Aerosmith gets its last day at Walt Disney World

Reportedly, the pre-show area has already been gutted from the attraction even though it is still operating. Aside from the addition of a Scooter animatronic in the pre-show room, it sounds like this will be a very light retheme. Even though they've started doing some of the work to convert this to the Muppets, there's only so much work that can be done in the 4-5 months the attraction will be closed. As expected when they announced this project, the only notable changes will be to the pre-show and on-ride audio. It's possible WDI make a few tweaks to the on-ride scenery to give it more of a Muppets flare, but I don't expect anything earth-shattering here with very little changes to the flat props seen along the course. I do think the pre-show animatronic will be nice (probably along the lines of Hondo from MF:SR), but IMHO it's going to be the on-ride audio that really makes or breaks this retheme. Disney has yet to announce what musical artists will collaborate with the Muppets on this (if any), but if they can get some big-name musicians, especially those that have worked with the Muppets before like Lady Gaga, Foo Fighters/Dave Grohl, and Elton John, it will make it easier for guests to forget all the great Aerosmith songs that played during the ride.

I would bet heavily on the playlist being exclusively Electric Mayhem songs. Music licensing fees aren’t cheap and the Muppets have plenty of in-house tunes to pull from.

@James - I would tend to agree, but the recent Muppets series on Disney+ featured a number of well known musicians, and they have a long history of working with top performers in the music industry dating all the way back to the old Muppet Show. While I agree that music rights are expensive, especially for what would likely need to be an "in perpetuity/ad infinitum" use license, it doesn't seem like Disney is spending a ton of money on the physical retheming of the attraction. Music is a major part of this ride, especially that randomly rotating on-board soundtrack, that I don't think that Disney could get away with using only Electric Mayhem tunes that most people wouldn't recognize. Imagine GotG:CR using a symphonic score instead of the 6 popular tunes that were chosen for random rotation.

@ Russell - I agree, and imagine there will a lot of upset people to ride THE Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster, and have it be a bunch of Muppet songs most people haven't hear of.

I remember first time on this in August of 1999. Had heard of it but online ride videos weren't a thing then and no video lets you feel that acceleration. Just stunning and happy FastPass just created to go on it a few times. It was unreal thinking "this is a Disney ride?!" and still a fave.

HUGE Aerosmith fan here, but i was in agreement that their time had come. After reading up on what's happening, now I am concerned the Muppet makeover is going to be HUGE dud.

TBH after seeing what they did to Rockin' Rollercoaster in Paris, its probably a good thing that this isn't a full on re-do of the attraction.

This ride introduced me to Aerosmith, still one of my favorite bands. I can concede it's time to remove the band from the ride. I'm concerned the Muppet overlay will be a flop because it seems like there won't be enough of the Muppets themselves within the attraction. On the surface, all of this seems perfect. Close MuppetVision, keep the Muppets in the park by sticking them on this ride, and ditch the old rock band in the process. But, it looks like we'll wind up with a cheaper-looking coaster covered in sloppy neon paint. I would have liked to have seen a different real-life band replace Aerosmith, but I'm not sure who that would be. If you want to keep the, "rock and roll attitude," of the ride, it's tough to think of any current rock band who currently have the cultural cachet that Aerosmith did in the late '90s.