01x03 - Star Tours

[bunniefuu]

ANNOUNCER 1: Remain seated, please.

(in Spanish)

Please remain seated.

(lively music)

(elephants trumpeting)

MAN: The love of liberty.

(moans)

(screaming)

NARRATOR: For over 30 years,

Disney Parks guests have embarked

on adventures across the galaxy and back.

First, on Star Tours

As a kid, I 100 percent

bought into the notion

that I had truly stepped aboard

a StarSpeeder.

NARRATOR: and it's continued to evolve

and innovate throughout the years.

As new adventures happened,

it's been updated along the way.

NARRATOR: But the recent addition

of Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge?

-(groans)

-Well, that's more than just an update.

If you're wandering through

Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge,

a place you've only imagined

in your dreams,

it's better than that.

NARRATOR: And while these

state-of-the-art attractions

may have redefined

modern theme park immersion,

the Disney Parks

have been immersing guests

-in fantasy and adventure

-(shouting)

ever since the very first day

that Disneyland opened.

To all who come

to this happy place, welcome.

NARRATOR: But this story begins

on Disneyland's second day.

Because on that day,

a special young boy attended the park

for the first time of many.

And that boy was George Lucas.

I was there the second day it opened.

NARRATOR: In fact,

there he is right there!

Probably. Maybe. Who's to say?

Now, of course,

being the young ten-year-old perfectionist

that he was,

he wasn't without his criticisms,

especially when it came

to one area of the park.

Tomorrowland, I thought that was

a portion of the park

that had always been a little less than

what it could have been.

NARRATOR: Well, he obviously missed

the Tomorrowland World Clock.

REPORTER 1: Which tells you, incidentally,

at a glance,

the exact time on any spot on the Earth.

NARRATOR: The nerve of that kid!

What did he know anyway?

Well, lightspeed ahead about 30 years

(groans)

NARRATOR: A lot. Yeah, he knows a lot.

Because, after all, along with its sequels

and subsequent mountain of merchandising,

Star Wars really was

REPORTER 2: More than just a movie.

It was a cultural phenomenon

for everyone in that time.

It really changed everything.

NARRATOR: And nowhere more than Hollywood

where the race was on

to create the next sci-fi epic.

But Disney had an ace in the hole,

as it were, with 1979's The Black Hole.

Chock-full of cosmic spectacle,

audiences just weren't

really sucked in by it

-Hello?

-as it were.

And this cinematic slump

wasn't just a problem for Disney Studios,

it also put Imagineers like Tony Baxter

in a bit of a pickle.

When you create a ride based on a movie,

it has to be one

that the audience dearly loves.

NARRATOR: Well, of course.

A movie worthy of a theme park ride

would need to have an exciting story,

iconic characters, and cultural impact.

The Black Hole didn't have that.

-NARRATOR: See?

-Help.

-Little bit of a pickle.

-Mm-hm.

NARRATOR: So, Tony took his grievance

to the top of the flagpole,

straight to Walt's son-in-law

and then Disney CEO Ron Miller.

I had gone to him and said,

"You know, some of the films recently

have not connected with the audience

and they're not the big crowd-pleasers."

NARRATOR: Insulting the boss to his face,

Tony continued.

We got to a point where he realized

we did need to partner with someone,

whether it be Steven Spielberg

or George Lucas.

And Steven being so heavily connected

with our competitor, Universal,

the logical thing was to meet with George.

And he was really open to the idea.

NARRATOR:

Well, of course he was! After all

I've always loved Disneyland.

He says, "I think

what I've been able to do

with the Star Wars series is first rate."

And I think what Disney set up

with Disneyland is first rate.

So a marriage of our two companies

in that regard

seems to be a natural thing.

NARRATOR: Clearly, the feeling was mutual.

And Imagineers like Tom Fitzgerald

couldn't agree more.

We all felt that Star Wars

was a very a Disney film.

Star Wars should be at Disneyland.

NARRATOR: And when it came to exactly

where in the park

they would put Star Wars,

well, that choice was obvious.

I wanted to have an involvement

in Tomorrowland.

I thought that was a portion

of the park that had always been

a little less than

what it could have been.

NARRATOR: Ugh, this again?

Well, the truth is that

while all of the other lands in Disneyland

had remained timeless

throughout the years,

Tomorrowland, by its very nature,

had repeatedly found itself stuck

in time.

Walt's vision of Tomorrowland

was a science factual.

A step into the future with predictions

of constructive things to come.

And, you know,

that gets dated pretty quickly.

REPORTER 2: Here in Disneyland,

the year is 1986. That's way ahead.

NARRATOR: But a Star Wars attraction

could solve all their problems.

(groans)

It'd be science fiction-y, space-y,

whilst, above all else, remaining

-Timeless.

-Great!

Now, how do we do it?

NARRATOR: Well, it would be

the world's first Star Wars attraction,

so, you know, no pressure.

It's a real exciting creative challenge.

NARRATOR: For their first big idea

Well, it's got to be a roller coaster

or some kind of a thrill ride.

NARRATOR: Which isn't exactly

cutting edge. It would need a twist!

Well, we could put a couple

of choice points in the ride.

So, instead of going one way,

you have some choices.

NARRATOR: While definitely innovative,

this idea would create serious issues

with space.

You put three choices

into a roller coaster,

and you suddenly got a building

that's bigger than Anaheim Stadium.

And, by the way, folks,

we already have Space Mountain.

