Universal Studios Florida Archives - Page 4 of 5

June 3, 2020February 21, 2023

T2 3-D: Behind-the-Screens of Universal’s Larger-Than-Life Battle Across Time

Central Florida has been a battleground since 1990. That’s when Universal Studios Florida opened, officially setting Walt Disney World and Universal Orlando on a back-and-forth battle to attract visitors to their respective parks. You might agree that Disney’s cornered the market on fairytales and fantasy; nighttime spectaculars; meet-and-greets; and certainly, family dark rides.

But you won’t find anyone who can do larger-than-life special effects spectacles quite like Universal, and for years, their parks hosted perhaps the most revolutionary, massive, all-encompassing attraction ever. T2 3-D: Battle Across Time was a genuine Hollywood treasure… a $60 million mini-sequel to a box-office shattering film franchise that defined the ‘80s and ‘90s.

Of course, if it’s a year post-2000, it’s probably a year that at least one legendary Universal attraction has bit the dust. And like so many of Universal’s classics, T2 3-D is now officially gone, with its valuable real estate set aside for something “new, now, and next.” Today, we’ll dive into the behind-the-scenes making of this James Cameron-helmed, star-studded extravaganza, relive the experience first-hand, and predict what’s to come at Universal Parks and Resorts. Many of our Lost Legends entries begin years before the attraction opens, but today’s feature instead starts decades after…

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May 30, 2020February 21, 2023

Nickelodeon Studios: Universal’s Lost “Slime” Machine Back to ’90s Nostalgia

Want to know if you’re part of the “Nickelodeon Generation”? Try these quotes on for size: “Welcome to Good Burger, home of the Good Burger, can I take your order?” “Move it, Football Head!” “A baby’s gotta do what a baby’s gotta do!” “Come and let’s play together in the bright sunny weather; let’s all go to Gullah Gullah Island!” “Bring in the dancin’ lobsters!”

“N-n-nick-nick, n-nick-nick-nick, Nick-o-lo-de-oooon.”

If you ever dreamed of winning a new Huffy sports bike on Double Dare; slaved over what your talent might be on Figure It Out; imagined piecing together the Silver Monkey on Legends of the Hidden Temple; or spent your after-school hours tuned into Slime Time Live daydreaming about being gakked, then you’ve come to the right place.

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May 27, 2020August 7, 2021

ICONS: The 12 Centerpiece Structures of Disney and Universal Parks

They’re iconic for a reason. They inspire breathless wonder. They’re orienting navigational centers. They’re feats of engineering. Though they come in all shapes and sizes, park icons all have one thing in common: they come to represent a park’s stories, settings, and style in our hearts and minds. The road to icon status isn’t always easy, as you might have read in our complementary list of Demoted and Demolished Lost Disney Parks icons.

Below, we’ve collected eleven of the most memorable, photogenic, and widely recognized theme park icons on Earth (in order of their introduction). Which have you seen? Which strike the greatest emotional and adventurous chord in you? Tell us in the comments.

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.

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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.

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May 27, 2020May 10, 2023

Living Legends – The Surprising Number of “Opening Day Originals” Left at Each Disney Park

Here at Park Lore, we’re always looking to see our favorite theme parks in new ways. That’s why we reported (and continuously update) a number of sometimes-surprising features that just may have you seeing Disney and Universal parks differently…

For Imagineering afficianados, we’ve broken down Disney and Universal parks by the numbers in two must-read features that are downright surprising: we ranked Disneyland, Disney World, and Universal Orlando’s parks by the number of certifiable “E-Ticket” anchor attractions each park offers (which do you think has the most? The least?) and, even more shockingly, broke it down to the sheer number of rides at each park… with some unexpected results…!

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May 27, 2020July 23, 2023

16 ‘Easter Eggs’ of Closed Classics Hidden in the Rides that Replaced Them

As long-time Disney and Universal fans know all too well, even the most beloved rides don’t last forever. In fact, Imagineering aficionados may have already scoured our collection of Lost Legends – the definitive, full stories of forgotten fan favorites and closed classics from around the globe – or taken a look at our Then & Now collection of hand-drawn, before-and-after layouts as rides are swapped out.

Those stories are evidence that, time and time again, sometimes attractions simply disappear. … Or do they? Over their decades of experience removing rides that guests have come to know and love, designers have gotten pretty good at leaving behind hints.

Today, we’ll take a look at some of our favorite hidden “Easter egg” hints of forgotten rides scattered around Disney and Universal Parks inside the rides that replaced them… These clever remnants are like mini-memorials to the beloved rides of yesteryear… if you know where to look.

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May 27, 2020August 31, 2021

Rewind Awards: The One, Single, Best Theme Park Attraction From Each Decade (So Far)

The best theme park attraction of all time. What would it take to earn the title?

In its more-than-six-decade history dating to Disneyland’s 1955 opening, the modern art of Imagineering has developed in fits and starts, yielding hundreds and hundreds of noteworthy and nostalgic rides across modern theme parks. For that reason, we won’t even dare attempt to pit Walt’s golden age classics against today’s multimedia E-Tickets, or to foolishly compare incomparable experiences.

But it did get us to thinking… In those eras of growth and transformation in the industry, which ride is the best representative of every decade from the 1950s to the 2020s? For each, what’s the single most iconic, memorable, and beloved attraction that also definitively speaks to the state of themed design? Today, we’ll walk down the timeline from the 1950s through today. For each decade, we’ll list our own personal nominees before bestowing the decade’s “best attraction” award.

