Epcot's first-ever roller coaster opens officially to all Walt Disney World guests this morning.
Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind delivers a plussed Space Mountain-style experience for fans of the Marvel franchise - or anyone else who appreciates a first-class theme park adventure. The indoor roller coaster takes over the former Universe of Energy/Ellen's Energy Adventure space in what is now the World Discovery neighborhood in Epcot.
Guests who wish to ride Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind will need to either buy a $17 Individual Lightning Lane pass to the ride or enter Disney's virtual queue for standby access. Both alternatives will open at 7am in the official Walt Disney World My Disney Experience app. And both are expected to book quickly, so make sure that you have everyone in your party registered together in the app, then refresh it right before the top of the hour so that you can submit your request at exactly 7:00:00 am Eastern time.
There will be a second-chance entry to the virtual queue at 1pm, and guests of Disney's Deluxe hotels also may request to enter the queue at 7pm on evenings when Epcot will be open for extended evening hours. For the 7am and 1pm virtual queue entry opportunities, you must have a park reservation for Epcot, and you must be in the park physically for the 1pm entry opportunity.
Note that guests using the pay-to-play Individual Lightning Lane will miss the Xandar Gallery walk-through exhibit in the ride's standby queue. Sure, you will have a shorter wait to the pre-show and then the ride itself, but the gallery does set a mood for the rest of the adventure, including some fun lines from the Guardians.
If you want to sneak peek of what awaits you in the Wonders of Xandar pavilion here is our review from the attraction's media preview earlier this month: Ride Review: Disney's Guardians of the Galaxy Cosmic Rewind.
And here is our walk-through video of the queue and pre-show, followed by Disney-approved on-ride video highlights.
That wasn't the music that you will hear on the coaster, however. Riders will get one of six Guardians-approved "Awesome Mix" songs on their ride:
I got "Disco Inferno" - which is possibly my favorite song ever - for my ride in the video above, so that's part of the reason why I am so absolutely loving life there.
And the ride itself is the rest of the reason. After I posted my review, I asked the question, How Does the New Guardians Coaster Rank Among Disney Rides?, if you would like to see what I - and other Theme Park Insider readers - had to say about that.
If you get on Guardians today or in the week ahead, we would love to read your reaction to the ride, in the comments.
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'Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind' is opening on the fifth anniversary of 'Flight of Passage' ... Which was followed in 2019 by Rise of the Resistance' ... And TRON waiting in the (if you had) wings.
Hopefully the VQ ends after a few weeks. VQs at Disney create artificial demand as there are those that would not stand in a long line for repeat rides.
In previews it appears the ride is running with little down time (much less than RotR or Remy) so hopefully the VQ ends faster than it did for those rides and it goes strictly to ILL and standby queue.
I have a strict no video rule until I experience the attraction in person. This ride is seriously pushing that rule with me. I'm so curious to check this out and press play on that video above with Robert. Nevertheless, I should be able to ride it in October and it clearly seems like a winner. I wonder if there is a sneaky tribute to Universe of Energy somewhere on this ride. Seems like there would be. A dinosaur or Bill Nye somewhere in the attraction for example.
Ha ... @Twobits, trust me you wouldn't be hoping for the VQ to be gone sooner rather than later, if you were going 3-4 times a week to the parks like I do.
It is my open door to ride the coaster pretty much every time I come to Epcot.
Once that VQ door slams shut it'll just be another once in a blue moon ride, as per Remy and ROTR are for me now.
Did anyone catch how fast the Boarding Passes went today? Hopefully it’s a little more forgiving than the lottery Rise had.
@James - Reports are that all of the boarding groups that were distributed at 7 AM this morning were gone within a minute or 2. I haven't seen reports for the 1 PM distribution yet, but I expect that they would have been sold out just as fast.
Gone within a minute. But double check at 10-12 past the hour at a release for the rerelease of times from people whose apps crashed or who messed up in the initial release.
you simply aren’t a real fan if you aren’t willing to stand in a six hour line for an attraction.
@Mako: Proving my point, thanks. AP holders would not stand in a long line for repeat rides, but they are more than willing to grab a VQ pass. And as you all have a lot of practice on how to grab them fast, I suspect a lot of the VQ passes go to AP holders.
But to be fair, you are correct. If I was an AP holder, I likely would have rode RotR daily when they was the only way to ride.
Actually @Twobits, it’s not a re-rideable attraction for me. Too much spinning, but you are correct, we will take advantage of the VQ until it expires, and then after that, as and when the wait time is less than 30mins. That’s my max limit anyway, others may wait longer.
I’ve ridden ROTR well over 30 times, and other than my pass holder preview, every time it was via the VQ. Don’t think I’ve been on since they took away the boarding groups.
I was into the boarding group grab phase seconds after the VQ opened this morning at 7am, yet I had #100 and a posted 590min wait. That would have put me at 4:50pm. I’m not sure if there was some sort of compensation factor added into that time because of the ILL’s, but my group was called at 1:05pm, and from entering the building to exiting the ride took about 45mins.
All in all, not bad for the 1st day.
VQ is the best if you're good with your phone. When it was in use on RotR, we rode everyday we went, and for no additional cost!
Now it's $20 a head or an interminable line in the hot, shadeless sun (thanks Disney!) that doesn't move because of all the ILL people going ahead of you.
Which is to say I probably won't ride it again unless and until the ILL removed. So lame.
Sounds like it had a very good day of operations, Mako. As I have heard already, the ride is pretty reliable, and hopefully VQ is eliminated soon.
Glad to hear it's reliable. I still have flashbacks to how it took about three years to get Test Track going and even then breakdowns.
What is "shadeless sun"?
The sun with no shade
"The sun with no shade"
Which is kind of the opposite of most of the RotR queue that thecolonel complains about (in both DL and DHS). In fact, over half the RotR queue is inside through the Resistance encampment (though open air in many places). The areas with less shade have landscaping that will eventually provide plenty of cover once the foliage grows in some more, much like the FoP queue has done over the past 5 years.
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I have boarding group 100 for today, so I’ll drive over to Epcot later, and (hopefully) ride it for the 2nd time.
I rode it at the pass holder preview and really liked it. It’s a great edition to Epcot, as well as WDW as a whole. The queue line is similar to Hulk with all the items and effects, and I really like the 2-sided loading area. All in all a great experience and something I’ll get a boarding pass for each and every time I go. I know the virtual queue will end after a few months, so now’s the time for me to ride it.
As a coaster I rated it as a 6/10, as an immersive experience, 8.5/10