So, we were getting pretty scared about,

you know, how are we gonna deal with this?

And then how do you create

a galaxy far, far away?

A galaxy in any kind of a building?

NARRATOR: Ideas were being struck down.

Until, that is, George visited.

And gave them all a new hope.

Going through the hallways,

George happened to see a storyboard

that was hanging

on one of the walls in the hallway

that showed a series of images

of white water rafts, airplanes,

and he asked what it was.

Turned out that that storyboard

was a result of a trip

that some of our Imagineers

had made to London.

By complete coincidence, Randy Bright,

who worked with the film

end at Imagineering,

had just come back from England.

TONY: And while he was over there,

someone said,

"Hey, you guys are into rides

and all that stuff.

You should go out

and see this industrial company

called Rediffusion."

And he went out there

and he looked at a simulator

that had been used both

for commercial pilots

and military training.

Simulator built like these.

They were interested in getting

into the leisure business,

and so we're looking to see

whether that same technology

could be used for theme park applications.

NARRATOR:

And this all sounded quite good to George.

He said, "I think that might be

an interesting thing for Star Wars."

Pretty soon after that, Tony Baxter and I

were on a plane to London.

NARRATOR: Their mission? To investigate

this "technological terror"

for themselves.

They had this crude mock-up in a warehouse

where they had taken

a few old airline seats,

strapped them to a plywood floor.

I think we all took Dramamine.

We were scared.

NARRATOR: Nevertheless,

the daring and dosed-up Imagineers

dove into the dangerous device.

They had a video projector and a screen,

and they had taken some POV stock footage.

NARRATOR: Cutting-edge stock footage of

A roller coaster.

So, we've abandoned the idea

of doing a roller coaster,

and we're now gonna get in this thing,

and we're gonna watch a roller coaster.

NARRATOR: A roller coaster?

What kind of pilots are they training?

This motion-based simulator

was meant to train pilots

in smooth flights.

(clears throat)

Which was not what we wanted to do.

And, in fact, some of the things

that we asked them

to test for us that day

how fast can it do this,

how fast can it do that

I think broke it.

(clears throat)

With all the flaws and all the problems,

we lived and came out of it,

and we went, "Wow, that was experiences

I've never had before."

We flew back to California very excited

that this was technology

that could be used to put people

into Star Wars.

So, we began working

on how we could flesh that out.

NARRATOR: Meanwhile, within Lucasfilm,

people were starting to wonder,

"What's George cooking up with Disney?"

And in hearing about it, it seemed like it

would be a pretty neat thing to do.

But, you know, I didn't even know

what a simulator ride was.

NARRATOR: Oh, but he will,

as would many at ILM.

George's Industrial Light and Magic

were world leaders in visual effects.

They were behind this,

this, and, of course, this.

And much like Walt and his Imagineers,

ILM had a strong creative hierarchy

focused on bringing

George's visions to life.

And in doing so,

everyone knew their roles.

I'm Dennis Muren. On Star Tours,

I was the effects supervisor

slash maybe director,

'cause there wasn't anybody else

around to direct it.

So, you know, that's it.

NARRATOR: No, that's not it.

Dennis also just happens to be

a nine-time Academy

Award-winning visual effects legend!

So, while Dennis figured out

how to split his time between Star Tours

and finding more shelf space,

the Imagineers turned their attention

to figuring out

How does this thing work?

TOM: We were gonna do things

with this machine

that it was never really intended to do.

And what we discovered was

While you're in motion, we're capable

of going 15 feet to the left,

15 feet to the right,

15 feet up, 15 feet down.

And so, it had a precarious feeling in it.

NARRATOR: Or, in other words

-It pretty quickly made you motion sick.

-(groaning)

And that turned out to be

an art and a science

that they had not mastered

that we had to master at Imagineering

so that it is fun and not nauseating.

NARRATOR:

Well, if that didn't make them sick,

the sheer quantity of all

the other problems that they had might.

There were lots of challenges

to making that initial cabin work.

NARRATOR: Oh! Go on.

How are we going to get people

in and out of it?

Because lots of people

are going to want to go on this.

We need capacity. We need 40 people.

We can't have a single door at the back

where everybody has to file out.

We've got to be efficient.

We're gonna have to create doors

and elevators that come down

and are there immediately.

We need to have doors on the left

and doors on the right

because to get that capacity,

we need what we call through-loading.

Okay, that can be done.

NARRATOR:

Phew. Well, that's solved. What else?

It had to be filmed.

'Cause video didn't exist.

NARRATOR: What are you talking about?

Betamax was more than

Mmm, okay. Good point.

We wanna add

a 70-millimeter film projector.

I've got to have a loop cabinet.

NARRATOR: Ah, a loop cabinet.

Well, let's circle back a few years

on that loop cabinet.

TOM: Disneyland had

a Circle-Vision presentation, Circarama,

and there were problems with it.

NARRATOR:

Namely the film in the projector.

They're scratching, they're breaking,

we're losing panels.

NARRATOR: This was a problem

that no one could have projected.

Luckily, a solution had been concocted

by legendary Disney animator, inventor,

and, not to mention, Mickey Mouse

co-creator himself, Ub Iwerks.

A loop cabinet, which is basically

rather than a film being on a spool,

the film is always just moving

through this cabinet

over rollers in a big loop.

The film never touches itself,

so it never scratched.

And it made these presentations

in the park able to run

with less maintenance and better show.

NARRATOR: But the Star Wars attraction

had to be the best show!

