PHOTO - Walt Disney Imagineering shares more details on Star Wars Rise of the Resistance

Aug 27, 2019 in "Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance"

Inside Star Wars Rise of the Resistance hangar
Posted: Tuesday August 27, 2019 11:09am ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

Walt Disney Imagineering has today share more information on the upcoming Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance - one of the most ambitious, advanced and immersive experiences ever undertaken by Walt Disney Imagineering. 


The new attraction will take guests aboard a full-size transport shuttle before they are captured by a Star Destroyer and wind up in the middle of a climactic battle between the First Order and the Resistance. The harrowing adventure will blur the lines between fantasy and reality on a scale never seen before in a Disney attraction.

Walt Disney Imagineering released additional details about what promises to be one of the most thrilling experiences ever created for a Disney theme park:

  • Guests will join the Resistance and depart from Batuu in a transport ship to meet General Leia Organa at a secret rendezvous point. However, on their way to the hidden base, guests are intercepted and taken prisoner by the First Order as their ship is drawn into the hangar bay of a Star Destroyer. The action then ramps up as guests seek to escape the clutches of Kylo Ren and the First Order.
  • Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance will bring guests face to face with some of their favorite Star Wars characters, including Resistance heroes Rey, Poe and Finn, as well as Kylo Ren and General Hux of the First Order.
  • Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance is one of the largest attractions Disney has ever created. Its massive show building is a world unto itself, housing two full-sized AT-AT walkers and a Star Destroyer hangar bay – complete with a TIE fighter and a garrison of Stormtroopers – plus more thrills and surprises.
  • Walt Disney Imagineering will combine multiple ride systems to tell the story of Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. In one sequence, a new simulator experience will give the sensation to guests they are falling from space to crash land on Batuu.
  • During a portion of the experience, guests will race through a Star Destroyer in a trackless ride vehicle featuring an onboard droid that reacts to its surroundings.

Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance opens Dec. 5, 2019, at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida and Jan. 17, 2020, at Disneyland Park in California.

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Henry Mystic22 hours ago

It’s a sensor issue. It’s likely it could be addressed in a refurbishment, but who knows.

Henry Mystic22 hours ago

I really hope Rise gets a refurbishment. It’s been in rough shape for a while now. We’ll probably have to wait for a new ride to take up its ILL spot, but one can hope.

trainplane325 days ago

Not the issue.

TrainsOfDisney27 days ago

I like that idea, maybe one could hide and the other pass and then hide and pass? Could be fun. The programming could be kind of hide and seek - would be a clever use of that space.

DisneyCane27 days ago

I don't know if it is possible but instead of having the transporter randomly back up for (now) no apparent reason, it should pull in next to a cannon to avoid being seen and then back out and continue. The way it is now makes absolutely no sense at all in the context of the ride story. They also need a complete wall to block the finale Kylo when in B mode. It's not that hard to see the AA there.

Magicart8727 days ago

Seems like an interim fix or b mode would be to have the guns retract or recoil backwards with the base still remaining fixed in place. It'd be a complete rebuild but still seems like they could still find a way to animate it while remaining stationary.

DisneyCane27 days ago

I thought the same. They just had the doors open on the right side room and had a CM hold everyone and then release them to the transporter.

TrainsOfDisney27 days ago

They wouldn’t collide but when the sequence got a little off timing the ride would stop. I think the issue now has a solution so maybe after they go down for rehab one day we may see them work again. Time will tell.

MisterPenguin27 days ago

That's odd since they have two Rey rooms.

Dragonman27 days ago

I have a theory that the cannons are stationary to avoid collisions with the ride vehicles but idk how true that is. It could just boil down to lazy maintenance or a yeti situation.

DisneyCane27 days ago

Rode 2x last night. Rey pre show was off. Kinda sucks if you've never ridden before. 2nd time CMs tried giving a little backstory performance. Effects all worked (we got one path each ride) except Kylo finale AA. That's a major downgrade. First time I've seen that not work for me. Of course cannons stationary but I doubt those ever get fixed.

