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Aside: Beastly Possibilities
I won’t belabor the point for long because countless tomes full of speculation and rumor-mongering (including one here) have been written on “the land that almost was” for Disney’s Animal Kingdom. By nature of reading this, you probably already know the story: what was meant to set Animal Kingdom apart is that it would feature (as is right in the park’s dedication) “animals real, ancient, and imagined.”
Early concept art shows what Imagineers had drafted up for the latter: a “Beastlie Kingdomme” divided into a dark and light half. Dragons, sea serpents, unicorns… Beastly Kingdom was envisioned as Animal Kingdom’s Fantasyland, getting us up close and personal to animals that never really existed, but are still universally known. Meant to be built in the southwest corner of the park, Beastly Kingdom would’ve been a major component of Animal Kingdom’s “Nahtazū” ethos… and certainly would’ve upped the park’s attraction count substantially.
Hints of the proposed expansion were famously sprinkled about – the park’s dedication, a “Unicorn” parking lot; a dragon head above the ticket booths; even a dragon in Animal Kingdom’s logo… Most famously, one of those little vignettes for guests aboard the original Discovery River Boats was an ominous roar and a plume of fire erupting from a jagged cave along the banks of the river… an odd landmark for Camp Minnie-Mickey, unless you knew that the hastily-constructed little area was really just a placeholder. (To be clear, Joe Rohde himself tweeted that Beastly Kingdom was written out long before it ever approached the funding stage, so it’s likely that us fans think it was much closer to earth moving than it really was.)
But “imagined” animals hold a powerful grip over us. Through legend, story, and song, we as humankind share stories of dragons, unicorns, sirens, sea monsters, and fairies because those stories tell us about ourselves. They’re creatures encountered as trials; creatures encountered as reward; creatures made not just real, but immortal, by our thinking about them. If in Animal Kingdom’s Africa animals are presented in the context of value, and in Asia in terms of cohabitation, then in a land of mythological creatures, they’re encountered in the contexts of storytelling…
“We don’t enter those woods lest we disturb the unicorns that rest there.” “We follow the fairies to discover our fate.” “Sail too far and the sea serpents will see to you.” Moreover, the power of that storytelling has a message that I think aligns well with Animal Kingdom’s: “There are things both fragile and frightening out there in the world we inhabit; things bigger, older, and more wondrous than us that must be considered…”
MYTHICA
Although “Beastly Kingdom” is as legendary in name as “Discovery Bay” or the “Western River Expedition,” I chose another name for my variation on the land. That’s partly because there’s a bit of a pattern here (Africa, Asia, America, Pandora, Mythica) and partly because – frankly – this is too many Kingdoms at this point. I don’t even think Animal Kingdom should be named Animal Kingdom if we’re being honest (I played with creating a new name and logo – Disney NatureRealm – but thought you’d come for with torches and pitchforks). But “Beastly Kingdom” being located inside “Animal Kingdom” seems like the kind of confusion that would leave guest services and marketing teams in a tailspin.
Placing my version of this concept in the expansion pad we’ve discussed also requires a different approach literally and figuratively. So let’s get into the first half. Following the river (and that new main pathway) leading north from Asia, we pass a new “weenie” that’s meant to draw people up along the river: a great, jagged rock arch made of volcanic slabs littered in the river, creating a sort of “tunnel” we must pass through – either via the River Ferry or on foot.
Through that rocky portal, we have passed into Mythica and found ourselves surrounded in a lush, verdant, otherworldly forest. The winding path passes alongside ancient petrified tree roots bursting up from the ground; even under a great arch of roots. Around the corner, their source comes into view: the giant, jagged, petrified tree stump that houses the GNARLWOOD GRILLE, a new table-service eatery with a patio overlooking the river, where its roots are feeding from the waterway. (Yes, I’m stealing this great concept back from Islands of Adventure.)
Finally, we come to the conceptually-iconic fork in the road, where the path splits – into a dark, lantern-lit forest and a sunlit, pastel glade. We’ll follow the path’s natural split to the right, to an arcing bridge that rises over the hitherto-unknown source of the Discovery River: a pool of bubbling fountains, pouring waterfalls into the river below.