And so Ub Iwerks' Circarama loop cabinet

would be looped in to Star Tours!

But one particular obstacle went far, far

beyond simply attraction mechanics.

Now we had to find the story.

So, we came up with different concepts.

One was more like a military training

like you were being trained

to go off into battle.

NARRATOR: Nice. Death from above

by way of deadly dogfight.

-(screams)

-Sounds fun.

Disneyland is the happiest place on Earth.

(yelling)

(screaming)

Many Bothans died.

That didn't mesh up as well

with the Disneyland DNA.

NARRATOR: Back at ILM,

the wizards of movie magic

were taking a shot at the story.

An idea I had for it

is that the audience members

who are coming in and sitting down,

once it gets going, you realize

that you are Luke.

NARRATOR: But that idea got tossed,

leaving Tony and Tom with one last idea

tucked up their sleeve.

A tour company.

NARRATOR:

And the tour company was called

Cosmic Winds.

Uh

Like a tour bus with a comedic approach.

-(bus horn honks)

-(people giggling)

The tour company was just a,

you know, wildcard.

NARRATOR: And George,

well, being the joker that he is

A comical tour of the galaxy

was the perfect choice.

He just thought that was more Disneyland.

NARRATOR: Clearly, the best idea had won.

It doesn't matter, really.

You know, we're just doing

People are just coming to see Star Wars.

NARRATOR: But anyway,

don't stress too much about the story.

This attraction was just a film

set inside a re-programmable

hydraulic machine.

They can change the story

anytime they like.

And George liked that idea best.

I think this will give us a big advantage

in being able to upgrade the ride

after a certain period of time.

NARRATOR: So, for now, it's settled.

So, we have a tour company.

It's gonna be an airport-type experience.

And that tour company

was gonna take you to some of the planets.

And, accidentally, you're gonna

get pulled into a battle sequence.

-(screaming)

-NARRATOR: Wait, this again?

-Accidentally.

-Fine.

So, then where would

this accidental battle take place?

The trench.

I've got to be in that somehow.

-Of course.

-Yahoo!

NARRATOR:

This iconic scene would be perfect for

Really? I mean, we did that before.

What could we do differently?

They didn't wanna do any shot

that they had done in one of the films.

But it was important to do.

TOM: That is the climactic moment

as a guest that,

"Yep, I'm in it, and I'm sh**ting

that shot that takes out the Death Star."

"Yeah, but you've seen it before."

That's what I thought, you know?

And then so we were at a impasse.

NARRATOR: But there was one who could

bring about balance in the Force.

Dennis just said to me, "You're gonna

have to get George to agree to that."

So, George said, "I, I think, kind of,

Tony has a point there, you know?

I feel that maybe we should have that."

And that shows you what Tony and Tom know

because they deal with the public.

It's entirely different seeing it

on the simulator than in the movie,

and you, like, got to have it there.

DENNIS: You've got to.

NARRATOR:

But soon enough, the tables would turn

because the entire premise

of the simulator

was based around iconic Star Wars visuals.

But Imagineers only knew

how to make attractions.

So they turned to Dennis

to make them a movie.

-No, no, no, no.

-NARRATOR: No?

-No.

-It's not a movie.

NARRATOR:

Well, if it's not a movie, then

-It's a window.

-Oh!

It's essentially one shot

from beginning to end.

The window's got to stay the window

the entire time.

If it's a point of view,

you've got no opportunity

to cut away from what's in front of you.

DENNIS: You always are looking

at what's going on.

So, you've got to travel

from the spaceport at Disneyland

(screaming)

and then back home.

TONY: From Dennis' perspective,

the only way to get from a model

to a matte painting or whatever was

Where to put these invisible cuts?

NARRATOR: But Dennis doesn't have

all those awards for nothing.

So, I had to fall back on what we did

in some of the original Star Wars films,

which was a good old laser flash.

DENNIS: You know, one white frame

on the screen, you can do a transition.

And there's a number of those in the show.

There's a number of things

where something goes real quickly

by the camera

RX-24: Comets!

where everything is lost

and blurs in darkness for a frame or two,

and that's points

of making other transitions.

(yelling)

NARRATOR: So, with at least some ideas

on how to pull it off, ILM got to work.

We had to deliver a,

you know, a 5-minute movie.

-NARRATOR: Wait, don't forget.

-It's a window.

NARRATOR: And with the window

quickly closing in on opening day,

Dennis Muren and ILM

began filming this script,

carefully written

and not to be deviated from, because

You have to film something

to match what the simulator can do.

NARRATOR:

Or, more precisely, what it couldn't do.

We learned we were going to have

to create the content

around the limitations

of what the machine can do

rather than the other way around.

NARRATOR: And the biggest limitation was

also the attraction's greatest strength,

that being those powerful

pneumatic pressure hydraulics.

When you exhaust all the cylinders,

and so you're down at the bottom

and you can't give anyone

a thrill, really,

you have to write a scene into the show

that allows you to recover that energy.

So, "Uh-oh,

we're caught in a tractor beam!"

(imitates Star Wars soundtrack)

TONY: And while that music is playing,

we're pulling you back up

to the full extent

of those 15-foot cylinders,

getting the energy back into the system

so we can go for another thrill.

But it was actually fun to find ways

to take advantage

of all these limitations.

NARRATOR: But, of course,

there's no greater limitation

than an unmanned StarSpeeder.

So, who's flying this thing anyway?

