More 'Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge' Details Emerge: Cinematic Spaces, Limited Signing, And Plenty Of Easter Eggs
We're only half a year out from the opening of Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge, which is being touted as the most ambitious land ever added to a Disney theme park. The highly anticipated Star Wars-themed lands open at Disneyland in summer of 2019, while Walt Disney World's version in the Hollywood Studios park will open later in Fall 2019. But one lucky Star Wars fan got a sneak peek at Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge and has some exciting details to share from the the experience.
Barron's Magazine spent a day at Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge at Disneyland with executives from construction, operations, and Imagineering, along with a "Star Wars expert in a holiday R2-D2 sweater." From their detailed report, here are a few new things we could glean about the highly anticipated immersive land after the sneak peek last week.
What It Looks Like
The first sight visitors will get of Galaxy's Edge will be a "carefully framed, cinematic view," achieved through short, enclosed passageways between lands that are designed to compress and expand the view "like a movie fading out and then back in." The major structures are already in place at the Disneyland site, though walkways and interiors remained unfinished at the time of the outlets visits.
The Millennium Falcon attraction entrance will be "subtly marked so as not to disrupt the look of the land," something Disney first did with Pandora, which led to some complaints that it's too hard to find the rides. But Imagineering wants Galaxy's Edge to feel like a real world without obvious ride signage — something that the 600 workers (down from a peek of 1,000 to 1,100) will probably have to deal with.
The Immersive Experience Can Be Interactive — or Not
The Millennium Falcon flight will allow options for visitors to opt out of the interactive story experience. However, if they do opt to interact with the story, the interactive, story-building experience will be different for each flight. For example, "After a ride, the visitor might, say, stop at Oga's for a drink and be told something like, 'The boss isn't happy about how you brought the ship back.'"
The other attraction, Rise of the Resistance, will take visitors through "highly themed interiors that evoke rundown rooms the Resistance has repurposed as a base for operations against the First Order." Groups of guests may even be "captured" at one point and ordered along by the enemy before making an escape aboard a trackless troop transport. The attraction also includes scenes of a Stormtrooper formation and one with Kylo Ren similar to the interrogation scene from Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Shops and Cantinas Will be Stocked by Familiar Characters
Visitors can visit Oga's Cantina, order blue milk (which will be a non-dairy drink), and visit shops supplied with items from a common stockroom and occasionally a full-size R2-D2. Some of those shops will feature droids that visitors can customize through an interactive experience, with some droids even able to interact with each other. One shop will also be presided over by Do-Ondar, a collector briefly mentioned in Solo: A Star Wars Story, and who will likely be an animatronic figure that cast members may interact with.
The shops will also sell merchandise for familiar characters with "new looks." According to Barron's:
"The imagineers visited the archives at Lucasfilm for early concept art. As a hypothetical example, an artisan figure of a familiar character might look slightly off, with the back story being that residents of Batuu have never seen that character, so they don't know exactly what the figure should look like."
But the most popular place to visit will likely be Oga's Cantina, which according to Barron's, is relatively small despite being an obvious draw for visitors.
Oga's Cantina relatively small for aesthetic reasons, and is likely to be popular. To maximize capacity and keep visits from becoming all-afternoon affairs, most guests will stand. There will be a handful of booths with seating around the outer edge of the restaurant; no decision has been made yet on whether or how these can be reserved. An intricate tangle of tubes and vessels behind the bar might make some drinks appear to flow from the ceiling. We heard a mention of a Fuzzy Tauntaun, named for the furry snow lizards ridden in Empire Strikes Back, although it's unclear if that's a hypothetical drink or a planned one, and the menu is still being decided.
It's fascinating they're keeping the Cantina small despite knowing its potential popularity, and that providing few seating options will keep it from being crowded. Maybe avoid the Cantina in the first few days (months?) if you don't like crowds.
Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge opens in summer and fall 2019.