Agree? Disagree? What’d we miss? Let us know in the comments below if you think we got these Rewind Awards right on or not… And as you’ll see, many contenders for each decade happen to link to full, in-depth entries across our Lost Legends and Modern Marvels collections, so fall down the “rabbit hole” and explore these classic rides!

Do you love armchair Imagineering, in-depth storytelling, and seeing the theme parks we love differently? Park Lore is an ad-free, quality-over-quantity, one-person project centered on building a world-class collection of the interconnected stories of theme park attractions, design projects, and industry explorations.

This feature is one that’s usually locked in our Member Vault, where Park Lore patrons can find hand-drawn art, armchair Imagineering walkthroughs, and other in-depth Special Features, as well as quick-read, just-for-fun Extra Features. Thanks to supporting Members, this feature is temporarily unlocked as a preview!

But if you value my mission to provide clickbait-free, ad-free deep dives and new ways to see the parks, consider becoming a supporting Member of Park Lore for as little as $2 / month. That support is what keeps this unique themed entertainment storytelling project open, ad-free, and available to all. Thank you!

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May 25, 2020March 25, 2021

“In-Universe Eats”: Must-Try Menus to Eat Like You’re Part of the Story

Welcome back to our Imagineering Originals mini-series curated just for Park Lore Passholders… From original worlds to original souvenirs; original mythologies to original characters, this breezy look into the creativity of Imagineering has been a celebration of the ingenuity and IP Disney has designed in-house!

The last decade has seen an almost unimaginable shift in the scale and scope of theme park additions, prioritizing built-out, in-universe lands over mere E-Ticket rides. But along the way, the most unexpected, exciting (and for Disney and Universal, lucrative) development has been each of those land’s ways of fully placing guests into their stories and worlds through foods, drinks, and snacks – how to eat like an alien, dine like an adventurer, drink like a cartoon character, and more…

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May 25, 2020June 5, 2020

These 9 Lands Don’t Just Recreate Worlds Seen on Screen, They EXPAND Them…

From Hogsmeade to Radiator Springs, it’s no surprise to fans of Imagineering that the era of “living the movies” is alive and well. Today, it can sometimes feel that no project can get the greenlight at Disney or Universal unless backed by a tried-and-true blockbuster intellectual property; that everything we see in parks today is directly drawn from the screen.

But pulling places from the screen isn’t always as straightforward as you think… Sometimes, attraction designers need to expand on the worlds we’ve seen in movies by taking a physical place and adding to it for logistical or narrative reasons; other times, they need instead to contract, distilling massive and incalculable worlds into smaller, concrete, “real” places guests can inhabit and connect with. Either way, some of the most spectacular theme parks lands on Earth today take the essence of source materials and expand them with “original worlds” born of the minds of designers! Here are some of our favorites…

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May 23, 2020February 21, 2023

KONGFRONTATION: The Reigning King of Universal Studios’ Lost Classic Creature Feature Attractions

Imagine it: it’s been a long day at work. You come home, kick up your feet, and turn on the TV. But wait… your regularly scheduled programming has been interrupted by a blaring warning from the Emergency Broadcast System. Natural disaster? Severe weather? An act of war? No, no, and no. Would you believe that a raging 40-foot tall ape is rampaging through town leaving a trail of destruction in its wake? Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction, and this unimaginable scenario played out day after day in the streets of New York at Universal Studios Florida with you caught in the middle of the mayhem.

Every month, our library of Lost Legends grows as we ride through the complete stories of fabled, fan-favorite classics to preserve their tales before they’re lost forever. We’ve asked you to help us by reliving your memories, all in hopes of helping a new generation of theme park fans understand why these lost rides matter.

We recently chronicled the in-depth stories of two of Universal’s best rides ever in itheir own entries, Lost Legends: JAWS and Back to the Future: The Ride – both must-reads for industry fans. But today, we have an even bigger fish to fry. We’ll make our way through the ravaged remains of New York City and tackle the might of the king on KONGFRONTATION, the ride whose closure literally changed Universal Studios Florida forever. Today we’ll trace the tale that leads to that closure and ask you to share your thoughts on the “sequel” that replaced this awesome ‘90s classic.

And before we head off, remember that you can unlock rare concept art and audio streams in this story, access over 100 Extra Features, and recieve an annual Membership card and postcard art set in the mail by supporting this clickbait-free, in-depth, ad-free theme park storytelling site for as little as $2 / month! Become a Park Lore Member to join the story! Until then, let’s start at the beginning…

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May 23, 2020February 21, 2023

JAWS: The Lost Universal Legend That Scared a Generation Out of the Water

“Amity Island had everything. Clear skies. Gentle surf. Warm water. People flocked there every summer. It was the perfect feeding ground.”

When it comes to Lost Legends, we’ve tackled some giants before. From getting tangled up with a giant squid aboard 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea to escaping a rampaging T. rex on Jurassic Park: The Ride; surviving a bloodcurdling Alien Encounter to facing the rage of the gods aboard TOMB RAIDER.

But to take on the creature in today’s story, let’s just say we’re gonna need a bigger boat… Today, we’ll dive deep into the history of Universal Studios Florida’s JAWS, the sensationally terrifying ride that represented the best of Universal’s action, storytelling, and signature special effects; a twisted take on a Disney classic, this complex attraction lived multiple lives before sinking forever in favor of a magical replacement.

Let’s relive the astounding story of this headlining ride that outlived most of Universal’s classics by exploring its history, riding through its signature scenes, and seeing where it lives on today…

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