Mark9

Back in 2010 the first Harry Potter attraction opened at Universal Orlando and a single ride changed themed attractions forever. No longer were theme park fans really satisfied with cookie cutter themes with a hint of a story, immersion was now the name of the game. The area of Hogsmeade increased Islands of Adventure's attendance by 1.5 million guests, an astounding figure by any standard. Since the Harry Potter franchise has given birth to two further expansions and is now home in California and Beijing. But Universal isn't completely my bag. I prefer the Disney parks. Universal has so much dross like Jimmy Fallon, Kong and Fast and Furious. Those attractions just feel thrown in whilst every Disney attraction feels placed and fits in to its surroundings. Naturally Disney saw the success of the Wizarding World and went off first with the world of Pandora (and the guest favourite Flight of Passage) and secondly with Galaxy Edge. Now, I'd previously visited the Floridian version back in its opening week in 2019 and whilst I loved it, it felt like something was missing. Smugglers Run is great, the look is great but where was that top tier attraction? Rise of the Resistance was delayed due to technical issues with the attraction and would be opening later. Looking back it was a mistake to open Galaxy's Edge without Rise. People put off visiting until it opened anyway and the area was seen as a failure for a while by the media. But now, with everything open and the world now able to visit, how exactly does Rise fit in. This review will feature big spoilers for this ride. Scroll to the final paragraph for a summary with none of the spoilers. Rise of the Resistance puts you in the position of joining the Resistance and fighting against Kylo Ren and the new Empire. Unlike the rest of Batu which is basically a trading town, Rise is set in an abandoned ruins with the queue taking place in small rocky corridors. The queue is long and mostly outdoors It commands a waiting time of an average of 100 minutes and is by the busiest ride in Disney World. We were fortunate and that it was open on time on one of our hotel extra hours times and over two trips we managed three rides. Once you hit the batching point you are assigned a room, I'm happy to call this the war room. Inside, BB8 greets you beeping away before being shooed away with a holographic Ray who tells you about the mission and welcomes you to the cause of the rebel alliance. The door opens and you are now outside with Poe's X-Wing and your transporter awaits in front of you. You board and the ship takes off. You leave the planet of Batu and it doesn't take long for some Tie fighters and a Star destroyer to appear and trap you in a tractor beam. The captain begs you to not reveal the rebel base to the First Order. Your ship is boarded and you leave from the day you came in from (I cannot tell you what an amazing effect this is, no video can do it justice. For all intents and purposes you have literally left the outside world and are now indoors on a space ship. It's outstanding). You are now prisoners and surrounding you are storm troopers, Tie fighters and droids. The group is escorted to the prison cells. where you are batched into interrogation groups. The cast members are outstanding, calling people scum and coming down hard on dissent. Think Nemesis Sub terra but with subtle acting and not unnecessary shouting. You enter your cell where Kylo Ren tells you how he will get the truth out of you personally. They leave and then a secret door is burnt through by the rebel alliance. Another great effect. You board your vehicle and the ride begins. What begins is a tour de force of physical effects, screens and Disney firing on every single cylinder. R5 will be driving you to escape pods on the ship but this is a long journey and I probably won't do the ride justice with my words. To start off with your R5 needs to convince other vehicles that he is escorting prisoners. These are just the new ride vehicles going to the loading area but the story implies these are evil droids and I just found it so clever. You almost make it to pods when Storm Troopers appear and start firing at you. The vehicles head backwards and after two corridors enter a room full of AT-AT's. More storm troopers appear and Finn appears from behind some crates and urges R5 to take you down to the pods. Instead the lift takes you half way up the building and out into the control room of the Star destroyer. Kylo Ren and Hux are here, discussing the torture of the prisoners (ie Us). In front of them, rebel ships appear for the attack and Kylo turns around and sees us. He gives chase, first attempting to use the force to bring us back, luckily some doors close on him. We then head into a lift shaft but his light saber appears through the ceiling. We escape and head past some gun turrets firing at the rebel ships. These weren't working on our visit but they are supposed to move back and forth and your vehicle is supposed to move back and forth between them avoiding the gun fire. `You take a turn to the left and the rebels score a hit with the room being half destroyed. Around another corner and Kylo appears declaring your end. But we are in luck as another rebel hit reaches his target and it is implied Kylo is blown out of the ship. R5 takes you to the escape pods which works in the same way as a towers of terror lift shaft with a star tours motion simulator screen. You really feel like you've been jettisoned out of a ship and are crash landing onto Batu. The Vehicle exists the pod and you are now back outside and have successfully defeated the First Order, hooray. It wouldn't be an understatement to say this is one of the best dark rides ever created. Disney have taken all of their 65 years of theme park knowledge and it feels like everything has been put into this ride. I was mightily impressed by every trick in the book being used to create this attraction and the perfect integration of screen based media and physical effects to put on the show. It works incredibly well and it is a miracle that it works as well as it does. Back to my original point, Galaxy's Edge needed Rise because it is the main event, the reason people want to be in a Star Wars themed area. it is incredible. This is an attraction that on a first ride will shock you and surprise you consistently. And that is more then 99% of rides out there can ever hope to achieve. A triumph in so many ways.

