What’s new at the theme parks: roller coasters, a stunt show and a Mickey Mouse ride
For the first time in several years, there are no entire lands opening at Florida’s theme parks in 2020. Instead, only standalone rides and other attractions will debut this year, with barely even a cupcake themed to go along with the new ride.
For years now, we’ve been immersed in new lands or zones celebrating Star Wars, Toy Story, Harry Potter, Sesame Street, the Simpsons, the Lego Movie, Avatar, sharks and penguins. Most of the lands include two or more rides, a themed restaurant and shops, and possibly a character meet-and-greet site, an exhibit or educational display, a video, a work of art or live animals.
In 2020, we’re just going to have to settle for standalone roller coasters and other rides, with maybe an exit through a store where you can buy a souvenir.
But the class of 2020 is a pretty varied and interesting collection of new attractions, including a stunt show, two roller coasters, the first ride ever dedicated to Mickey Mouse, another ride based on a rat who wants to be a chef, a new Cirque du Soleil show, a space-themed restaurant and a pirate-themed hotel. Specific opening dates have not been announced for many, but most are scheduled to open by late spring.
Here’s what’s coming this year:
IRON GWAZI: BUSCH GARDENS, SPRING
For thrill ride aficionados, this roller coaster being built — or rebuilt — at Busch Gardens is one of the most-anticipated theme park rides coming this year. Built partly of lumber from the old Gwazi roller coaster, which closed five years ago, and in the same spot as the original Gwazi, Iron Gwazi will be a hybrid of a wood foundation and steel rails that will create a much smoother and thrilling ride.
Even though it’s using part of the original structure, the new track will have a completely different design. Busch Gardens says the coaster will be 206 feet high with a top speed of 76 mph, which would make it the tallest and fastest coaster in Florida. It will have three inversions and plenty of air-time moments, and its animal signature is a stylized crocodile.
“When you ride these [hybrid] coasters, it’s a different experience. It’s not the wooden coaster you remember. It’s so smooth and so fast,” said Mike Denninger, senior vice president for attractions for SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment, which owns Busch Gardens.
“What the steel has done to the wooden coaster experience is a huge enhancement. ... This is an evolution of Gwazi. It’s a completely new ride.”
MICKEY AND MINNIE’S RUNAWAY RAILWAY, HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS, MARCH 4
Behind the facade of the Chinese Theater, Mickey Mouse’s first ride at any Disney park opens in just a few weeks. The ride is based on the “Mickey Mouse” cartoons on the Disney Channel, and Imagineers — Disney’s creative team — created a new cartoon just for this ride.
That cartoon, “Perfect Picnic,” is the pre-show. In it, Mickey and Minnie (plus Pluto, somehow stuffed into the trunk with the picnic lunch) are taking a drive when they spot their friend Goofy operating a train. There is an unfortunate encounter between the train and a pie. Then guests step through a simulated movie screen and into the cartoon world for the ride itself.
Visitors board Engineer Goofy’s train on the Runnamuck Railroad and head into a series of wild adventures. Mickey and Minnie are right there in their sportster. The Imagineering team says the technology of the ride turns two-dimensional cartoons into a three-dimensional adventure without 3-D glasses.
The setting of the Chinese Theater has significance, said Kevin Rafferty, the ride’s executive creative director. One of an earlier generation of shorts, “Mickey Steps Out,” premiered at the real Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood in 1931, followed by another cartoon, “Mickey’s Gala Premier,” in 1933. So it makes sense that this new short debuts at this Hollywood Studios replica.
Also, if you collect hidden Mickey sightings, Disney says Mickey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway has more of them than any other Disney attraction or area in the world.
ICE BREAKER, SEAWORLD, SPRING
This new roller coaster looks like quite a thrill in the renderings and early promotional video. Although it won’t be particularly tall or fast, it has a 93-foot spike that riders will go up backwards, then come straight back down facing the ground. Actually, it’s not quite straight down because the track is briefly at a 100-degree angle. SeaWorld calls it the “steepest beyond vertical drop in Florida.”
The ride will last about a minute and a half and hit a top speed of 52 mph. It doesn’t turn upside down, but it will have forward and backward launches — it will be SeaWorld’s first launch coaster and run multiple times on the same stretch of tracks, sometimes backward, sometimes forward.
The ride is between Shamu Stadium and Bayside Stadium, next to the Wild Arctic attraction, and so extends the Arctic theme. SeaWorld is partnering with Alaska SeaLife Center, which is developing an educational component, making Ice Breaker the closest thing to a themed area the parks will open in 2020.
BOURNE STUNTACULAR, UNIVERSAL STUDIOS, SPRING
This live-action stunt show is based on Universal’s Jason Bourne film franchise. Universal Orlando says the show “will blur the lines between stage and cinema in a hybrid form of entertainment that has never been seen before.”
