Brief review of Tron at Magic Kingdom, 3/8/23

The long wait is over, as humans, er, users, are riding the new Tron roller coaster at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom. Preview invites very suddenly went out a week or two ago, and we scored one of the last slots after waiting online for a crazy three hours. I was hoping for a night ride because of the lighting package, but we got 9:30 a.m., because that's all that was left.

I'll say this, as a themed attraction, it's about what you should expect from Disney, though because the world of Tron is so dark with blue trim, the queue and such are not what I would describe as richly textured. What is textured is in the video clips and such displayed in the queue and station. There's also a pretty cool reveal moment in the queue, though it's confusing about what to do after that, unless you happened to see the door open. Missing is any indication of Olivia Wilde.

For our ride, I was reminded why we still use the disability access service (DAS) from time to time. My son just turned 13, with autism, but he has a way of having anxiety turn him into a puddle for anything new. He had been obsessing about the motorcycle position of the ride for weeks, and after doing the test seat, resolved to not do it at all. We learned shortly thereafter that every train has a standard lap bar row for people who either can't fit on the lightcycle or, in his case, is for whatever reason freaked out by it. The cast members were very kind and accommodating, reassuring him that it would be fun. And spoiler alert, he enjoyed it.

I sat on one of these at the Vekoma booth at IAAPA many years ago, and found it kind of uncomfortable and gimmicky. I don't think that it really adds anything to the ride. In fact, it feels awkward when you're locked in and waiting to dispatch. I imagine it wouldn't feel great if you had a stomach full of churros and Dolewhip. Your field of view is somewhat limited just because of the body position. To board on the far side of the train, you walk between the cars, and while there is some clever iconography explaining that, I wonder if people will get it during normal operation. It felt really awkward to get off of it, too, and I kind of tripped on something. I get the theme, I just didn't care for it.

The visual effects during the 74 second ride are pretty cool, with some clever use of mirrors, screens and lighting. I think it helps to have seen the movies, but even then, I can't say I made any real connection with it. It's a lot of (mostly blue) eye candy.

As a roller coaster, the launch feels like it has a very long acceleration curve, which is a good thing. Unfortunately, there isn't much to it after that. It meanders back and forth around some fairly tight turns and then it's over. There are five or six-ish turns inside the building, with I think a total of three long block brakes (they mercifully don't slow the train). There just isn't much there. I might even argue that if you take out the launch, Seven Dwarfs Mine Train does more stuff. I guess given that it's in Magic Kingdom, it's appropriate, but I think I would choose Space Mountain or Big Thunder Mountain before Tron if I could only ride one in a day. Admittedly, I was so dazzled by Guardians at Epcot, and that threw my expectations out of whack.

I sound kind of underwhelmed, and I am, but it's a fine attraction for that specific park, that a wide range of people will enjoy riding. And if any park needs more high capacity attractions, it's Magic Kingdom.

One final note, you can tell this is a copy of a ride built for another park, because the sight lines are a little jarring in places. I mean, as you exit, looking over at the queue for Barnstormer is super weird.

I honestly haven't been following the construction of this at all, so any stats are new to me. The two things that really stick out are the ride time and the fact that it's a clone.

74 seconds just seems unreasonably short for a new Disney coaster.

And a clone? I'm aware that Disney parks like to offer the same ride experiences from park to park, but I thought with rides of this scale there were usually differences (like Space Mountain).

Happy 200th. At least it's high capacity.

A lot of sound and fury and money spent for 74 seconds.

I’ll definitely check it out in June.

Jeff:

One final note, you can tell this is a copy of a ride built for another park, because the sight lines are a little jarring in places. I mean, as you exit, looking over at the queue for Barnstormer is super weird.

interesting. I wonder if they will eventually put up a wall or trees? Typically Disney is the best at disguising/hiding stuff to protect the ‘Magic’.

Because of the orientation relative to the train, it's not really possible. The train path is the sightline.

I liked the version in Shanghai, though I share the view that it's a bit on the short side.

Now if only The Mouse would build some stateside copies of the Shanghai version of Pirates – that ride is second only to ROTR for me as the most impressive dark ride I've seen.

Oh yes, I've seen some of the making-of stuff on Disney+. They definitely entered new territory with that one.

I rode Shanghai Pirates "spoiler-free" other than knowing it was "better than the stateside versions."

Wow.

Interesting review Jeff. Its quite short, but I am of the school of though that if it was any longer, the average Disney visitor could not endure the riding position. Guests are having issues fitting on and I can imagine that they already ordered from Vekoma extra sit-down cars so that they every train will have one. In Shanghai, they have two sit-down cars they rotate on the trains in service on the ride and at WDW, they ordered three, but it's not enough.

The one attraction from Asia I now want the Magic Kingdom to install when the Oriental Land Co. exclusivity deal ends is Enchanted Tales of Beauty and the Beast. Disney took the ride system used for Antarctica from Oceaneering, made the cars larger (for 10 riders) and its a complete 7.5 minutes experience with 35 animatronics. Its breathtaking and would be a huge capacity accessible to everyone attraction that would help the park. They load 6 of those cars at once and they dispatch them every 1.5-2 minute or so. I rode the one in Tokyo this week and I preferred it to Rise of the Resistance.

Every train already has a standard lapbar car.

That's incorrect. This video from March 10th clearly show a train with seven lightcycle cars. The ride started the previews with 3 TAV (Transfer Accessible Vehicle, the internal name for the lap bar car) across it's fleet of seven trains. Hopefully, the extra car or cars arrive quickly to make the ride even more accessible.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/O60woNuiAJM

I don't know what to tell you, dude. Every train I saw while in the station had a lapbar row. In fact, the last queue row isn't configured for anything else. So tell me more about my incorrectness.

There are multiple photos and videos from previews showing that not all trains have the lapbar seats available online.

https://www.instagram.com/p...MyMTA2M2Y=

https://www.instagram.com/p...MyMTA2M2Y=

https://www.instagram.com/p...MyMTA2M2Y=

This train doesn't have it

This one does

Would you like to be shown more about your incorrectness, Jeff? 😂

Tekwardo:

Would you like to be shown more about your incorrectness, Jeff? 😂

Whether or not they exist isn't my point. During the preview I attended, all of the trains in use had the lap bar seats.

Every train already has a standard lapbar car.

So what was your point when you said this exact phrase?

In fact, the last queue row isn't configured for anything else.

And that as you doubled down? 😂🤣🤡

BTW your first response was in response to this for context:

Guests are having issues fitting on and I can imagine that they already ordered from Vekoma extra sit-down cars so that they every train will have one.

Then you said every train had one, when they do not.

Every train I saw had a lap bar row. All of the photos I took that day had the lap bar row. That's what I saw. If trains without exist, as they apparently do, I did not see them that day. The last row on the right side platform was only configured for handicap access. Not sure what else to tell you. I mean, if it's so important to you that you have to come back to it every five minutes with another post, cool I guess.