As the story developed,

George wanted to have a physical pilot

with you on the ship,

not something on a monitor,

and we had to figure out

what this character would be.

NARRATOR: Well, wonder no more.

Reporting for duty

Hi there!

was RX-24,

or as his friends call him

Captain Rex from the c*ck.

But unlike the other well-known,

beloved droids

of the Star Wars universe

We really only had about, oh,

I don't know, 12 to 15 seconds, maybe,

for you to fall in love

with this new character

because we had to get onto the ride.

NARRATOR: So, how do you do that?

Well, I have to make this character

be a little goofy.

It was my first flight

and I'm still getting used

to my programming!

That raises the stakes of nervousness

for the audience.

"What do you mean?

He's never flown this before

and we're gonna fly with him?"

NARRATOR: But to really grab

a guest's attention

Gonna do a lot of screaming.

(screaming)

NARRATOR: Wait a minute.

A little goofy, screams a lot

(screaming)

Could it be the voice of

Oh, Pee-wee Herman.

R2, lightspeed to Endor!

Paul Reubens giving us a character

that was akin to Pee-wee Herman.

First day, kind of nervous,

funny, and great screams.

(screams)

NARRATOR: So Pee-wee Herman would make

the voice work on this big adventure.

Ladies and gentlemen,

there may be some turbulence up ahead.

Make sure your seat belts are fastened.

NARRATOR: But

How is that robot going to work

all day long, being thrown around?

And, and what How do

You have to think about it differently

than, say, Mr. Lincoln

in the Lincoln show.

TOM: Can't have too many functions,

can't have this be too heavy.

It's going to be bolted down.

But he has to have kind of

a lightspeed kind of moment.

He's got to face the audience.

He's got to have eyes.

He's got to have expression

in his personality,

so his visor is going to be

really important.

You know, all of those things

are adding to the complexity of this thing

that's being shaken

around all day long, every day.

NARRATOR: He's right. Rex was going

to have a lot of first flights.

And as his very first, first flight

and opening day grew closer,

there was one last thing to get right.

That is the first thing guests experience.

The maintenance hangar, as we call it,

when people first enter the attraction,

they will see their friends R2-D2

and Threepio.

Those things take us back

to a comfort zone

and you're about, now,

to enter that experience.

I think George really put it best

the other day

when he got off it and said

Great.

(chuckles)

For about the 300th time,

it was still great.

NARRATOR:

And George's overwhelming enthusiasm

was a good indication

of what was about to come.

C-3PO:

Today is the grand opening of Star Tours.

NARRATOR: The occasion was kicked off

by an exciting grand opening ceremony.

For the most part, it was all exciting.

Wait, "for the most part"?

We affectionately refer to it

as the Darth Vader Ballet.

The what, now?

The Darth Vader Ballet.

You had Disney-style entertainment

combined with the characters of Star Wars.

You kind of have to see it to believe it.

(grunts)

It's rather interesting.

NARRATOR:

And while the performance was a smash,

there were ribbons to be cut

and stars to be toured

by throngs of eager Disneyland guests

who were lined up all the way

to the front gates

The park stayed open around the clock.

NARRATOR: for three straight days!

Because no one

had ever seen anything like it.

I loved it.

It was just the best. It was so good.

(screaming)

It's a film,

but you're moving to the film.

And it's like you're in space.

Aw, this is so cool!

(screaming)

And of course you got out,

right back in line,

got in again, rode it again.

(screaming)

Sorry, folks!

I'm sure I'll do better next time!

NARRATOR:

Rex never really got the hang of it,

but he certainly racked up

some flying hours

Lightspeed to Endor!

NARRATOR: because Star Tours continued

its nonstop flights out of Anaheim

and just outside of Orlando,

followed by Tokyo

and Paris!

(in French)

I am Rex, your captain.

NARRATOR: Well into the next decade,

its legacy stowed securely

in the baggage compartment

of beloved Disney attractions.

(groans)

NARRATOR: And yet, as the years went by,

a distant whisper remained

hung on the wind.

We can upgrade the ride

after a certain period of time.

That was originally the plan.

But from that opening day

in 1987 and beyond,

Star Tours remained untouched.

Because the film that we had in there

was working just great.

And so, from the park perspective

and the guest perspective is,

why would we change it?

NARRATOR: Well, here's one reason

TOM: George went back into Star Wars

and said, "I'm doing the prequels."

-What?

-And we said, "Aha."

We have an opportunity to go in there now

and change the story.

NARRATOR: Great! Now what story?

We knew nothing about the story.

TOM: But George showed us a podrace.

NARRATOR: You couldn't get

a more perfect scene to update Star Tours.

Jumping into action

We came back to Imagineering

and we boarded out a podrace.

NARRATOR:

the Star Tours update sped towards

Well, wait.

What's going to be in Episode II?

I mean, maybe we should wait and see

what's in Episode II

and then we'll decide what we wanna do.

NARRATOR: And so they did,

before then sitting down

to hash out the

-Well

-Ugh!

We might as well wait for Episode III

-and see what's in Episode III.

-NARRATOR: See what's in Episode III.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You wanna be really certain,

when you make a choice,

that you've made the right choice

that this will be the scene from Star Wars

that guests will be so excited

to step into.

NARRATOR: And this presented

the Imagineers with a challenge.

We had 6 episodes,

and we had the difficult task of saying,

"Well, what one story should we do?"

But we were never going to satisfy

the Star Wars fans

by only going to one place, right?