Fantasia Gardens
The bridge deposits guests in the first half of the land – FANTASIA GARDENS. For this half, I envisioned an environment inspired by Rolly Crump’s kinetic, facade of “it’s a small world” in Disneyland. Almost a pop-up book of flat facades, pastel panels, hedge sculptures, and greenhouse-style enclosures (to help weatherproof this area for Florida).
The plaza guests step into would offer SATYR’S SPIN (a teacup-style ride, swirling around frantically beneath a glass dome. (The ride’s queue would be a similarly-enclosed greenhouse along the lagoon.) Across the way would be HALLOW VALE RESTAURANT (a nod to my from-scratch park, Disney’s Fantastic Worlds, for those of you who’ve been around a while!). I envision this as a table service eatery where guests eat in an enchanted glen – dining among the trees, with dangling moss, a bubbling spring, and a wraparound screen (a la Space 220) maintaining a perpetual twilight with occasional appearances by ice fairies who’d freeze the forest.
The backdrop of the plaza would be the “small world” style clocktower and pop-up book facade of the land’s dark ride – FANTASIA: VOYAGE OF THE HOURS. This musical boat ride would whisk guests through the beautiful storybook gardens from Fantasia’s “Dance of the Hours” segment – itself a comical take on the “La Gioconda” opera. As in the Fantasia segment, this boat ride would drift through a day of ballet – from ostrich dancers at dawn, to hippos at noon, elephants in the evening, and alligators at night – a comical, musical equivalent of “it’s a small world” for Animal Kingdom.
A second arcing bridge would carry us to an enchanted glen – the entrance to QUEST FOR THE UNCORN. Originally planned for Beastly Kingdom, this epic walkthrough attraction would orient a group of guests, then release them into an interconnected, sprawling, multi-segment hedge maze to locate ancient bronze statues of mythical beasts – a griffin, peryton, and hippocampus.
As guests proceed through the maze, each statue would awaken and – via Audio Animatronic – provide a hint to efficiently navigate the next sub-section of the labyrinth.
Ultimately, those with the determination to make it through all three segments would arrive at their goal: a great castle (still brought to life by “pop-up” panels and hedges) serving as the attraction’s conclusion: a reflective, ethereal encounter with a sleeping unicorn. Like Disneyland Paris’ iconic La Tanière du Dragon, this experience would reward guests’ effort with an emotionally-moving moment – a story to take home.
Finally, I wanted to use the elevated, shallow pool we’ve created as the spring from which the Discovery River flows as SWAN LAKE SKIMMERS – an LPS trackless “flat ride” like Tokyo DisneySea’s “Aquatopia.”
Guests would queue in a beautiful marble temple at the north end of the lagoon, then step aboard elegant, stylized Swan Boats that would depart for a wonderful aquatic “obstacle course” through the water, swirling and dancing in an interactive ballet as the boats spin, reverse, interact, rush through leaping fountains, dance around whirlpools, and more. A cooling, misty ride where “you might get wet,” I think this would be wonderfully refreshing and joyful. (The storage building for the vehicles is located next to the restaurant.)
With a two flat rides, a dark ride, a walkthrough, and a table service restaurant, we’ve experienced just half of Mythica; after all, the further you step into the light, the greater your shadow becomes. Fairies, unicorns, and dancing hippos don’t paint the entire picture of our relationship with creatures of myth. The broader bestiary of imagined creatures doesn’t just inspire joy, but also, respect. Mythical creatures can demonstrate the power of the natural world and our desire to make sense of its dangers…
Dragonscale Village
Looming across the bay from Fantasia Gardens is a very different region of Mythica – DRAGONSCALE VILLAGE. Here, we step into a cold, lantern-lit, cobblestone town square drawn from European myth and legend. Scorch marks through the center of town suggest that something large has flown through. Indeed, into the WYVERN’S ROOST INN quick service tavern and the attached SCORCHED LAMB PUB, barkeeps have their eyes turned skyward, twitching at every sound of wingbeats, or of great beasts landing on the thatched roofs…
A dry fountain in the town’s square – steaming as if its water has been evaporated and boiled away – borders the land’s animal offering: where goats and sheep (relocated from Rafiki’s Planet Watch) offer a hands-on petting zoo. Nearby, the ROOK’S ARMORY serves as a new counterpart to the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, transforming youngsters into valiant knights, mages, thieves, or summoners.