The Bourne Stuntacular will follow the character of Jason Bourne around the globe as sinister characters pursue him, Universal says, and will include “thrilling chase scenes, punishing fistfights, death-defying leaps and danger at every turn.” The stunt show will use live performers, high-tech props and a huge LED screen.
The attraction replaces Terminator 2: 3-D, which closed more than two years ago.
REMY’S RATATOUILLE ADVENTURE, LA CREPERIE DE PARIS, EPCOT, SUMMER
Except for the exact opening date, there’s not much we don’t know about this attraction, a trackless dark ride, which is a copy of one of the most popular rides at Disneyland Paris.
The premise is that guests will be shrunk to the size of rats and see the world — or at least Gusteau’s Restaurant — from a rat’s eye point of view. To support that illusion, enormous hams, fish, apples, oranges and containers of olive oil are stacked on the floor or hung from the ceiling.
Guests will ride in rat-inspired vehicles across the roofs of Paris and along the floor of the restaurant’s kitchen and dining room, chased by the malicious and manipulative Chef Skinner.
In addition to the ride, the construction going on in the France Pavilion — which will more than double the pavilion’s size — includes a new restaurant. La Crêperie de Paris will offer both table service and quick service dining. The menu, inspired by the Brittany region of France, will feature the cuisine of celebrity chef Jérôme Bocuse, the mastermind behind the other two restaurants in the France Pavilion, Chefs de France and Monsieur Paul, according to the Disney Parks blog.
HARMONIOUS, EPCOT, 2020
Sometime this year, “Harmonious,” a nighttime spectacular of lights, music and pyrotechnics, will debut over the World Showcase Lagoon, replacing the long-running “Illuminations.” There’s an interim show there now, with an indefinite end date, but progress on the permanent show is evident: In January, several floating platforms that will serve as the base for the technology that will support the show were delivered to Epcot.
The theme of the show will be “how Disney music has the power to inspire and unite us all.”
It will feature large floating set pieces, custom-built LED panels, kites with special effects, choreographed moving fountains, lights, pyrotechnics, and lasers, according to Disney.
SPACE 220, EPCOT, WINTER
At press time, Disney had not announced the opening date for Space 220, a space-themed restaurant next to Mission: Space. The opening was delayed and now is scheduled for an unspecified date this winter, which ends in about a month. The Disney Parks website was not yet taking reservations.
The restaurant, supposedly set on a space station 220 miles above Earth, will have panoramic views of space. It is accessed by an elevator with a view straight down through the floor that shows Florida getting smaller as the elevator rises. It is billed as offering modern American cuisine.
SOLAR VORTEX, ADVENTURE ISLAND, SPRING
Busch Gardens’ water park describes this family raft slide as a dual-tailspin water slide, with high-banking rotations and rapid descents that will send sliders on a swirling journey of up to 20 mph through two open tailspin features. Busch says the new slide will open when the park opens for the season March 13.
RIPTIDE RACE, AQUATICA, SPRING
To call Riptide Race a waterslide might be a bit of an understatement. It’s a dueling pipeline with side-by-side racing lanes. Starting from 68 feet high, it’s 600 feet in a two-person raft through tunnels, loops and open sections to the finish. Aquatica, which is SeaWorld’s water park, is open year-round; the specific opening date for Riptide Race hasn’t been announced.
CIRQUE DU SOLEIL, DISNEY SPRINGS, MARCH 20
It may be hard to believe that one Cirque du Soleil show was performed at Disney Springs for 19 years before it closed in December 2017. Since then, a new show, celebrating Disney animation, has been in the works, and the theater has been rebuilt to fit the new show.
The new show, “Drawn to Life,” opens for previews March 20 and officially premieres April 17.
The show is a collaboration between Cirque du Soleil, Walt Disney Animation Studios and Walt Disney Imagineering. It is a family show that celebrates Disney’s legacy in the art of animation, written and directed by Michel Laprise and with Fabrice Becker as director of creation.
PIRATE ISLAND HOTEL, LEGOLAND, APRIL 17
Legoland’s third hotel, opening April 17, will have 150 pirate-themed rooms, each with two spaces, one for adults (king bed, TV), the other for kids (bunk bed, TV, play area), plus interactive Lego pirate models. The five-story hotel also will have a heated pool, Shipwreck restaurant, Smuggler’s Bar, in-room treasure hunts, more Lego models and character experiences.
DOCKSIDE INN AND SUITES, UNIVERSAL ORLANDO, MARCH 17
The second part of Universal’s value-priced Endless Summer resort, Dockside Inn and Suites, is scheduled to open March 17. It will be Universal’s eighth hotel, part of the same beach-themed complex on the former Wet ‘n Wild property as Surfside Inn and Suites, which opened last summer. Dockside is significantly larger, 2,050 rooms with two pools compared to Surfside’s 750 rooms and one pool. The complex is not contiguous to the rest of the Universal resort and is about two miles away, but has shuttles to CityWalk.
This story was originally published February 20, 2020 at 6:30 AM.
