Carnival & Fair News

The new Pixar Pier attraction, featuring a revamped roller coaster as its centerpiece, will open on June 23rd at the Disney California Adventure Park. The park adjoins Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif.

The Pixar-themed attraction features four distinct neighborhoods, each representing Pixar characters’ adventures, with rides, food concessions, and gift shops themed to each of the four. Disney content representative Erin Glover notes that one of the largest and most thrilling new attractions is the Incredicoaster. “This is a revamp of the former California Screamin’ roller coaster, an icon of the park since 2001.”

A central part of the Paradise Pier section of the park that is now being transformed into Pixar Pier, California Screamin’ was an intrinsic part of an attraction area designed to resemble a classic California amusement park pier in the 1920s. While fans of the area lined up to get in last rides and souvenirs in January of this year, there’s even more excitement and anticipation for the revamp.

Incredicoaster will include engineering reboots of the existing coaster launch system and a 360-degree loop, according to Glover. The coaster structure itself remains the same – that of the world’s longest steel looping roller coaster. Riders in the 24-passenger cars zoom from 0 to 55 m.p.h. in just four seconds. And those thrills are just simply too good to replace.

So, rather than re-creating the technology of the original impressive coaster, the theme and story of the ride are what will change, creating the adventures of the superhero family in 2004’s The Incredibles. The first sequel to that film, which has been a long time coming, will premiere in June – the perfect segue to the new Incredicoaster ride.

As visitors enter the new ride, they’ll find a new, modern glass entry way and an area for waiting riders to queue up in the shade, as well.

Walt Disney Imagineering Producer Jeffrey Shaver-Moskowitz has described the reason for the thematic change. “We had this great coaster with no theme and no story,” he states, adding that now the story that riders will experience is about “the Incredibles family of superheroes rescuing their baby Jack-Jack.”

In the original film, superheroes and former crime fighters Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl had three children, Violet, Dash and Jack-Jack, also with superhero powers, and were living anonymously as the Parr family in suburbia. Their sojourn in the ‘burbs ended with the necessity to return to superhero action to save the world. The ride is designed to expand and continue their story, with the family honored for their heroics from the film.

Park visitors will first experience The Incredibles backstory as they wait in line to board, hearing that it is supposed to be the first launch day of the coaster and that the entire Incredibles family will be on hand for the opening. Because superhero baby Jack-Jack is deemed as too small to go on the ride, he’s sent off to the VIP lounge to wait. However the tiny but powerful tot isn’t thrilled with that turn of events, and uses his superpowers to escape and go on the coaster after all.

Once they’ve boarded the ride, park guests will be able to see how the superhero family tries to catch their baby as the ride goes on. These adventures will be viewed as riders enter a series of so-called scream tunnels.
In the first tunnel, Jack-Jack’s older brother Dash attempts to catch him -unsuccessfully. The second tunnel features Jack-Jack’s mom, Elastigirl attempting to stop him by going inside the uphill tunnel ramp. Then it’s dad — Mr. Incredible’s chance at foiling the baby – but he fails to lure his child out of the ride with a cookie. In the next tunnel, the baby’s sister Violet tries to catch him with a force field; but success will only come at the end of the ride. As another element, the coaster will include a new, specially designed musical score to set the stage for these adventures.

Along with the Incredicoaster, California Adventure park visitors will find a new float featuring the Incredibles family as a part of the already-popular Paint the Night parade. The parade debuted at the park when the Pixar Fest commenced throughout California Adventure and Disneyland on April 13th.

The fest also includes a Pixar shorts film festival, and Pixar themes in the Disneyland fireworks display, as well as live appearances of favorite Pixar characters from Buzz and Woody to the Incredibles at Paradise Gardens at the revamped Pixar Pier for a new photo op with the kids.

In Disneyland, guests can continue to enjoy the popular Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters Ride, Finding Nemo submarines, and Radiator Springs racers. All three attractions have plenty of “Buzz” in Disneyland. Back at Paradise Pier in California Adventure, the Toy Story Midway Mania ride continues to allow guests to aim at moving objects in a 4D game that features Pixar characters from the film Toy Story; the ride is now centrally located within a Toy Story-themed neighborhood. Also at Pixar Pier, a new play area with an Inside Out theme is planned. Food stands will have Pixar character themes; Ariel’s Grotto has become the Lamplight Lounge with gastro-pub cuisine and cocktails for the adults that also offer loosely Pixar-themed fare.

Throughout the Pixar Pier area, Disney staff members will have new uniforms designed to fit the attraction area’s theme.

As always, Disney has pulled out all the stops to create a detailed experience of Pixar film fun, with the new Incredicoaster an “incredible” and scream-worthy place to start exploring the adventures of all these favorite animated characters.