Has there really not been a post here for over a year, even with Velocicoaster opening. Wow. So I managed to get over to Florida after a two year delay and part of the trip was to give Universal a bit more time to enjoy. I usually give the whole resort a day to do everything but this time each park got a day. Which I think is more than enough as with good planning you can get on everything you want really easily. Whilst everyone rushes to Hagrid's and Velocicoaster, we started with Hulk, Spiderman, the Seuss rides, Forbidden Journey and Jurassic Park before 10:30. Which is the ideal order as it covers over half the major stuff before going into the longer waits. Baring in mind, the last time I went, the Dragons had only just stopped duelling so majority is new. So:- New Hulk- Rides better then the previous version and the soundtrack really adds to the ride. I still maintain that the last third of the ride are a complete waste of time but the first two thirds are so snappy, precisely paced and hit after hit that I am more forgiving than I was in 2012. Spiderman is great, still remains a revolution in dark ride design and is a lot of fun. Seuss land is nice. Forbidden Journey has aged really well. It is a lot of fun and now that it doesn't command an hour queue at a minimum, its so much easier to ride and a lot less is hanging on the ride experience to deliver. My fiancé doesn't understand a thing about Harry Potter but appreciated the effects and ride experience. I'm completely biased in saying River Adventure is one of my favourite rides at the resort. I love dinosaur themed attractions, I love Jurassic Park and I love the variation and story telling of this attraction. It's so much fun and the physical precense of the dinosaurs really adds to make this a 10/10 attraction. So there. So to start.. Velocicoaster. So this is one of the best rides in the world. I think we all saw this coming but it further refines the successes that Intamin have had with Maverick, Taron and Taiga and I think adding this in a Universal park, one that commands huge attention in the theme park industry will bring Intamin a lot of success. We got four rides in various rows and it delivers in every seat. It feels like what would happen if Taron were more refined. Thats not to say that I think its better then Phantasialands ride (The jury is still out on that front) but the two are very similar in terms of sensation and pops or airtime litter both rides. Pacing is important to me and this ride has it in droves. The theming is okay, I think the story itself is a bit forgotten the moment you complete the first launch and it just becomes another rollercoaster albeit this has a beautiful location over the lake. Next Hagrid's motorbike thing. We waited an hour each for both of our rides and this ride is okay. It throws every Intamin trick in the book at you and its frankly a miracle that this works. I don't think its the greatest ride in the world because the Harry Potter implementation is a tad too weak for a Hogsmeade ride and frankly a lot of it is just a bit meandering. I admire the ambition if nothing else. So thats IoA for another decade. A great visit. 26F85C4E-CCD9-4EB2-801F-3CFE4F83D57B.heic

No VELOCICOASTER IS THE BEST RIDE EVER. NO ICE BREAKER IS THE BEST RIDE EVER. NO IRON GWAZI IS THE BEST RIDE EVER. I understand this is the Florida discourse here.

My sole memory is riding Flying Jumbos in that area and not wanting to go up into the air so we just stayed on the ground. Bare in mind I was 4 at the time.

The best dark rides combine screens with physical effects and animatronics. I find rides that are screen based only incredibly lazy (even though I know they technically aren't). Whereas something like Forbidden Journey or Rise of the Resistance really appeal to me because they use all areas of technology to create the experience.

Woo, the ride that everyone hates is coming. 🥳

The owners of Flamingoland donate to the conservatives so I can't say I'm sad.

This ride is cursed.

More importantly, does this make it a new cred or not? It's not a full on new coaster after all..

Makes sense for this to be a complete rebuild. A lot of parks do this for older attractions and Nemesis hasn't lost any of its popularity over the years.

Kind of why I find topics like this funny. In one breathe you say Grand National, not rough, can't understand why anyone would see it as rough and then the next breath, Smiler is unridable. I think the complete opposite. Roughness is such a personal thing and I wouldn't personally say I couldn't understand why some would find a ride rough when quite clearly, some people do.