But naturally, all eyes are on the land’s anchor attraction: THE DRAGON’S TOWER – a gnarled fortress of stone and bone, rising up over the village. A genuine “weenie” for this part of the park, artwork suggests that guests might gather before the tower to gaze up at its churning waterfall, and that every so often, the eyes of a great dragon might illuminate from a cavern within, blasting out a plume of fire that would catch the waterfall on fire – a great show that you can imagine folks wanting to be around for.
Long considered the “lost” E-Ticket that Animal Kingdom was meant to have, various versions of Dragon’s Tower have been seen in concept art from various iterations of the land. Based on the artwork alone, this ride has ranged in concept from a suspended, swinging family coaster to a more intense, traditional coaster – but always ending with a climactic face-to-maw encounter with a giant Animatronic dragon.
I sort of split the difference here, envisioning Dragon’s Tower as a thrilling launched coaster with guests seated in inverted trains dangling from the track – all the better to swoop over lava pools and to burst out of the tower and over the crowd below. That’s a maneuver I think is needed given that the ride’s name might imply it’s a drop tower, and the inverted seating might help communicate its intensity.
Finally, the land features MERLIN’S MAGICAL MENAGERIE, where Merlin himself has rolled into town with a collection of enchanted creatures we can encounter close up. I envisioned this as an adaptation of Universal’s long-extinct Triceratops Encounter (which, incidentally, I brought back in updated form in my build-out of Islands of Adventure), with Merlin’s apprentices inviting us to meet a real griffin, peryton, or hippocampus (the same creatures we encountered stylized versions of in the Unicorn maze) via full-scale, “living” Animatronics – again, imbuing us with the respect of these powerful creatures.
The attraction would then route guests into a CREATURE’S NEST retail space to adopt your own mythical creature – a “Build-a-Bear” or “Droid Depot” style experience where you select parts and watch them be sewn together in real time, even creating a brand new creature altogether. And finally, a “last stop” of the DISCOVERY RIVER FERRY brings us to the end of that line.
NEW! MYTHICA
RIDES
- Satyr’s Spin (teacup style spinning flat ride)
- Swan Lake Skimmers (LPS trackless aquatic obstacle course)
- Fantasia: Voyage of the Hours (musical boat ride)
- Dragon’s Tower (launched inverted thrill coaster)
ATTRACTIONS
- Quest for the Unicorn (interactive hedge maze walkthrough)
- Merlin’s Magical Menagerie (interactive animatronic encounters)
RESTAURANTS
- Gnarlwood Grille (TS)
- Hallow Vale Restaurant (TS)
- Wyvern’s Roost Inn (QS)
- Scorched Lamb Pum (Bar)
- Unicorn’s Keep (S)
My Mythica obviously sticks to the framework of the Beastly Kingdom concept pretty neatly, but I think there’s a reason: like the stories they inspire, these creatures lend themselves so well to day and night; water and fire; reward and trial. The bilaterally split land is beautiful in concept, hammering home that idea of storytelling and literature. It just works. Perhaps there were more stories we should’ve told here, but this is a meaty land when you see it in the context of the park!
By the way, if you’ll allow me to expand on the “elemental” alignment we talked about back in Discovery Island, I like the idea of the prevailing aura of these areas being leaves (Fantasia Gardens) and stone (Dragonscale Village). I realize those aren’t elements, but y’know… vibes.
