What's New, What's Next at Disneyland Paris

What’s the one thing Walt Disney Studios Park needs more than a dark ride? This: a new restaurant! While the initial planning notice for the Ratatouille dark ride only noted a project known as “Toon Studio D”, this new full-blown Marne-la-Vallée construction notice, spotted by Mouetto of Disney Central Plaza, confirms that both an attraction and a new restaurant are on their way to the park. For the Studios, this is a big deal: the park only has three true restaurants to its 17 attractions, even including the minuscule Café des Cascadeurs. This will also be the first real dining location in the whole of Toon Studio — the park’s largest land, taking up the whole of its right side.

Don’t let the French theme lead you to expect a traditional Bistro de Paris-type dining experience here, though. As we teased earlier this month, we’re more likely in fact to be dining in a giant-sized version of Rémy’s rat restaurant, perhaps on the first floor of the new showbuilding’s frontage. This would allow Imagineering to create something truly unique and fun with the theme — after all, if you want a traditional, stuffy Parisian restaurant, there are plenty just a short RER ride away.

Surprisingly, with the restaurant confirmed, there is now some doubt whether the plan for a boutique adjoining this “Kitchen Calamity” will see reality, or if it could be built as a later phase. This was rumoured to be built in the workshop of the existing Imaginations (Costuming) backstage building, bordering the construction site. Hopefully sense will prevail because, if there’s one thing the park needs more than a dark ride or a restaurant… well, you get the idea.

VIA Mouetto (Disney Central Plaza)

“Time for lemonade and Cracker Jacks, Casey Junior’s back, Casey Junior’s back!” – You didn’t think he’d miss the 20th Anniversary, did you? Yes, the endlessly reincarnated train, last seen as the Disney Dance Express, will return again from April 2012!

At least this time, for the first time since his return as the Disney Characters’ Express five years ago, Disneyland Paris decided against giving him “new attraction” billing in the brochure. Too busy ramping the colour saturation up to “maximum”, perhaps.

Your thoughts?

If we needed any final evidence that construction is at last ready to begin on the first dark ride at Walt Disney Studios Park, here it is! The view from the top of Toy Soldiers Parachute Drop, captured here by @ParkZone_es, now reveals a vast plot of cleared land after final tree clearance work throughout this week. Workers in fluorescent jackets can be seen milling around the site again, the first activity in almost a year. With the plans submitted, funding found and construction permit posted, the Ratatouille dark ride and its Parisian place-making is now almost ready to start rising.

Despite clearance beginning on the site during the construction of Toy Story Playland in 2010, a large patch of trees were left in place. As the photo above now shows, this was likely to prevent opening up unwanted sight lines before absolutely necessary. As well as a perfect view of the construction site (thank you, Imagineers!) riders on the Parachute Drop now have a clear view right along the route of Studio Tram Tour (which is currently closed) towards the main backstage area of the resort.

Meanwhile, the rumoured project title of this long-awaited dark ride has just come to light: Ratatouille Kitchen Calamity!, or Ratatouille: Désastre en Cuisine in French. It’s not quite the tongue twister of Crush’s Turtle Twister, the project title for Crush’s Coaster, but it will still be very much open to change before Rémy finally throws open the restaurant doors sometime in 2014. Until then, Parachute Drop just became our favourite ride…

PHOTO VIA @ParkZone_es (Twitter)

Can you swing through the trees like an ape? Are you a talented gymnast with a passing resemblance to Jane Porter? Disneyland Paris is giving you another chance to make your big break — and for thousands of new park visitors to watch in amazement — as it confirms: The Tarzan Encounter will return again!

Official casting notices (PDF) have just gone out for the high-flying acr0batic stage show, with contracts running from late April to early September. Last year, the show performed from 11th June to 4th September with contracts beginning early May, so it looks like the show’s 2012 return to The Chaparral Theater will follow broadly similar dates, perhaps beginning a week or two earlier.

Auditions were launched this same week last year and the show returned to positive acclaim in June, ending a two year hiatus and finally giving the production, which began in 2000, a long-awaited tenth season. In 2009 the Frontierland stage presented the less popular Goofy’s Summer Camp, while in 2010, despite efforts to bring Tarzan back, it remained empty through the summer. Its 2011 return was therefore hailed by Disneyland Paris as quite the event, even boasting a special video trailer at the annual shareholders meeting and listing it as one of the key “highlights” at the end of the year.

PHOTO Bert Snyers (Flickr)

We’ve already had a glimpse at the concept art for Disney Magic on Parade! thanks to some leaked images late last year, but now here they are in all their high definition, officially-endorsed glory! The 20th Anniversary preview video released by Disneyland Paris on Friday teased fans with an immediate challenge to “screencap” all the new details, and we’re only happy to oblige. As confirmed previously, only the opening and closing floats of the parade will see major cosmetic changes, but for the old “Dreams of Imagination” the difference is dramatic enough.

Gone are the sun and moon, with a pink fairytale castle, magical mirror and pumpkin carriage in their place. Though Tinker Bell will apparently be featured as an actual live character in the reworked parade, that didn’t stop entertainment slipping in a golden ‘Tink at the top of the castle. (Well, at least it’s not the castle…) The float also looks to continue the idea of embedded LED lights, introduced with the original Once Upon a Dream Parade, to give some extra sparkle even in daytime.

