Universal Orlando set to unveil new drone show, hot on the heels of Disney

Apr 29, 2024 in "Universal Orlando Resort"

Forum Forums Tweet Share Tweet Share

Gallery / 2 Photos
CineSational: A Symphonic Spectacular concept art

Posted: Monday April 29, 2024 3:50pm ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

Today, Universal Orlando announced that the waters of the Universal Studios Florida lagoon will come to life with an all-new nighttime show, CineSational: A Symphonic Spectacular.

CineSational: A Symphonic Spectacular concept art

The new show will celebrate the emotional power of music by leveraging the iconic scores and scenes from blockbuster films that have inspired Universal Orlando's past, present and future attractions – including Warner Bros. Pictures Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts films, Jurassic World, Jaws, Shrek, Ghostbusters, Trolls, Back to the Future, Universal Monsters, Transformers, How to Train Your Dragon, E.T., Fast and Furious, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Minions, The Mummy and King Kong.

CineSational: A Symphonic Spectacular will feature 228 fountains that reach heights up to 131 feet, 4K projection mapping, an original composition featuring newly arranged scores, and more than 600 drones.

CineSational: A Symphonic Spectacular concept art

Disney will launch its own drone show on May 24, although we don't yet know the number of drones involved.

"Disney Dreams That Soar" will showcase Disney stories celebrating the joy of flight with state-of-the-art drones choreographed to create designs in the sky, paired with a "soaring" musical score and memorable movie quotes. Disney Dreams That Soar will run nightly from May 24 through September 2, 2024.

Disney Dreams that Soar

Walt Disney World has previously presented a limited-time drone show, Starbright Holidays, at Disney Springs for the 2016 holiday season in association with Intel and its Shooting Star drone product. That 5-minute show featured 300 drones, intricately choreographed in 3D space over the Disney Springs lake and synchronized to holiday music.

Starbright Holidays overview

Discuss on the Forums

Get Walt Disney World News Delivered to Your Inbox

Coaster Lover23 days ago

Saw CineSational for the first time this past weekend. Super impressed! Is there room for improvement? Sure, but overall, it's a very, VERY solid show (and one that I would gladly come back to see again!). The mixed used of drones, pyro, fountains, and projections was very effective and provided a great canvas to tell an intriguing story! Hoping they will this as a proof of concept for whatever night time show they have planned for Epic Universe!

jrhwdwJun 24, 2024

So...Chances of the Toy Solder Band back in MOUACT? Steve, why won't MK and Epcot do what we know their capable of???? This doesn't give me hope for 2025!!!!!!!!!!!

Andrew25Jun 24, 2024

The summer before the storm they were inconsistent when it came to showtimes still. The show is great, and I'm hoping Universal can operate it far more consistently, especially during weekends.

JoeCamelJun 24, 2024

I think they were having trouble getting it show ready on a consistent basis then it was damaged in the storm so they started over. Hit a home run with this one

Andrew25Jun 24, 2024

Ends August 25th for "HHN Season" and will return in November (based on how they ran Cinematic Celebration). Problem with Universal is that they have the tendency to have inconsistent showtimes.. so it's hard to tell when they run it. There's weeks where they would run it on a Tuesday, and not run until Sunday since private events can take over the park on Friday/Saturdays. Cinematic Celebration was a great show, but ruined by poor communication on when it ran.

DisoneJun 24, 2024

It ends its nightly run August 25th or it ends August 25th? Like it's not going to continue on weekends or whenever the park is open past a certain time? Seems like a huge investment to only do it for a couple of months. Just saw the show in person tonight. Absolutely spectacular. Universal has not had a night time show this good ever. Absolutely their best attempt. I laughed, it gave me goosebumps. I even teared up at one point. The show is tall the show is wide, and above all as I already indicated, the show has emotion. Something that was lacking in all of their previous night time spectacular attempts. I'm not going to say it's a perfect show but dang it's a very good effort. I think the screen resolution is a bit off. And that will have me pull it back from an A+ to a solid A.

mergatroidJun 17, 2024

Thanks for that.

Andrew25Jun 17, 2024

The show is great, I think all the nitpicks here are somewhat valid... but it's a great show at the end. It is odd to choose music as the reason for the show, but you can easily ignore that and just watch the show itself. No reason to dislike the show over it. Good to see most of Orlando's parks all have great nighttime shows (including SeaWorld's ignite). It supposedly will have, they are just behind construction wise. There's a new building on the water they are working on that will support the effect. Cinesational ends August 25th, doubt they have enough time to create a HHN show for this year... but I hope they at least use the lighting/fountains/projectors to add to the park's ambience. One minor thing they added to the park were spotlights at the USF arches. IOA has 3 (Hulk, Lighthouse, Velocicoaster), so now USF has their very own.

mergatroidJun 16, 2024

Some good points, to be honest I found most of it meh. I came away thinking I wonder how much they spent on that and hoping it wasn't expensive. The clarity of the projections was disappointing and the drones whilst good, weren't utilised enough. Large parts appeared to be mostly music accompanied by high fountains lit up, I wanted more variety. The thing that disappointed me was that the fountains didn't 'dance' to the music. By that I mean take a look at the Bellagio fountains and how they move to music. I think if it were more like that I would be more entertained rather than thinking this looks the same for every song. I'm there in September again for HHN and was wondering whether they'll have this show or the special HHN show they had last year if anyone knows?

Centauri Space StationJun 15, 2024

That’s been gone for 4 years

TTA94Jun 14, 2024

I agree. It does look a good show. Strange they did not have any fire effects. I’m still salty Universal has this WoC type show and WDW does not lol.

Henry MysticJun 14, 2024

It’s genuinely brilliantly designed and a bold new direction for theme parks. Disney for too long played it too safe. My guess is MK will still take the top spot just being what people think of “Disney World,” but it’ll definitely be #2. Universal will still have a problem where too many attractions have height restrictions to truly compete with MK for families. The question is how much will it cannibalize the other Orlando parks? AK and USF are likely to struggle, but they’re sort of taking the hit, understanding that it’s pretty inevitable. Disney isn’t even trying to compete with Epic because they know nothing they can do will be able to until the hype dies down. Though, if Epic is indeed successful, and it’s likely to be, Epic, IoA, and USF will see expansions start rather quickly that will continue upping the ante. TWDC has a response with significant additions planned for every existing domestic parks and after that decade is done new parks are likely going to happen. Mind you, these are all very longterm plans, so many things outside Disney/Uni’s control can change that. Potter was only the beginning of the theme park wars.

DisoneJun 14, 2024

Now that's a bold statement. Is it more interesting because it's new to you or is it more interesting because it is genuinely better design? It won't be open the entire calendar year of 2025 but would you also predict in 2026 Universal's Epic Universe will be the number one theme park in Central Florida?

jrhwdwJun 14, 2024

Select Nights through Aug 25th.....Come on USF!!!! You don't need to pull that till HHN Starts! I believe HEA is every Night till MNSSHP!(July 3-4th Celebrate America of course)