From Mythica (the furthest point of the river), we could ride back to Discovery Island (near the park’s entrance), bringing this adventure to a close and demonstrating the usefulness of that restored intra-park transit system… But my Build-Out of Animal Kingdom features one more land, and I promise you, it’s probably not what you’re expecting…
Having recently watched Hoppers, one of the first things I thought coming out of it is how incredible a fit it is for Animal Kingdom! Unlike movies such as Zootopia, it really fits the themes of the park, with our connection with animals and nature being one of its main themes. I think a Hoppers show would be perfect in the Tree Of Life theater, much better than the awful Zootopia show that’s in the theater now. The story for the attraction can be set up so easily as well, as it could be about Mabel and the scientists she’s working with showcasing a new Hoppers program to guests that gets them up and close with the animals! Putting Hoppers here could even work for Disney as a brand builder, since the movie is looking to be a genuine box office success! It is insane how perfect Hoppers and Animal Kingdom fit together, it almost feel purposeful!
I just wanna say I love this Animal Kingdom build-out, especially the Gravity Falls area. Including it was a brilliant idea! I’m just bummed there’s a lack of extinct animals in your version of the park.
I totally agree! When I sketched out the first ideas that would evolve into this Build-Out more than a decade ago, I thought Pixar’s The Good Dinosaur (which wasn’t out yet) might be a good way to do that. That tells you how long these ideas sort of lingered before I had Park Lore to put them down on paper. In retrospect, even if The Good Dinosaur had been a success, putting it here would’ve done the thing we try to avoid with Animal Kingdom, which is assuming that just because a movie has animals, it’s about animals.
The other obvious problem is that Universal owns Jurassic Park and leverages it heavily in their parks right up the road. Jurassic Park brings dinosaurs to our world in a way that’s very smart and perfect for a theme park. Sure it was meant to be a sort of dystopian sci-fi story about the hubris of man, but ultimately the setting of a theme park filled with dinosaurs still lets us adore and revere them as animals. It works really well. It gives Universal de facto “ownership” over the T. rex, and the Velociraptor, and “dinosaurs getting loose.” And it puts Disney on its back foot. Sort of like if Universal decided they wanted to start a line of animated Princesses. Like, sure, I guess you can try… but you’re never, ever going to supplant the pop culture image of that genre that’s held by your competitor.
If Jurassic Park brings dinosaurs to our world, then the logical inverse is that we visit theirs. The “problem” there has always been “theme-park-ability” – like, but where are the restrooms? The restaurants? How do you sell retail in a world that exists 65 million years before humans? I think you could do it by embracing the Dino Institute frame story… Perhaps you enter the land through a Chronotech portal that bridges us back in time to a dino-reserve operated by the Dino Institute. That would give us our needed infrastructure – restroom pods, and a futurustic pop-up canteen for Dino Institute researchers, and the frame story we need to have “rides” and “laboratories.” The problem is that even though that’s the inverse of Jurassic Park, I’m not sure it would read much different. It would still fundamentally be a dinosaur theme park.
Which is why it’s so brilliant that Dinoland U.S.A. avoided the trope altogether and found another way to explore how we as humans adore and revere dinosaurs, you know? Animal Kingdom is ultimately a park about us. That’s why it was such a smart idea to have a Dinoland so uniquely about something grounded (the absurdity of giant reptiles once being the dominant life on Earth, and now being plush animals and pajama sets and cartoons)… So even if that was lost on a lot of people (which, don’t get me wrong, is ultimately the fault of storytellers whose theme was obviously not conveyed or not connected to audiences), it was such a good idea that it’s hard to decide how else Disney can “own” dinosaurs with Jurassic Park a few miles away at Universal.
Thanks for checking this out!
The original concept for The Good Dinosaur posited that the creatures never went extinct, and lived alongside humans in a more egalitarian society.
That could be an interesting approach to bring prehistoric creatures to the park.
