Walt Disney Imagineering unveils progress on Tiana's Bayou Adventure Animatronics

Sep 11, 2023 in "Tiana's Bayou Adventure"

Forum Forums Tweet Share Tweet Share

Gallery / 1 Photo
Louis Audio-Animatronic figure at Walt Disney Imagineering

Posted: Monday September 11, 2023 10:53am ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

During this past weekend's Destination D23 event, Walt Disney Imagineering gave us a rare look inside the Audio-Animatronics Workshop as work continues on Tiana's Bayou Adventure.

Louis Audio-Animatronic figure at Walt Disney Imagineering

In the video below, a large audio-animatronic version of Louis is being assembled before being installed inside the attraction.

Speaking at the event, Disney Parks Chairman Josh D'Amaro said, "These folks are doing amazing work. They're hard at work on all the figures that we're just packing into this attraction. It's going to be such a great experience experience, bringing you a new story from Tiana's world that picks off right where that classic film left off."

Tiana's Bayou Adventure will open in late 2024 at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom and Disneyland.

Tiana's Bayou Adventure logo

Discuss on the Forums

Get Walt Disney World News Delivered to Your Inbox

EagleScout6108 hours ago

I completely forgot they're planning on closing Big Thunder. That'll be disasterous for Frontierland if Bayou can't operate for a full day and BTMRR is down.

monothingie9 hours ago

BTM is planned to be closing for an extended refurbishment imminently. TBA as a new ride was unlikely to close this winter. Without TBA you have an entire land without a major attraction and a severe hit to capacity. They've painted themselves into a corner in terms of what they can do.

Mike S12 hours ago

Finally rode it myself. What a downgrade. Splash Mountain was a ride I could go on again and again every trip. This? Once is enough if I’m even feeling like it. Can’t wait to go to Tokyo one day just to see it again.

EagleScout61013 hours ago

The way I see it, they have two options - A. Shut down TBA less than a month after opening it to fix the bugs B. Wait until winter (when they would usually refurbish Splash) to take it down and fix it then. The issue becomes, do they admit their new ride can't function properly when the old one worked (admittedly less so at the end), or let it close multiple times a day for a good chunk of its debut season?

EricsBiscuit14 hours ago

IIRC it took them a while to fix FEA too. Within a couple months they’ll fine tune it.

monothingie17 hours ago

The problem with TBA is that they are unable or unwilling to fix it at this point. Unable because the problem can not be resolved without extended downtime. Unwilling because shutting it down for a month or more would be a tremendous embarrassment. Ironically I think more guests would be less critical of an unplanned refurbishment to get it working properly, than to have it breakdown for half the day on a constant basis. But I guess that would bruise some pretty inflated egos at the company.

EricsBiscuit1 day ago

FEA is a very apt comparison. Both rides are enjoyable but had rough openings and are objectively not as good as what they replaced.

co100641 day ago

This attraction’s opening reminds me of FEA in so many ways. I wasn’t following the opening of FEA very closely, but I remember there being substantial downtime and ride evacs early on. I don’t know what changed to get the ride more reliable, but hopefully they can fix it soon! It’s very disappointing when you plan to experience a new attraction on a (very expensive) vacation but don’t get that opportunity.

MisterPenguin1 day ago

BrerFoxesBayouAdventure1 day ago

One can only hope DL's version isn't as pitiful in terms of operation.

lightningtap3471 day ago

This is egregiously bad too as today's a day where we didn't have any rain. Today was the day NOT to have this happen.

monothingie1 day ago

7 hours of total downtime today. Just the latest continuing example of a day in which the ride was down just as much as it was up. They can’t fix this thing and they can’t shut it down for an extended refurbishment so soon, so they’re just going to let it limp along and get progressively worse and downplay any vocal complaints about these problems. This was so predictable. Shame on the shills who gaslighted anyone critical of this mess. Congratulations Disney you built a mediocre attraction\