NARRATOR: Right! How do you pick between

Tatooine, Utapau, Hoth, Yavin 4,

Mygeeto, Mustafar

-Dantooine.

-thank you,

Endor, Naboo, Coruscant, Geonosis,

Bespin, Cato Neimoidia,

Felucia, Dagobah, Alder

Ah! Maybe not Alderaan.

Kamino or Kashyyyk?

We couldn't figure it out.

NARRATOR: Luckily, the team had

one thing going for them.

New technologies.

-NARRATOR: And now

-TOM: Now we're ready for video,

now we can do 3-D,

and now we can do more storytelling

than we were able to do before.

NARRATOR: Without the heft of

A 70-millimeter film projector.

NARRATOR:

and the subsequent loop cabinet,

the galaxy was their playground.

If we're gonna go to video,

why does it have to be one?

And that led to what I call

the slot machine approach

where you had a first act, second act,

and a finale,

and you could make those the same length

so that you could hop from wheel to wheel.

You could get a lot

of different combinations.

NARRATOR: Well, for example

As soon as you start the story,

you're either gonna get confronted

with Darth Vader

saying that you have a Rebel spy on board.

SCOT: Or the Millennium Falcon's

gonna be there,

they're going to get into some trouble,

and they're going to need to escape,

and we're going to need

to escape with them.

Now, because we're rushing,

we're going to go to lightspeed

without having time to set coordinates.

So, you don't know

where you're gonna end up.

So, we come out of lightspeed,

and now we have more options

of where you could end up.

NARRATOR: And so on, and so on,

before safely returning you

to the spaceport.

There's more variables than,

probably, anyone can ever experience,

and that was the goal.

NARRATOR: But the goal was also

to get George's approval.

We got called up to the ranch.

NARRATOR: Skywalker Ranch, that is.

Lucasfilm's base of operations

at the time.

So, a ton of pressure to go up there

and talk about these new ideas.

Even though it had been 20 years

since we had updated, we had a big idea.

NARRATOR:

Well, being known for big ideas himself

He liked the idea,

he added a few comments.

NARRATOR: As we know about Imagineers

We make the impossible possible.

NARRATOR: So, when George had

a relatively simple request

George Lucas wanted us

to have water spray into the cabin.

(screaming)

NARRATOR:

After considering George's request

Uh

NARRATOR: The Imagineers said

No.

That one we cannot do

because water over time will cause rust,

will cause corrosion.

NARRATOR: But don't worry.

George had other ideas too.

George wanted us to have a spy

in the audience.

What if, actually, we could take a picture

of someone in the cabin

and put it up on the screen

and really let a guest see themselves

as a Rebel spy.

NARRATOR:

And if that didn't grab your attention

In 3-D, we have something

we call "flinch moments"

where I do something that makes you

kind of do this.

And Sebulba, who is the bad guy

in the podrace,

throws a wrench at the windshield,

and we were making

that wrench logical size.

TOM: And George kept pushing it

to make it bigger, bigger,

because he felt it was so fast

that we could take license with it

and it would get a bigger reaction

from the audience.

And he was right.

NARRATOR:

And that's not all George was right about.

We started developing

this character named Ace.

TOM: Kind of like Tom Cruise in Top g*n.

Very c*ck, very confident.

NARRATOR: Good at shirtless

beach volleyball, probably?

Where nothing would go wrong.

NARRATOR: Until, that is,

it was George's turn to say

No!

TOM: George is not buying this.

He wants a pilot that is nervous,

that can be humorous.

NARRATOR: Scrambling for solutions,

the Imagineers frantically

Wait, we have this character already.

C-3PO: Over here! Hey!

C-3PO.

NARRATOR: Arguably the most nervous and

-(nervous moan)

-humorous droid in the galaxy.

How rude.

But the best part

We have this character.

TOM: We know how to make the robot.

We've got all the tooling.

We just had to figure out

how Threepio got accidentally

(yelling)

launched into the adventure.

You leave in such a rush

that you have an all-new surprise pilot

on board,

and that was C-3PO.

I don't think they could've chosen

a better droid for the job.

-NARRATOR: And don't worry, Rex-heads!

-(chuckles)

Imagineers found a way

to keep your old friend along

for the ride

Welcome aboard

in a slightly diminished capacity

in the queue area of Star Tours:

The Adventures Continue

which opened ballet-less

yet still to some exciting fanfare.

And it was quickly obvious

that their slot machine gamble

had paid off.

We had more than 54 different

story combinations that you could ride.

Oh, yeah!

You know, and everyone

has their favorite sequence.

"Oh, I love Hoth."

"Oh, I love Kashyyyk."

NARRATOR: There was plenty to love

about Star Tours: The Adventures Continue.

And lucky for park guests,

a whole new adventure

was just about to begin.

Because in 2012, after nearly 40 years

of running Lucasfilm,

George was ready to call it a day

and put the keys

to the empire in safe hands.

REPORTER 3: Disney expects to release

Star Wars: Episode VII in 2015.

NARRATOR: And it didn't end there.

I'm thrilled to announce the next chapter

between Disney Parks and Star Wars.

-(crowd cheering)

-ROBIN: We saw Bob Iger stand up at D23,

say, "I've challenged the team

to be ambitious."

And we were all sitting

in the audience going

-Yes!

-(crowd cheering)

It really got a lot of Imagineers excited.

Whoops and hollers, I could hear them

from across the building.