RoysCabinFeb 14, 2024

That "linear story" thing may be a factor, for sure; I don't think I watched a full ride through video before going on, but I'd seen pictures and heard descriptions of stuff. Still, I've watched full ride-throughs and Martin's entire tribute to a ride like, say, Phantom Manor, but I still have a lot of desire to actually be on that ride for myself and see it firsthand, and I think it being less linear story-wise and more experiential contributes to that.

Marc Davis FanFeb 14, 2024

This is a really interesting take. Thanks for sharing all these details. Did you already watch the RotR ride-throughs, or were you going in spoiler-free? I think one issue is that it’s very linear-story-driven, which makes it particularly impressive when you’ve not watched videos of it. That was my experience and that of a number of friends I’ve gone with since (and interestingly, most found it especially impressive on the second ride-through, perhaps because there’s so much going on that one doesn’t catch the story as well on the first ride-through). I was also blown away be the land itself—including the rockwork, small details, and how the layout promotes exploration/discovery. The main thing I found lacking—apart from the kinetics as has been discussed a lot—is the “architecture of reassurance,” which is particularly noticeable at DL since it’s so at odds with how that quality permeates the whole rest of the park. Edit: Rereading your post, I see that indeed you were not going in spoiler-free, and I think that was likely a major factor.

RoysCabinFeb 14, 2024

Ironically, I just got back from a trip yesterday; my brother got us a Lightning Lane for Rise, but it was actually shut down first thing when the park opened and didn't open up for a few hours. That was the first time I got to experience Rise, Smuggler's Run, and Galaxy's Edge as a whole (didn't get to have a drink at the cantina, granted), and I have to say my reaction was a pretty resounding "it was ok." Don't mistake me, I can see the technological work and everything that went into the attraction and ride, and my friends thought I was kind of crazy for not being more enthusiastic, but I couldn't help it - probably didn't help that I knew a lot of what was in the ride already (wish the AT-AT room had been a surprise for me), but I just didn't really have much of a reaction to a lot of what was happening...notable exception being Kylo's lightsaber lighting up and approaching the car, that was a fantastic effect. It occurred to me that it was pretty much the same reaction I had to Flight of Passage when I last went to WDW in 2019; nice ride, wouldn't mind going on again if the lines are reasonable, but I didn't really see anything that made me want to spend extra money on a Lightning Lane or wait on any lengthy lines. I wonder if part of it is just not really having any kind of emotional attachment to the movies the rides are based on; I've never watched the Avatar movies, and the Star Wars sequel trilogy just left no impression on me in the end (ended up not bothering with Rise of Skywalker), so just getting to see characters/settings from them really leaves me feeling kind of empty. Rides can still be effective when they're based on a film/series a rider isn't familiar with, but they have to be designed a certain way to overcome the lack of familiarity/care a rider might have. Unfortunately, I feel like a lot of the newer IP-based rides don't have that enough. To me, attractions need to be more evocative than anything else; the more plot you squeeze into them, the more the experience kind of suffers, and it doesn't solve the problem to have a bunch of "Leo DiCaprio points at the TV" moments for fans to go "I recognize that!" over. Flight of Passage avoids doing too much of that, to its credit, but not really caring about the sequel trilogy made this ride feel a bit hollow for me, at least relative to the hype. End of the day, I kind of felt it was a 3 star out of 5 kind of attraction, but one that's hyped, budgeted, and presented as something that breaks the scale. Meantime, I felt like it was an inferior version of Spider-man over at Islands of Adventure, which is over 20 years old but still 100% held up when I got to ride it again in 2019. I wonder how it'd fare if Galaxy's Edge maintained that whole "LARP" quality it was going for initially, where your ride experiences would influence your experience in the wider land, but I ended up feeling about Galaxy's Edge the same way I did about Pandora, but to an even stronger degree: it's "Disney's answer to Potter, without getting what makes Potter work." So yeah, pretty good, but nothing I'm particularly enthusiastic about.