Star Wars Rise of Resistance Ride Report: Compromises & Improvements
As announced last week, two big changes have happened with Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance at Walt Disney World. This ride report shares photos & thoughts about the modified pre-shows, ride vehicles, and new pre-park opening virtual queue process for the Hollywood Studios headliner.
This is actually our first time doing Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance in at least a couple months. Obviously, that’s not a long time in the grand scheme of things or for anyone who visits Walt Disney World once per year or less, but we’re at DHS about once per week.
At first, we were passing on Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance simply because we didn’t “need” to do it. There were no changes and the process was going fairly smoothly for rope drop arrivals; we thus didn’t want to “take” an entire ride vehicle from other guests, potentially ones who had never done it. More recently, we have needed/wanted to do the attraction again, but have been shut out of the boarding pass drops.
Then the new 7 am virtual queue approach began, and we were shut out due to Snafus with Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. Fortunately, those all seem to have been remedied (based both on our experience and a lack of reported issues on social media and the comments here).
As such, we both got up bright and early once again, and gave it another try…
Success!
We each tried different methods (discussed in our Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance ‘How to Ride’ FAQ…which has been updated with info for the 7 am process) and my force-refresh attempt was successful.
Everyone loves the satisfaction of getting the lowest number boarding group possible, but at this point, I’d honestly prefer a higher numbered group. Unfortunately, there’s no good strategy for securing one, as virtual queue spaces are filling up almost instantaneously. Pausing before hitting the “Join” button runs the risk of being shut out entirely.
In any case, we were called back at 12:05 pm with an hour to return. We rolled up to Disney’s Hollywood Studios at 12:45 pm, making it inside the park by about 12:55 pm. We got to the attraction pretty much right at 1:05 pm.
Things started out well. None of the outdoor queue or overflow queue was being used, which is always a good sign.
I’m not going to fixate on the indoor queue as literally nothing has changed about it since Disney’s Hollywood Studios reopened. If you want to see the physical distancing and plexiglass barriers, refer back to our previous Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance ride report. Lots of photos in that.
Thankfully, we ran into no issues with the Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance queue backing up or stopping. To the contrary, the entire indoor queue moved smoothly at all points.
The parties both in front of and behind us were very mindful of physical distancing, which also helped. Guests have gotten pretty good about this, especially in actual queues (as opposed to the makeshift, overflow ones).
When getting to the first pre-show, each party is assigned a color that will be relevant in the briefing room and subsequent scenes. Previously, this was a number, but the color system definitely is a thoughtful improvement on that.
WARNING: Photo spoilers of Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance INCLUDING the actual ride-through portion of the attraction follow. Sorry, but there’s really no way around it given the nature of the attraction modifications.
We highly recommend you close out this window now if you haven’t experienced Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. You don’t need to read this–just do the attraction.
Seriously.
Last chance…
Guests then stand on this same color in the briefing room, outdoor load scene that follows, and aboard the Intersystem Transport Ship.
Previously, Cast Members were not filling all slots because there was not adequate space for physical distancing in some spots and due to the ride vehicles themselves having lower capacity.
That has now been remedied by the installation of physical barriers in both of the pre-shows. This is an imperfect solution, with not all views being equal. (You can see them above and below.)
Unfortunately, there are no perfect solutions to this–they’re all compromises. The alternative is roughly half as many guests experiencing Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance per day.
Aboard the Intersystem Transport Ship, each party again has their own space with more than adequate physical distancing.
We were assigned to the best spot in the house, directly in front of Lt. Bek, one of the greatest Star Wars characters ever and our ride or die homie.
Unfortunately, not all of these spots aboard the ITS afford stellar views of this magnificent Mon Calamari Communications Officer.
The guests in the far front left and right corners have a really poor view of Lt. Bek, if they can see him at all. This is a shame, as this portion of the attraction is a sleeper highlight.
This proceeds as normal, with the First Order directing each party to exit one by one. There are no changes to the hangar, so we’ll skip past that.
Assignments here are done with physical distancing in mind, but also with thematic integrity. As always, the First Order Cast Members really help make this attraction. They are truly fantastic.