It’s an interesting idea! My only “worry” about that is the “dinosaurs & humans coexisting” thing, specifically as it relates to Animal Kingdom. Joe Rohde has talked about how when you visit Animal Kingdom, you are in a story, but not a fantasy. Even Pandora uses the fantastic to examine the real, with messages about biodiversity, indigenous people, keystone species, etc. So while I think there’s a compelling case for The Good Dinosaur’s sort of multiversal setup of “What if the meteor didn’t hit?”, I think there’s also a delicacy in putting that sort of thing in a park people do associate with real information. A YouGov poll a decade ago found that more than 40% of Americans think dinosaurs and humans coexisted (and unfortunately I’d wager that number has increased since! 🙃). Does Disney have a moral obligation to use its pop culture powers to develop a scientifically literate society? Probably, no… but it’s still something that’s probably worth considering specifically in Animal Kingdom! haha.
Brilliant, but I really do think that prehistoric animals deserve some real representation in a park like Animal Kingdom, though I wouldn’t change anything about this fantastic build-out.
Is there nowhere you could ‘squeeze in’ an expansion land for some of the most beloved creatures of all-time?
These are all fantastic and so well-crafted! Any plans for an Epcot one? Excited to see what you would concoct up
Hi Matt! Thanks for checking this out! An EPCOT build-out is probably my most-requested on social media! I have avoided it because I don’t think an EPCOT build-out meshes with my style, which is basically an overhead map. The “pavilion” situation makes it hard to do EPCOT that way, because the physical buildings maybe wouldn’t change? So it would just be the existing park but labeled differently? I don’t know…
I have been quietly working on something else, which is a sort of new age, next generation, what-if-a-park-like-EPCOT-were-built-today concept… so keep an eye out for that! Until then, thank you so much for reading!
I love these arm-chair imagineering posts, but I have what might possibly be a dumb question: How do you make the custom maps you have here? And do you have any tips and tricks for making your own? I’ve always wanted to design my own theme park like this but I don’t really know where to start!
Not a dumb question at all. I hand-drawn these on an iPad using the Procreate program and an Apple Pencil. I usually start by drawing on top of the existing park. I then do a lot of work to make sure things are at least reasonably scaled by looking back and forth at existing parks or showbuildings and using a 1:1 scale. And of course, contextualizing all of that in new layouts and pathways and backstage access. None of it is scientific or real (this isn’t actually my day job and I don’t know what I’m doing!) but it’s fun and, again, at least “reasonable” in terms of access roads, cast infrastructure, etc. It takes weeks to make one, but you can see an example of the process in this video here! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qub3MDdxvao&t=1848s
Hey Brian, I have a suggestion. Can you please do another version of Animal Kingdom Armchair Imagineering, this time with a Lion King land and Dinosaur staying, and also an original park for Walt Disney World with lands based on Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, The Great Mouse Detective, Zootopia, Beauty and The Beast, Moana and Emperor’s New Groove / Atlantis The Lost Empire please?
Also, I love this idea you’ve done!!! It is brilliant!!!
Thanks for checking this out, and for these suggestions! For me, I wouldn’t probably come up with another version of Animal Kingdom for a few reasons. One is that I want to basically have one build-out of each park as my sort of definitive “version.” I just wouldn’t want to have two or three or four versions of each park. And I wouldn’t include a Lion King land in Animal Kingdom if I were given creative control because ultimately, Lion King has the same problem as Zootopia – it has animals, but it’s not about animals. It’s a parable for human experiences that’s no more about animals than Frozen would be if Anna and Elsa were designed as arctic foxes instead of humans. To my thinking, Lion King is used perfectly in the park as it is in Africa… as an excuse to celebrate African arts and storytelling. It becomes diegetic in that the people of Harambe are celebrating the story of the Lion King, which makes sense in the context of Animal Kingdom whereas a land of cartoon animals would not.
Your ideas for a new park sound really cool, and very specific! I did come up with a concept park I called Disney’s Fantastic Worlds you might enjoy. As for this specific arrangement of IP, I totally encourage you to sketch it out and see what you can come up with! Hope you do, and share it if you do!