NARRATOR: And soon enough,

everyone was scrambling to get assigned

to the new Star Wars attraction.

Like, "Hey, you guys

got to let me in on this.

You got to let me in on this."

I, like, fangirled out hardcore.

NARRATOR: After all, by 2012,

Disney Imagineering was flush with talent

that had spent their entire lives

worshipping at the altar of Star Wars.

CHRIS: It was part of your childhood,

so that opportunity to then go off

and work on Star Wars,

for me, it was just like getting

to build my own playset.

NARRATOR:

Yep, a really big playset, because

I knew from the very beginning

that what we were going to do

with Star Wars was going to be big

because we already had a beloved

Star Wars experience in Star Tours.

But we didn't want to just be in a vehicle

or a transport as passive participants,

we wanted to feel like

we were part of the story.

We wanted it to be a place

where we could push deeper immersion.

NARRATOR: But how could you possibly build

an attraction

that would immerse you

deeper than Star Tours?

This was not gonna be,

"We're gonna do a new attraction."

NARRATOR: Then what would you be building?

We're going to build a land.

-NARRATOR: A whole land?

-Yeah.

Technically, two whole lands.

Both at Disneyland

and also at Disney Hollywood Studios.

We built two at the same time.

NARRATOR: Yep. Disney was going all in.

Now, since Star Tours

is already in Tomorrowland,

you know, it only made sense

to put the whole thing there.

Uh-uh.

NARRATOR: "Uh-uh"?

This is not an addition to Tomorrowland.

That's not what Star Wars is about.

NARRATOR: Well, come to think of it,

you can't get much further away

from tomorrow

than a long time ago.

SCOTT: If anything, it's space fantasy.

It has more in common with Frontierland

than it does Tomorrowland.

It really needs to be its own land.

NARRATOR: Well, what kind of land?

Just gotten the property, yes,

there's talk that there's gonna be

a new set of movies,

but nobody knows anything about it.

There was no Episode VII.

There's no script.

NARRATOR: With no choice but to fly blind,

the Imagineers

began intense brainstorming.

You get a group of writers

and designers in the room and engineers.

NARRATOR:

But it wouldn't just be Imagineers

We were working closely

with the team up at Lucasfilm.

NARRATOR: Just as with Star Tours,

the best and brightest of Lucasfilm

would be along for the ride.

And among them was this guy.

I'm Doug Chiang. I'm the Vice President

and Executive Creative Director

for Lucasfilm.

NARRATOR: Doug was the design director

for The Phantom Menace

and heavily involved

in most of the Star Wars films since.

You know, I provided

the Star Wars designs.

They provided the physical world,

and we will work hand in hand as one team.

NARRATOR: And the objective was clear.

How can we make this experience

authentically Star Wars

and yet fulfilling for the guests?

Based on what we know today,

Episodes I through VI.

That's what we had to work with.

We knew that there will always be Jedi,

there will always be Sith Lords,

droids, ships, aliens and creatures,

because we didn't know

all the details just yet.

We had some ideas, just rough ideas

that we could put up on the board

and start talking about like a Tatooine.

NARRATOR: The team then took

their planetary presentation

to the man in charge.

JOHN: At that point,

we presented it to Bob Iger,

and Bob was like,

"Wow, this is really great stuff, guys,

but these new movies are coming out.

That's what you need to be doing."

NARRATOR: New movies that didn't exist.

Yet.

And it's like,

"Well, okay. Is there a script?"

"Well, it's coming."

NARRATOR: Uh, when?

Good question.

NARRATOR: Well, to finally fill them in

on the upcoming movie,

director JJ Abrams picked up the phone.

How are you?

For, like, an hour,

he pitches the whole film off his iPhone,

and he's, like, flipping

through the storyboards

and the crawl on his phone.

So, he got up and left, and I remember

we all looked at each other

and were like

NARRATOR: Spoiled for choice,

the Imagineers now could consider Jakku,

Takodana, Hosnian Prime

Actually, maybe not Hosnian Prime.

Starkiller Base

I just don't know if there's a planet

that we'd go to that resonates

like a Tatooine.

Whatever we build has to be Star Wars

for everyone.

It can't just be Star Wars

for the 45-year-old fan.

NARRATOR: So after ruling out

all existing Star Wars planets,

something was becoming clear.

Guys, I think it's got to be a place

we've never been.

Maybe you haven't seen it before,

but when you get there,

you would know

this in the Star Wars universe.

And it's not restricted to a vision

that, that they've seen somewhere else.

NARRATOR: All right, then,

but what is this new place?

-Batuu.

-NARRATOR: Oh, gesundheit.

No, the planet Batuu.

-NARRATOR: Ah, that is the place.

-Yeah.

NARRATOR:

So, then, what's the story with Batuu?

Batuu is a remote planet.

ROBIN:

It's kind of where smugglers and villains

and people who want to hide out

end up being.

MARGARET: It's a place that has

its own culture and language.

We wanted to make sure

that we were building an actual place,

an actual planet, an actual town

that you were visiting.

NARRATOR: But it's not just the story

that needed to work from all angles.

The guests aren't going to go

to those two walls,

they're going to go around the corner,

behind the door,

into this other room that's here.

And so we want to make sure

that the illusion of Star Wars

is maintained for all that.

And we did that by basically, you know,

designing it out,

but then we fabricated

a large foamcore model

that was highly detailed,

and we went in with a lipstick camera

to see, "Okay, how are the sightlines?

DOUG: How are you experiencing

these different areas?"

