Universal Studios

Yes it has been decided we will try to tackle the 2 yes 2 universal parks in Orlando in one day. The two parks are Universal Studios Orlando Florida and Islands of Adventures. From what I am seeing from the break downs of the parks is the Universal Studios takes on a more American city theme for the park areas while Islands of Adventures has more Movie themed areas where the rides are based on the area.

I think what we will do for our day at Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure  is spend the morning at Universal Studios then the afternoon (possibly some of the morning) at Islands of Adventure. Universals Studios in divided into

• Production Central
• Woody Woodpeckers Kid Zone
• San Francisco/Amity
• Hollywood
• World Expo (Nothing like World Showcase at Disney World though sounds the same)
• New York

When it comes to rides there’s not many that I am interested in going on, Mum on the other hand has found the one ride she really wants to go on, E.T Adventures. In this ride guests mount a bike (The ride has a couple on a platform) and you travel around scenes from the movie as you try to get E.T home where you get to visit. This is a ride also at Universal Studios in California and hold a very funny memory for my family. At the start of the ride you give your name to one of the ride operators. At the end of the ride E.T says goodbye to you and actually says your name. My family has very simple names that a computer could say except  Mum her name we were expecting to be said funny but in the end it turned our Dad’s name was too hard being call Row-Burt by E.T. We laughed so much. This ride is very child friendly it is located in Woody Woodpeckers Kid Zone. It’s not completely just for kids adults will enjoy it too. Just be warned if your child does not like E.T or get scared of dark places they may find the ride frightening.

A show on at Woody Woodpeckers Kid Zone is the Animal Actors on Location. The show combined live animal appearances with video as well as audience participation. I was also reading somewhere that the animals in the show were rescued from local shelters. Not too sure how true this is. This show has the potential to be cute, it’s great if you love animals.

Production central is home for the Rip Ride Rocket Roller Coast, Jimmy Neutron Nicktoon Blast and Shrek 4-D. Well Rip Ride Rocket Roller Coast is not on our list because it’s a roller coast. Shrek 4-D has made it onto my list just because I always love 4-D shows. The 3D in them are really great and the 4-D just really adds to the experience of watching in 3D. Added smells, spraying water on the audience when the film has a scene on water.

San Francisco/Amity seems to have the most I want to see. The Jaws ride (if you can call it that) is a boat ride out into the lake (seen in map above), though at some point during your cruise the boat is attacked by a great white. One would assume the great white is mechanical. Other wise there’s Disaster! and with a name like that it sounds like it has the potential to be one. The description on this ride is a bit confusing all I know for sure is you get into a “train” and then the roof of the subway caves in, it looks like a plane hits the train and the subway fills with water. It’s meant to be that you are the extras for some film that’s being made. Next is a show Beetlejuice’s Graveyard Revue. It’s a rock show with Beetlejuice and the classic film monsters eg. Frankenstein’s monster and his bride, the Wolfman, Dracular and The Phantom of the Opera. WDW has a section on Universal Studios and the person who wrote up the section for this show was not a fan. Might as well see it, and if I don’t enjoy it I can leave. It’s outdoors after all.

Hollywood is not really tempting me to see any of the shows. Lucy – A tribute is great for Lucille Ball, whom I’m sure most young people  (gen y down) wouldn’t know who she was. I only know because I’ve seen I Love Lucy and I just watched an episode of Here’s Lucy about an hour ago. You get to see some clips from her shows and costumes and other mementoes of Lucy. I’m looking forward to Universal Horror Make-Up Show, it’s a stage show showing how the make up and prop artist make horror gory special effects. Then there’s finally Terminator 2: 3-D, James Cameron helped with this getting the cast from the second film back to films scenes to I think either tie in with the film, being a scene from the film timeline but not in the film, or they re filmed scenes from the film to fit with the ride better. I’m not a big terminator fan. I think it’s a mix of a ride and 3-D. Not to sure. This is supposedly something not to miss. If I do miss it I probably won’t regret it much.

World Expo had 2 attractions, of those 2 I only want to see 1. The one I don’t want to see is The Simpsons. I feel personally they are over exposed so I have lost all interest in the yellow family. I want to keep what every good memories I have of the show back when it was, dare I say good. The ride I do want to go on is Men in Black: Alien Attack. I saw the name of this ride and my first thought was Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin and the first thing WDW said was basicly it’s like that ride. So it was an instant decision of must go. I liked the MIB films. The first was great second ok hopefully the ride is at least good.

Finally is New York. More roller coasters with Revenge of the Mummy, to be honest I have no idea why the ride is in New York when the films are based in Egypt and London, China as well if you include the 3rd film. I may get the nerve to go on this ride only because I loved the first 2 films. I probably didn’t like the third because I watched it on an aeroplane and I don’t get along with them. Twister…Ride it Out lets you feel what it’s like to be in the middle of a twister (the ride comes with a warning of you may get wet). But standing in a stage with lots of wind blowing and rain sounds like walking home in the middle of winter (and summer) here.  On the side of one of the streets guests will be lucky to see The Blues Brothers perform. My brother is a big fan of that movie and he sort of got me hooked on it, well more the music but that car case scene is truly has the best car pile up in movie history.

That’s it for this post. Next one will be on Islands of Adventure. I thought I could cover both parks in one posting but I couldn’t which now has me worried about doing both parks in one day. Maybe I’ll swap the order we go. Why? Wait till the next magical (wink) post.

Take care