Four parties are assigned to each interrogation room; previously, you were only in this room with one other party.
However, ride vehicle capacity has been effectively doubled. Color markers have been added to the floor to ensure physical distancing. No issues here.
Thanks to a plexiglass barrier installed between the front and back row in each ride vehicle, two parties of four or fewer guests (or one of 5 or more) are now assigned to each First Order Fleet Transport ride vehicle.
Previously, you might’ve had a single rider or couple occupying an entire ride vehicle. Pretty far from ideal for an attraction that had issues with hourly throughput even in normal times.
This comes with a compromise: those in the second row are looking through plexiglass.
There have been complaints about the impact of this on the ride experience, with photos making the rounds on social media illustrating just how bad it is.
Respectfully, I’d push back on a lot of those complaints and also suggest that maybe the crappy photos have less to do with the barrier and more to do with the fact that it’s incredibly difficult to take good photos on Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. Of course iPhone photos are going to suck–they did before, too. Nothing new there.
Here are my DSLR photos taken from the second row, through the plexiglass barrier. (If you look closely, you can see it in several of the shots.)
To be sure, glare and reflections are visible at various points in the attraction (you can see Sarah in the right corner of the photo above).
From our perspective, these are almost entirely a non-issue when experiencing the attraction in person and not via photos or video. It’s not much different (and certainly not worse) than sitting behind a tall person; you adjust your field of view and focus your vision past them.
There are even some segments with blaster fire and lighting effects that are arguably enhanced by the plexiglass.
Suddenly, there’s a lot more blaster fire in front of you!
These photos still don’t do justice to what this is like in person. It’s really hard to take good photos on Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance even if you know what you’re doing.
Our perspective is that this is a relatively minor compromise that does negatively impact the experience to a small degree, but that’s more than offset by the capacity gains.
Stated differently, we’d far prefer getting to do Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance like this than not at all.
That’s what this tradeoff ultimately comes down to: off-angles in the pre-shows for some people and second-row ride vehicle reflections in exchange for roughly double the number of guests being able to do the attraction.
Ultimately, there are a lot of valid guest gripes with Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. A lot. However, you can’t complain about all of those and also that Walt Disney World made some mostly negligible modifications to address the larger and more legitimate criticisms. It’s one or the other, so pick your battles.
As before, we’d highly recommend making every effort and jumping through every hoop in order to have a chance at riding Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. If it’s your first time doing Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, you’re going to be blown away by the attraction. Maybe not as much as those who experienced the attraction in December through March, but literally everything is different now. If you’re unwilling to accept any compromises, I’m not sure what world you’re living in.
As for the impact of the other big change, it’s still early, but our preliminary opinion is that the 7 am virtual queue release is a significant improvement over the old system. It allows for greater flexibility and a more relaxed start to the day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, which have been guest complaints for almost a year at this point.
The new approach should also help redistribute crowds throughout the day, although it’ll take time for word of mouth to spread on that and the degree to which it’ll occur is debatable. We’re already working on new strategy and itineraries for Disney’s Hollywood Studios to test, so stay tuned for those. In short, we view these as two very positive developments for an attraction and park that have been desperately in need of changes. This doesn’t fix everything with either, but it’s a huge step in the right direction.
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YOUR THOUGHTS
Have you been done the new 7 am Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance virtual queue release? What were your thoughts on the modifications? Think the new physical distancing barriers and ride vehicle plexiglass negatively impact the attraction? Are they a worthwhile tradeoff for more guests getting a chance to experience Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance? Will you be attempting to join the new/modified virtual queue at Disney’s Hollywood Studios? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment? Any questions? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
Hi, Do you have to have a reservation for Hollywood Studios before you try to get the Star Wars Rise of the R. boarding pass?
Hi Tom, I completely agree with your observation that the cast members in this attraction are fantastic. I was wondering, do you know if they are members of Actors Equity?
They are not.