I think if the pandora improvements, the Bugs land, and the riverboats/nighttime show happened, it would already be “complete” even before the fantasia gardens or other more blue sky stuff. Chester and Hester sought to “add capacity” but did so in a cheap way. Bugs land, if in right context, could be lower cost and add a ton of children’s capacity. Animal Kingdom doesn’t have a shortage of E tickets. It has a shortage of smaller, low-to-no wait experiences.
Can you next one be universal?
Amazing gravity falls but you should have added bill in the park
He’s there on the map, just like other creatures. 😉 He can visited in stone down a little discrete wooded trail.
I noticed that the rides for your buildout of Tropical America are the same as the rides you made for your build-out of Hollywood Studios. I think you should replace the ones in your build-out in Hollywood Studios with a Monsters, Inc. land instead.
Yep, you’re right! I designed that build-out of Hollywood Studios long before these changes to Animal Kingdom were greenlit, so it’s sort of wild that I got the mix of Indiana Jones and Encanto “right” – just at the wrong park. Haha! I think you’ll see me sweep back through that Hollywood Studios build-out eventually and do some reorganizing. I was never 100% happy with the flow that inserted an Incredibles land right between a 1930s Hollywood and a 1930s Walt Disney Studios… something seemed off about that flow, so maybe this is a chance to fix it.
Once again, you absolutely blew this out of the water! I love the Mythica, Gravity Falls, and Bugs Land combo, and the map is inspiring as always. A bit funny of a recurring joke though, is it just me or has every single buildout you’ve made (except HS) specifically include an Aquatopia-inspired ride, with the word “Skimmers” in it? Definitely enamored with the word lol
Additionally, aside from Ideal Buildout you might want to check out a few other amazing armchair Imagineering projects/blogs on the web for inspiration (if you haven’t already!) – this includes Imagineerland, DisneySky (Complete and Restored), and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice Season 8: Magic Journeys (one of many armchair Imagineering competitions). They’re all worth checking out!
I would recommend a Lion King land for Animal Kingdom. In my opinion, it really fits the theme
I think Lion King is present in Animal Kingdom in the best way it could be – drawing on its music that draws upon the “Circle of Life,” wrapped in a show that’s “decorated” with the artistry and culture of African artisans. Otherwise, I think the high bar to entry that “guards” Animal Kingdom would prevent Lion King from being included as a land or a dark ride.
Lion King is obviously a fantastic film, but I think it’s really not so different than Zootopia in that is has animals, but is not about animals. The characters could just as easily have been designed to look like humans, telling a “coming of age” story about a young boy who loses his family and is set loose in the world to find his way. The fact that its characters are stylized as lions adds a lot to the film, but it doesn’t actually make it have anything to do Animal Kingdom’s big idea – “the untradeable value of nature.” Joe Rohde’s thinking is that the park’s Africa is primarily concerned with resources – how the people of Harambe think industriously to make the most of what they have, and that they have decided to value the rhino over the horn. That’s big, deep stuff that’s dealing with human’s relationship with nature. Even though there are animals in it, The Lion King isn’t about that.
Thanks for checking this out!
As a huge theme park fan and a massive Gravity Falls fan, I adore the Gravity Falls land you made for the park! However, there are a few lore notes that I have to give about Strange Dimensions ride. Firstly, the strange creatures didn’t come from the portal. They were always in Gravity Falls, even before the portal was built, and were all at Gravity Falls because of the Law Of Weirdness Magnetism. Secondly, the portal was first built in order to get Bill Cipher and his pals to our dimension so he can start Weirdmageddon. So basically, if we reopen the portal in this ride, if this ride follows canon we should be starting the apocalypse!
THANK YOU! Like I said, this is not an IP I’m super familiar with! I have changed around the description into something more generic… but please feel free to let me know what the ride’s story should be and I’ll update it! Hahaha!