We wanted to make sure

when you were in the park

that you didn't see, suddenly,

a power pole or another skyscraper

that was outside the park.

NARRATOR: But what about

the real-world stuff inside the park?

When we designed the walkways

that we actually had tracks

of, you know, various characters,

and R2-D2 and stuff.

We had the opportunity to go up

to the Skywalker Ranch archives,

get the original Kenny Baker

costume droids from the original movie

and take a rubbing of the feet to put

those exact tracks into the ground.

Those details,

not everybody's going to notice them.

NARRATOR: And you'd be forgiven

for rolling right past this next one too.

We had the Dok-Ondar's Den of Antiquities,

which is one of our stores

that sells all these valuable relics

from around the galaxy.

And, when you first enter,

there was this wall,

and we didn't know what to hang up on it.

MARGARET: And in Revenge of the Sith,

there was this bas relief

and it depicted this great battle

between the Light side and the Dark side.

So, we made a smaller version of that

as if Dok-Ondar had acquired for his den.

NARRATOR: That's a relief.

There are many of those things

that are built throughout the land

for the reason that we want the guests

to self-discover these things

and kind of see all the,

the homework that we did for it.

NARRATOR: With the Imagineers obsessing

over details,

it was clear they had set the bar high.

Now, speaking of bars

Every self-respecting outpost

is going to have a cantina.

ROBIN: I mean, you know,

where else would people go?

NARRATOR:

And like every self-respecting cantina

We don't serve their kind here.

Droids are not really welcome

in the cantina.

NARRATOR: Well, except one

Hi there!

NARRATOR: who appears

to have been brought back online.

ROBIN: Rex is the DJ.

And for those who are fans of Star Tours,

you might remember

that he wasn't a great pilot.

Where are the brakes?

And

he's not a great DJ either.

NARRATOR: But there's more

to Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge

than just intergalactic beverages.

A lot more! Because

The number one thing that our fans said

that they wanted to do

was have the opportunity to

Bypass the compressor.

NARRATOR: No, it wasn't that.

It was overwhelmingly and resoundingly

Fly the Millennium Falcon.

It's such an unbelievably iconic ship

and, in many ways, certainly,

we think of it as a character.

NARRATOR: Well, whatever this ship

means to you,

the Millennium Falcon is unquestionably

One of the most beautiful designs.

NARRATOR: and the single

most important ship

in the galaxy's welfare.

Yeehaw!

(chuckles)

NARRATOR: And at the heart

of this immersive experience,

a simulator attraction that takes

what was achieved

with Star Tours to the whole next level.

We knew we needed to put you in control.

(whoops, laughs)

You get to be the one that gets

to crew the ship,

to fire the laser blasters,

to be the one to work furiously

to try to keep the bucket

of bolts in working order.

NARRATOR: An idea so exciting,

so ground-breaking

It was a natural fit

for a motion simulator technology.

NARRATOR: it almost seemed

too good to be true.

Wait a minute.

There's only one Millennium Falcon.

There's only one c*ck.

SCOTT: There's, like, six seats

in that c*ck.

Oh, my gosh. The line for this, you know,

it's like, you're going to be able

to only get, like, a hundred people a day.

Um

NARRATOR:

And the more they looked into it

Designing something that

a whole lot of people can ride in an hour?

Very, very hard.

-NARRATOR: the bigger the issues?

-Uh

How do we make this happen?

How do we make this happen?

How do we make this happen at scale?

NARRATOR:

As the Imagineers' heads were spinning

How do we make this happen?

How do we make this happen?

NARRATOR: a solution emerged

from a long time ago

in an attraction far, far away.

ANNOUNCER 2: Welcome

to Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress.

NARRATOR: The Carousel of Progress was

A theater in which the audience itself

moves in their seats around the stages.

Such a simple system.

It's just a circular track

that goes click, click, click.

NARRATOR: They'd found a way to create

a unique experience

for every single guest.

And when you cross that threshold

into the c*ck of the Falcon,

you're actually walking

into the Carousel of Progress,

so to speak.

JOHN: But you don't realize

is there's really

5 other pie wedges of theaters

that are watching different scenes

of this same show

at the same time as you load into it.

And doors close, you go on your ride,

and you have your whole experience.

Meanwhile, click, the next pod

comes in, the next people get in.

The magic of it is that when you get off,

there's no one trying to get on.

You truly feel like we're the

only ones getting on it,

and we're the only ones getting off,

it was our ship.

NARRATOR: Your own ship.

You hear that, Chris?

Have the Millennium Falcon now.

It's just full-size.

NARRATOR: And you didn't even have

to put the decals on it.

So they had Imagineered their way

to a workable solution

for high guest turnover.

But for their next issue

This is an experience

that's all about flying in a spaceship.

ASA: You need to be able to see, you know,

fantastical imagery

through that c*ck window, obviously.

NARRATOR:

Obviously, just like Star Tours, but

The fact that we were giving people

the ability to control the ship

meant that this couldn't be a film either.

ASA: It meant that this would have

to be something

that was being created in real time,

being rendered on the fly

based on what people were doing.

NARRATOR: And while that may sound

a lot like a video game

Well, it leverages technology

that is used in the video game industry.

NARRATOR: this attraction

was a game-changer because

The technology that we needed

in order to deliver

Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run

absolutely did not exist in 2015.

-NARRATOR: Definitely a problem.

-Huh.

ASA: The game engines that existed

were not capable of delivering

the pixels we needed

at the frame rate we needed.