Just to reply to the two above me, Grand National is nerfed by those awful Kumbak trains. The layout with the old trains was absolutely fine but I cannot stand the trains. They make the thing unrideable. Age has nothing to do with it, 100 year old Rutschebanan at Tivoli is incredibly smooth and enjoyable. As for mine Like Scream and Medusa Both are these are fantastic B&M floorless coasters that don't get near enough credit for being fantastically paced, intense and exciting rides. Scream gets more abuse but frankly they are both car park coasters. But this is Six Flags, not Galaxys Edge and these are both excellent rides. Gatekeeper I loved this ride, it really does the wing rider justice with huge inversions, air time and great near misses. For me, its personally flawless Schwur des Karnen One of the most terrifying rides I've ever been on. I don't know how Gerstlauer came up with this but its off the chart. Dislike Top Thrill Dragster Awful ride. Not worth the queue, no matter how fast or exciting the ride is. You could ride Raptor 30 times in the time it takes on TTD and you'd have a much more exhilarating time doing so. The dread from rollbacks made the queuing experience awful. Leviathan A 300 foot B&m should be so much more then what this is. But it's just disappointing frankly. It feels way too short and compared to Behemoth in the same park, is so much less interesting. You can tell they learned their lessons from this when they built Fury 325. Expedition Ge Force This is my automatic go to when I think of a ride with a mighty reputation that did nothing for me. It meanders around doing nothing in particular for me to rate it particularly highly and I actually think Goliath at Walibi Holland is a far better ride. Cheetah Hunt This thing is actual garbage. It doesn't do anything well for me, another ride that just goes on and on and not doing anything particularly well. The Big One Boring, dull, meandering, pointless shallow drops that don't do anything whatsoever. We could have had a British MagnumXL, we got a 200 foot big apple.

If it's good enough for Disneyland Paris, then it's good enough for Thorpe Park.

So the theme so far is Margaret Thatcher closing down a mine whilst the Doctor tries to stop the Slitheen destroying Big Ben and Shrek is looking on bemused whilst Donkey sings Bowies greatest hits.

Park I like less then most - Port Aventura. The most mediocre collection of rides in a park. The worst park guests I have ever encountered. Just a horrible place to visit, only Shambhala and Dragon Khan make it worth visiting. And even thats a push. Park I like more then most - Toverland. Not spoken about enough. An excellent theme park that continually renovates and improves. Such a gorgeous place to visit.

Guy fawkes theme confirmed. OH MY GOD, THE SLITHEEN DESTROYED BIG BEN IN DOCTOR WHO. DOCTOR WHO CONFIRMED.

Maybe. I don't think it would take Velocicoaster to cause a significant shift though. All of the Disney investment points at interactive family rides and I think thats how it will continue. It would take a severe drop in attendance that is unrelated to covid-19 restrictions that may force Disney to alter slightly. Right now though, no.

Obvious one here, Nemesis. Everyone knows why. Big coaster that is a waste.. mmm. Leviathan at Canadas Wonderland. Behemoth in the same park is a much better ride are is basically the same, just longer and with far more air time. I'll throw in Top Thrill Dragster as well. Waiting for the thing is a nightmare because of the risk of roll back. You go on it and sure, it is thrilling. but I want more than just twelve seconds of actual thrill, it severely under-delivers.

Ban request please. 😉

I love Doctor Who. it's my favourite TV series. I own every classic story on dvd and am getting them all now on blu ray in collection boxsets. I've loved every doctor, yes even Jodie Whittaker. Even I know Doctor Who is no where near cool enough for Thorpe Park.

I'm enjoying the B&M hyper discourse. As if an efficient, high capacity, (RELIABLE!) crowd pleasing rollercoaster wasn't exactly what Thorpe needed right now. I'm not saying that what they've gone for won't be popular, I just look at the way people come off Silver Star, Shambhala, Mako, Behemoth (to name a few) and know that for all the spectacle Exodus provides, its substance seems really questionable. I think its okay, after all Stealth has been 100 foot higher than nearly everything around it for 15 years and it hasn't dented the other rides enthusiasm. Inferno and Swarm are still seen as Thorpe's best two rides (according to the park in 2019 anyway).

oh when I meant short I meant length. Should have clarified. 😅

I like people calling this one of the shortest hyper coasters ever when Stealth is literally right there. To be honest, the layout they’ve shown is really ugly. It also does nothing to solves Thorpes issues. But as a means to stop the bleeding of visitor numbers, it will do.

Sure, I love nostalgic over indulgence 😁 Animal Kingdom in 2011 - Part of the Jammin' Jungle Parade - We were just getting a photo with Goofy in Camp Micky when a cast member approached us and asked us to met at the big doors near Kilimanjaro Safari at a certain time. We got there and the same cast member told us we were going to be in the 45 minute parade around the park. It was our first trip to the park and it was quite the experience. Somehow watching it after that moment was never quite the same. Thorpe Park March 2013 - TPM meet - I think this was the trip to end all trips for TPM frankly. It was freezing cold, there was a large number of us and it was just one of those trips where the good humour and fun had no bounds. From riding Slammer (somehow in near zero temperatures), too Peaj and Sidders braving Tidal Wave. I still to tis day don't know how they still live. Great time and I don't think there was a better trip for the forum. Toverland - Flaming Feather lunch - I think the Flaming Feather, overlooking Fenix and sitting in the blazing sun may just be one of my favourite theme park experiences when it comes to pure relaxation. Sitting and just being at peace makes this one of my favourite venues. I want to go back just to sit at the Feather tbh. Sometimes theme park experiences just come together perfectly. This was one of those.

Can't wait to ride Olympia Looping all of next year then.