Princesses Cinderella, Aurora, Snow White and Belle being knocked off their former “Dreams of Romance” finale float will be reconciled with the addition of two new smaller units. Both Cinderella and Aurora will be pulled along on whimsical carriages by carousel-style horses. LED lights are again hidden amongst the flowers at the rear, while the Sleeping Beauty unit features sculptures of birds, a squirrel and even the owl, to tie it into the story.

Taking the 20th Anniversary‘s theme of “colour, lights and magic” to its absolute pinnacle will be the new finale float. Gone is that calmly-coloured green hillside. In its place, a psychedelic mix of blue, indigo and violet, forming a landscape for the Sorcerer’s Apprentice. Not content with two statues celebrating the moment over at Walt Disney Studios Park, Mickey will perform his thrusting of the magic wand into the skies for real.

The costumes of all the characters here will be brand new and designed especially for the new parade. Artwork below shows Minnie, Chip, Dale, Donald, Daisy and Goofy all receiving their own, brightly-coloured “Sorcerer’s Apprentice” outfits, covered in shimmering gold thread details.

Finally, “Magic Everywhere!” was revealed just this morning by @InsideDLParis on Twitter to be the title of the new song to accompany the parade and other 20th Anniversary events. But is all this enough to convince you the old parade will be given enough “magic” to make it feel new again?

“We’re gonna bring the Second Star to the Right and ignite it above the castle…” It’s not a sentence you hear every day but, in this exciting new preview video for the 20th Anniversary released by Disneyland Paris today, Steve Davison casually drops it in amongst a plethora of other surprises. Walt Disney Imagineering’s Creative Director of Entertainment, famed for his work on Fantasmic! and World of Color, joins a number of backstage artists to tease us on the new additions for the anniversary. Show director Katy Harris tells us about the new Mickey Mouse meet ‘n’ greet, while Emmanuel Lenormand shows off detailed concept art for Disney Magic on Parade! and its new costumes.

But it’s the section on Disney Dreams! which is the most surprising — even breathtaking. Real previews are shown of the new castle projection effects, which have been in testing for some time, along with confirmation that the show will feature not just projections, not just fountains, but lasers, pyrotechnics, fire, an original musical score, and perhaps most importantly: a story! When the Second Star to the Right ignites above the castle, the “Disney Dreams” pour out and come to life in “new ways”.

Watch the exciting new preview video below!

Senior technical director Chuck Davis reveals the Imagineers at Creative Entertainment have mapped the whole castle with “pixel accurate video” so it can “do all kinds of great tricks”, while Dave Bossert confirms that water screens will be installed in front of the castle, creaing a huge new canvas for the show to take place on. Particularly interesting to note: Dave is the director of Special Projects at Walt Disney Feature Animation, showing the breadth of Disney talent being combined for this new show.

It’s a rare but incredibly welcome step for Disneyland Paris to let the talent behind its magic tell the stories of new projects like these for once. Similar videos are consistently produced for other resorts, notably California, and always serve to provide both a more exciting teaser for what’s next and a more inspiring insight into the work required to achieve it.

“So that at the end of your day, you can walk away and go: wow, that was cool!”

VIA Disneyland Paris (YouTube)

It turns out, a construction permit really can be this exciting to see. A mere two days after The Walt Disney Company agreed to loan Euro Disney S.C.A. funding of €150m for park expansion, a fresh “permis de construire” has appeared at the rear of Walt Disney Studios Park for a project ostensibly titled “Toon Studio D”. This can only mean one thing: the Ratatouille dark ride is ready to go!

From the first rumours back in 2008 to the first planning application in 2009, apparent special effects testing in 2010, then final confirmation from Disney, concept art and planning permission and a visit from John Lasseter in 2011, this has been one long project. With today’s new permit signalling that construction is imminent at the Studios, it could be around another two years until the attraction opens, such is the average construction period for a large Disney attraction. All hopes are now set on 2014 for a grand opening, providing the perfect pick-up from what might be expected to be a two-year 20th Anniversary celebration, as the previous 15th, to maximise the “anniversary” draw.

The permit also reveals that the new showbuilding will stand 17.8 m tall with the surface area of construction totalling 5719 m2. For comparison, RC Racer reaches a height of 24.8 m, while the vast “it’s a small world” showbuilding covers around 4000m2. The date of 13th April 2011 coincides well with the publication of concept art and planning documents last May (above), which gave a very detailed look at the exterior of this new “Parisian quarter” but very little clues as to the attraction which will lie inside its walls. Rumours continue to point to a primarily projection-based experience, likely in 3D, likely utilising a “trackless” ride system first used at Pooh’s Hunny Hunt in Tokyo in 2000 and conveniently due to be used for Hong Kong Disneyland’s new Mystic Manor dark ride, due to open late 2013.

Almost more important than the dark ride, for a park so starved of facilities as Walt Disney Studios, will be the restaurant incorporated into the showbuilding itself. As we’ve hinted in the past, this probably won’t be the stuffy Gusteau’s dining experience you might have expected, but a rather more informal and fun “rat-sized” restaurant as imagined at the end of the film itself. Despite much investment in attractions, a short-sighted lack of dining provision is one of the key reasons why the Studios’ opening hours remain cut short even in peak seasons.

Euro Disney S.C.A.’s first quarter revenues announcement on 7th February could be a good moment for the company to confirm the project. Though given past experience, don’t expect anything more than a black and white footnote to trumpet what may well be the most exciting development for the Studios in all its beleaguered ten years. Something unique to the park, technologically advanced, classically Disney and inclusive to all ages. Come on Rémy, surprise us!

VIA Disney Central Plaza