So we did Hollywood studios this week on Thursday 11/19 and tried the new 7am ROR virtual que. I had to set an alarm to make sure I wasn’t in the shower or some other part of our morning rituals. We stayed at Bay Lake Towers and I noticed that the cell phone signal was not good in the room and the wifi was worse. So we both went out on the balcony where the signal was stronger and I was able to score group 9. Not too bad. Having done the ride twice before (in March and August) we both thought the ride was better this time. I think it was because all of the elements were functioning properly – no B mode.
Thanks for all the useful information. we will be there over Thanksgiving week.
Question — for a group of 10, which is more than the ride’s capacity, do you still recommend that we “select all“ – or break up the group – when attempting to enter the virtual queue?
“If you’re unwilling to accept any compromises, I’m not sure what world you’re living in.”–nicely put.
[potential ride spoilers]
I have now ridden RoTR three times – in February, during cast preview, and in October with the recent modifications. My biggest complaint with the revisions now (and maybe it was because it was too close to the revisions) was that my party of 5 was split between the ‘green’ dots. We had an issue in the first pre-show where they weren’t clear on where the green dots were (on opposite sides of the room) and half of our group ended up on a blue dot in the first preshow (it was dark enough that it was hard to tell the difference). That was fixed before getting on the transporter, but on the unload of the transporter, they didn’t unload by color (they just went around the transporter), so all of the groups got split (and they had to figure out how to sort us back out in the second ‘preshow’ area). That being said – those cast members were awesome about it and able to stay in character while doing so, but the process to get to ride was definitely stressful (with 3/5 of our group not having experienced it before to know what was going on). I almost wish they still had it numbered rather than colored.
So to refresh the app when getting a boarding group you just swipe down on your phone correct?
I’m here for the first time with my husband 6 and 8 year old kids. While we were in line (backup boarding group 87) a dude walked by and said “stick it out, people! It’s worth it!” And I thought, jeez what a weirdo dork.
I am here to tell you STICK IT OUT IT’S WORTH IT. I knew it was going to be great but after reading all the hype I naturally lowered my expectations because nothing can really be that great. This is that great. It’s worth whatever hassle you have to go through.
You were kinda hard on that guy.
I’m in a bit of a conundrum for an upcoming trip. Three of us are annual passholders, but we have four other family members coming along this trip. The two parties are in separate MDE accounts (primarily because my dad and I share the same name, and this confuses MDE).
I don’t want to manage the other party’s reservations from my account (due to the aforementioned name issue), so we’ll have to make our RotR boarding group reservations separately. Obviously we’d like to all ride together. So my plan for now, is to make the reservations and if we get boarding groups far apart from each other we will go to guest services to see if they can do anything to get us close together. Thoughts?
If you both get boarding groups and the cast member you approach isn’t in a fowl mood, I’ve seen them adjust groups like that before (they’ll give you whichever one is the higher number in this scenario). You’ll might run into a problem if only one of your two groups gets a boarding pass though–that seems like its gotten mixed results on whether they’ll add you all to the one or not. It’s still worth a try to ask either way though!
Thanks Maggie!
I’m a little concerned with this strategy becoming popular. Will everyone book a park reservation at DHS and then if they don’t get in change their res.? Effectively this would increase the number of people attempting to get a BG
There are still capacity limits at DHS (limits to the number of people who can book a Park Pass reservation), and DHS was hitting that limit almost every day even before this change, so this should not affect the number of people trying to get a BG.
@AJ: I’m not so sure of that. If the new 7am RotR procedure results in reduced attendance for the same number of park pass slots (because some number of people don’t bother to go after failing to get a BG), you could see disney increasing the number of available park passes accordingly. This, in turn, would create more 7am competition…
Tom,
Really appreciate the spoiler alert. We are planning a visit in December and I’ve so far avoided any hints about the experience.
One quick question for you (or anyone who wants to answer), my three year old son is 40″ tall so technically meets the height requirement for the Rise, but how intense is it? Too intense for a three year old?