I asked the Gravity Falls subreddit on what a potential story for a Gravity Falls ride could be and they mainly said either a tour of the shack or a ride based on Weirdmageddon. Honestly, I don’t love either of those ideas. A simple tour of the shack is too quaint and small scaled for the type of E-Ticket you’re proposing here. I have always thought that a tour of the shack could be the queue of the ride, as you see the fake creatures made as the shack’s attractions while on the line, with an animatronic Stan or Soos (similar to the animatronic Mr. Potato Head from Toy Story Mania) presenting the the shack’s “wonders.” As for the idea for a ride that takes place during Weirdmageddon, I find it hard to make it work as part of the land’s timeline. There was no fair at all when Weirdmageddon started and Dipper and Mabel canonically don’t return to the shack until three days after Weirdmageddon started. Plus, we have to spoil the ending of the Weirdmageddon arc in order for the ride to have a satisfying ending. (To be fair, we pretty much have to spoil the existence of a certain character that the show keeps as a mystery for most of the show anyways, since I kinda feel like the land should take place in the summer after Dipper and Mabel’s original summer, and you can’t really do that without having that character appear.) However, I have come up with an idea that I think can work. In the Gravity Falls graphic novel Lost Legends, it is revealed that there are rifts that have opened in Gravity Falls after Weirdmageddon ended, rifts that can travel to other dimensions when someone goes inside of it. While we see the Pines fix and close one of these rifts in the graphic novel, it has not been confirmed that they closed all of the rifts, or that rifts have stopped appearing, so we can work with that. The Pines family can introduce themselves to the guests in the pre-show, and then in that pre-show we can have a character (probably Soos or Waddles) get sucked into a rift. Now we have to join the Pines and go into the rift and through the multiverse in order to save them. When it comes to what universes we go to however, I’m kinda stumped. I feel like the universes they go to have to be both relevant to the show and relevant to the themes of Animal Kingdom. I assume that most of these universes will be made just for the attraction, as the actual show never really goes dimension hopping itself, instead bringing characters from other dimensions such as Bill into our world. And even dimensions mentioned in supplemental material like the books are more sci-fi like worlds that don’t fit in Animal Kingdom at all. I had the idea of maybe crossing over with the shows Amphibia and The Owl House, shows that have basically acted as Gravity Falls’ spiritual successors, traveling to their dimensions Jimmy Neutron: Nicktoon Blast style, since I feel like those worlds fit Animal Kingdom quite well, but those shows are even more niche than Gravity Falls, making it kind of a hard sell. However, I do know that I want the last dimension they enter to be a parallel universe where the Pines family lost against Bill into Weirdmageddon. The new Gravity Falls book called The Book Of Bill confirmed that there are parallel universes that exist where the Pines family lost, so it’s a way we can have the incredibly popular and iconic Bill Cipher in the ride and go through Weirdmageddon without breaking canon! Of course, we end the ride with them barely escaping Bill, returning to their home dimension, closing the rift, and congratulating us on a job well done! My ride idea isn’t perfect, and we still need to figure out what will be the other dimensions that the characters will go through, but I feel like I have found a way to preserve your idea of traveling the multiverse with the Gravity Falls cast, without breaking the lore and canon this time!
By the way, if you want to see what other people answered on my post about what a Gravity Falls ride should be like, here’s the post: https://www.reddit.com/r/gravityfalls/comments/1gi5341/if_gravity_falls_had_a_land_in_disney_world_how/
My personal idea for a Gravity Falls ride is a “Mystery Tour” similar to the one stated in the post above with a new E-ticket focus. The idea is that Stan is testing out a new automated golf-cart mystery tour (so he doesn’t have to drive people around/pay anyone to drive people around) that will go through setup portions of the surrounding forest with cheap attractions and replicas. Soos is remotely controlling the test carts that you ride on (after going through the queue that is the Mystery Shack itself) and you load up “outside” at night for the tour. The tour goes pretty well and is “boring” until Dipper and Mabel appear over the radio and tell Soos that the tour doesn’t show anything real and to let the passengers go to some real interesting (yet safe) areas where we can find things. Unfortunately, one monster from the show (you can probably pick which one but maybe something like the Gobblewonker or bring back the dinosaurs) is a lot more dangerous than expected as you go on a high speed chase through the forest before outmaneuvering with Soos’s help allowing you to get back to the Shack.