So, for many, many years of the project,

when we were in

our mock-up projection dome,

there would be days when we were looking

at imagery that was

one to two frames per second.

It caused us to have to really have trust

that those engineers

would be able to find a way

to fine-tune that engine,

to get the performance

out of it that we needed.

NARRATOR: Luckily,

the software engineering caught up

with the theme park Imagineering.

So, it really wasn't until maybe

the final 6 months of the project

that we were ever able

to actually sit in that c*ck,

fly through the experience

the way that our guests would.

NARRATOR: And what an experience

they were in store for.

CROWD: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

(cheering)

NARRATOR: Because in May of 2019,

Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge

made its grand opening to the public.

Our biggest fans have dreamt

about being a part of this world

for more than 40 years.

NARRATOR: But Galaxy's Edge

was just getting started.

We, as a company, are still advancing

all of the systems that we use.

NARRATOR: In late 2019,

at Walt Disney World,

and early 2020 at Disneyland,

an attraction so advanced

opened in Galaxy's Edge.

It really needs to be seen to be believed.

Rise of the Resistance is 360 immersion.

There are no hat tricks.

ASYA: You can see everywhere.

There's the Resistance ship,

it's out there.

JOHN: And you actually walk

into this huge 70-foot ship.

Those doors close,

you take off from the planet,

and then you're immediately

getting tractor

beamed into a Star Destroyer.

And when those doors re-open,

you're now

in that Star Destroyer hangar bay.

That's epic.

That's like living the adventure, right?

It's part ride, part role-play.

It's so epic,

I need a ride to get to the ride.

NARRATOR: And once you ride to the ride,

the ride that you'll ride is this ride.

It is an 8-seater troop transport

for the First Order.

ASYA: It has an onboard astromech unit.

It's an R5-J2

for our major fans out there.

Which is important to me

because George Lucas

described Episodes IV through VI

as a period piece told

from the perspective of droids.

(beeping)

Yes, R2. I was just coming to that.

ASYA: And so, the fact that that droid

is your narrator,

just like every Star Wars story,

is what makes it so authentic to me.

NARRATOR: And while Rise of the Resistance

is quite authentic,

right down to the

stormtroopers' betaplast armor,

it's also the culmination of over 60 years

of Disney Parks innovation and technology.

There's so much of our DNA as a company

that we've put into this

and crammed together

into this one amazing experience.

PAUL: These are the building blocks

that the future is based on,

all of the attractions from here on out.

NARRATOR: What the Imagineers achieved

with Galaxy's Edge

and even still to this day

with Star Tours

As the films come out,

it's been updated along the way.

NARRATOR: is truly revolutionary.

However

It is really what Walt, I think, you know,

what he was trying to do in Disneyland

and putting you into the story.

REPORTER 4:

For Disneyland will never be completed.

That is actually very much in the DNA

of going back to Walt Disney himself.

WALT DISNEY: It will be unlike

anything else on this earth.

The concept of immersion into a story

was what Walt set out to do

with Disneyland.

I remember going to Disneyland

and going on the Jungle Cruise,

and that was real.

ROBIN: That was the most, that was

the most immersive three-dimensional thing

that you'd ever done.

NARRATOR:

From Disneyland's very first day,

and its second day

when a young lad visited the park

I was there the second day it opened.

NARRATOR:

and set into motion a relationship

that seemed to be forged in the stars.

YOUNG TONY: This marriage of Disneyland

with Star Wars,

you really can't compare it

to anything else.

I think Walt and George

are probably fairly similar.

DENNIS: They very much know

what the public wants,

which is what they want.

-We created a new

-A new kind of technology.

They're brilliant.

(screaming)

NARRATOR: From the brilliance

of George Lucas and Walt Disney

to those who followed their lead

and brought Star Wars

from the big screen

Stay in attack formation!

NARRATOR: to the simulator screen

Tony and Tom

are two incredibly talented Imagineers.

Star Tours was how we could,

as Imagineers,

bring Star Wars to life back in the '80s.

It made us proud because

It's really, actually,

blown everyone away.

People are still walking through that door

and having goose bumps.

(screaming)

But, wow, when you step

into Galaxy's Edge,

you are truly in the story.

NARRATOR: And for the Imagineers

who walked in Tom and Tony's footsteps,

or droid tracks

We created this together.

NARRATOR: they brought Star Wars

not just off the big screen

(groans)

but into the big, wide world.

DOUG: Star Wars never gets old for me

and it always takes me back

to when I was 15 years old.

I grew up in Michigan in the suburbs,

and I was in the bookstore one day,

and this painting by Ralph McQuarrie

of the X-wing flying down

the Death Star trench

just completely blew me away,

that I realized

that's what I wanted to do.

I wanted to learn how to do that.

And that's what the magic

of Batuu is for me,

is that even though I know all

the heartaches that build what we build,

but when I get there,

I can forget all that

and I can experience it

like when I was 15 years old.

CHRIS: I feel like we really did pay off

that childhood dream of getting to step

into this incredible world,

and I have a place in this, in this world.

NARRATOR: A world of villains

Move along, move along.

-rogues

-(mumbles)

and heroes,

but most of all, imagination

(screaming)

and adventure.

If you've ever dreamed

of being an X-wing fighter pilot

or dreamed of being

in the Star Wars films,

now is your chance.

Wow, that was incredible.

Let's get in line again.

Good night, and may the Force be with

(upbeat music)