Hi Neil,
Not Tom, but I have a 3 year old who is also 41″ tall. I rode it in August and I do not think my kiddo would think it’s too intense and definitely plan to take my son on it in December if we get a BG. My suggestion though would be to take your son on other rides, like Slinky and Star Tours (Or anything similar at other parks) just to make sure that he likes “thrill” ish rides and wouldn’t be scared. Otherwise it’s a very fun, and mostly tame ride. Just my two cents. Someone else may have a completely different experience though!
This is a your-mileage-may-vary situation. There are loud noises, explosion sounds, flashing lights, and the impression that you are in the moment/part of the action, so picture a ride with someone shooting at you in semi-darkness. That might be the coolest thing ever or completely terrifying to a someone who has trouble distinguishing between real and make-believe or doesn’t like the dark or cries at very loud sounds.
From a sensory perspective, the ride experience is *VERY* loud and immersive and in-your-face. From a physical perspective, it is a very gentle and mellow dark ride (i.e. the seat belts are there to keep you from standing up, not to keep you from falling out).
If you’re familiar with Universal, the best (albeit imperfect) analogy I can think of is that it’s like riding Transformers or Spider-Man, but without 3D glasses and with the vehicle motion bases turned off.
Within the Disney bubble, it’s basically the ride experience of Runaway Railway crossed with the sensory experience of Star Tours.
I am going to Disney for the last time in 2 weeks. I am in my sixties and some of this new technology is very confusing for me. My daughter will be with me so she will have to do that part. I know times change, and we have to change with it, but i have been going to disney almost as long as it has been open. It was so nice and easy to just stand in line for the rides. This virtual queue thing is probably something I will never master. Even just to walk up to get something to eat. Now its alot of mobile ordering. I don’t even know how to do that. Again my daughter. But I am making this trip because I LOVE Disney. But will miss going by myself.
Paula, I get being overwhelmed by the technological hurdles, but know that these are special cases.
Rise of the Resistance has a virtual queue because it is super popular AND because it breaks down so frequently. Disney doesn’t want to *allow* you to stand in line for hours with no guarantee of riding. Whenever those issues get sorted out, the virtual queue will go away. Mobile ordering at food places is normally an option, and has only become mostly-mandatory due to COVID protocols. Again, temporary.
I hope you enjoy your trip!
If you let the cast member at the entrance of the quick service restaurant know that you didn’t mobile order because you wanted to pay cash they will let you in to order in-person! They are usually very accommodating.
Ours day at DHS was yesterday and it was our groups first time at Galaxy’s Edge. We were aware we may not get into RotR but got up early and started hitting the refresh button at 6:58. The join button appeared right at 7 and we were in boarding group 21. We meandered to the park and went straight to Smugglers Run. 40 minutes in line there and we were right on time for our 11am reservation at Oga’s Cantina. About 11:45 we were called to return within an hour. RofR was amazing and we were just thankful to have gotten on. The plexiglass really did not feel abnormal at this point because of its prevalence in rides and queues now. Such a meat, immersive experience and I think having your group stand on the dots was brilliant and make it feel more realistic. All in all the plexiglass is a great compromise so more people can ride it!
Forgot to note that we were a little concerned about how far the range was but it worked fine from our room at Universal Studios Endless Summer resort. Thanks as always for all your useful updates Tom!!!!
Regarding the join “range”…there is no range. The app does not look at your physical location, only whether or not you have a valid park pass reservation for that day. You could join the queue from your house in Atlanta, then hop in the car if you so desired.
Just FYI on the 7AM booking….you have to be in the Orlando vicinity to book. You don’t have to be at an on site Disney hotel but Disney indicated to me (I asked them) that you do need to be in the Orlando vicinity to book a boarding pass at 7AM.
I’m curious to know if you are able to book a reservation for a different park if you miss out on the 7 am ROTR drop. I know you said it worked for you the other day, but you weren’t sure if that was just a glitch.
Unclear as of right now. We’ll try to figure that out at some point in the next couple weeks.
I’m a little concerned with this strategy becoming popular. Will everyone book a park reservation at DHS and then if they don’t get in change their res.? Effectively this would increase the number of people attempting to get a BG
You absolutely can change parks, whether you successfully get a boarding group or not. Other blogs have reported this strategy working. There is also no physical geo-fence of any kind on boarding passes. You can book at 7AM from any location anywhere.
