ask his friends and family what Walt Disney was, you might get any number of answers: an animator; an artist; a dreamer; an optimist; a futurist… But that’s not all…
According to the fantastic Eat Like Walt by Marcy Carriker Smothers, Walt was also a restauranteur – a man experimenting right at the height of mid-century middle class American dining, introducing the idea that food and fun could go together; that food was full of color and fantasy; that food could be an integral part of the story of each of Disneyland’s themed areas.
Image: Disney
However, there was one area where even Walt wasn’t willing to mess around: coffee. As the story goes, Walt decreed back in 1955 that Disneyland would always offer a cup of coffee for ten-cents and not a penny more. And in fact, coffee in the park did cost only a dime until Walt’s death in 1966. Those days, of course, are long gone…
Back in the first half of the 20th century, the business of entertainment was quite a bit different. Back then, mere “amusement” was enough to draw people to leisure gardens, carnivals and traveling fairs, seaside boardwalks speckled with thrill rides, and rudimentary roller coaster parks. But when Disneyland opened in 1955, entertainment changed.
After being swept up into its “worlds of yesterday, tomorrow, and fantasy” – immersive, cinematic lands built not by carnies, but by filmmakers – guests began to have one simple, timeless, reverberating request: “take me somewhere.” And in the decades since, designers have chased that very idea, looking for increasingly elaborate ways to make guests feel as if they’ve become part of another world, from Peter Pan’s Flight to Pirates of the Caribbean; Haunted Mansion to Indiana Jones Adventure…
But there’s only one kind of attraction that can take guests somewhere without really going anywhere at all: simulators. Today, a growing chorus of critics say that Disney and its contemporaries may rely too much on the transportational power of these increasingly-elaborate attractions, and in an age where guests are increasingly surrounded in screens at home, legitimate questions must be raised: is it time to sideline the simulator? Can physical sets ever make a comeback in the digital age? Or has the reign of these technological giants just begun? Let’s start at the almost-beginning…
Stories in the Extra Features and Special Features collections of Park Lore are all about connections – they’re the threads that interlace between the Lost Legends, Declassified Disasters, Modern Marvels, and Possibilitylands you’ll find in our Main Collections. In other words, these features are for people who really want to dig deep.
This article and hundreds more are available for Gold and Platinum Members who help support this ad-free, clickbait-free, quality-over-quantity collection with a monthly membership. Park Lore Members can access more than a hundred Member-exclusive articles, unlock rare concept art and construction photos in every story, stream audio across the site, tune into podcast exclusives, and receive an annual member card and merch in the mail!
If you choose to join Park Lore’s community of Gold and Platinum Members, you’ll instantly unlock this story (and of course, a lot more). You can learn more about joining and supporting Park Lore (and browse all the available Extras and Special Features) in the “Memberships & Perks” menu above. If you can’t afford a Pass, please contact us; we’ll make some magic happen.
Year after year, it seems that more and more classic attractions and beloved fan-favorite rides enter our Lost Legends collection, replaced by hotter, fresher, and newer stories. In fact, fans have gotten used to saying goodbye to rides.
But throughout the history of Disney and Universal’s theme parks, there have also been rare times when entire themed lands disappear off the map – literally. Today, we’re collecting a list of twelve lost lands you may remember. In fact, you may have even stepped foot in these axed areas! Some of these replacements may be obvious improvements… Others may make you wish for a time machine to experience the classics of yesteryear one more time.