We rode this for the first time this past Sunday. The 10 am queue filled up in about 30 seconds, but we made an “alternate” group (# in the high 70s) at 2 p m. Got called up around 4 and still made it to 5:15 dining reservation. The ride was excellent even if we had the poor view and we met all our WDW Star Wars goals by spending the entire day there, which was key since we traveled and had just one day in that park. The crowds really dropped after 2 and dipped a bit even after noon so maybe the new system will keep that in check.
“The crowds really dropped after 2 and dipped a bit even after noon so maybe the new system will keep that in check.”
That’s been the case for the last few months–the longest wait times of the day have been within 30 minutes of park opening.
I’m slightly worried that this 7 am virtual queue opening will reverse that; many guests won’t feel the need to arrive at or before official park opening time, and thus might stay later.
I would be fine with all of these compromises. I traveled from Seattle in mid-September and failed to get a boarding pass four times. I’d guess that most complaints aren’t coming from people who have never ridden before. By the way, although definitely a different experience, I still found plenty of magic on my trip, and a disturbing new penchant for watching YouTube dash camera accident videos completely disappeared after a week at Disney. Mental health restored!
“I’d guess that most complaints aren’t coming from people who have never ridden before.”
Absolutely. The complaints are coming almost exclusively from Annual Passholders who have ridden several times.
I can understand them saying the attraction experience was better before–I agree with that. It’s another entirely to claim this ruins it, or there’s no point in riding now. (Even though I’m sure many of those same people will continue to ride.) That’s hyperbole at best, and doesn’t reflect the circumstances for the many guests who have not ridden before–or have been denied a chance in the past.
Totally agree, Brian! I’d say that applies to a lot of complaints about WDW in general (both pre and post closure). The parks definitely aren’t perfect and we shouldn’t just accept anything Disney does – they are charging a lot of money, after all – but to low frequency or first time visitors most of the “unbearable” issues are quirks or minor annoyances at best. I’m sorry you had such awful luck with the boarding pass, I hope you get to ride on your next visit!
Tom……Any thought as to how long BG last at the 7am window? was it more than 10-20 seconds?
ty
Less than 30 seconds.
However, I believe they are allocating more boarding groups to the 2 pm drop (at least for now, presumably due to concerns about word of mouth not yet fully spreading with regard to the 7 am drop). I’d expect that to shift over the next few weeks.
Looks like the final Kylo AA is working again?
All effects were working on our ride-through. Doesn’t mean that’ll be the case next week or even tomorrow, but the ride-through was firing on all cylinders and the pre-show pacing was spot-on.
Looks like they got the big ion cannons rolling again Tom, is that so? They really make a huge impact to that scene.
TOM your articles are ALWAYS Excellent. I have ridden ROTR during COVID. . . I was by myself. It was surreal. I missed out on the 10 am lottery and a Cast Member helped me get a pass at the 2pm lottery. I am coming back on December 9th. When you try for the Virtual Queue. . . if you have the ROTR Virtual Queue open before 7 am. . .will the BLUE BUTTON just appear at 7 am or do you need to keep refreshing to make that blue button appear? thanks. . .
I always do a refresh, but it’s supposed to just appear. I never take my chances with that happening, though. YMMV.
Since you have time, as in weeks, before you go, if you have time as in a couple minutes in the morning, you can practice the wait for the join button from home at the 7am drop, but I’d take Toms advice and not chance it appearing on its own.
@GMan: to elaborate on Erik’s suggestion above, you need a park pass reservation to JOIN the virtual queue, but you don’t need one to start the process. Anyone in the world that has the app open at 7am eastern can see the ‘Join’ button pop-up. Try doing some practice runs; you’ll know you succeeded when you get a “whoa, looks like you don’t have a park pass reservation” message in the app.
Thank you so much for this report! I have been a little anxious about how the barrier would affect the ride experience. I am so excited to see that it doesn’t much! We have a party of 8 going and will take the entire vehicle so this is great news for all our people to enjoy the ride!