Universal Orlando is holding a media event for the premiere of its Fast & Furious: Supercharged ride on Wednesday evening, May 2.
Now, as things normally work in this business, an attraction would open to the public immediately after, or the day after, its media premiere. In this case, that would suggest a Thursday, May 3 debut. But Universal's invitation makes no mention of that, and Universal has run media previews of new attractions several days or even weeks in advance of their public openings (hello, Diagon Alley!), so there's no guarantee that you will be able to get on the ride if you are visiting Universal Orlando that first week in May.
But Universal is inviting a whole bunch of press and VIPs to go on the new attraction on May 2, so the odds are that this ride will be opening to the public sooner rather than later, and sometime in the spring rather than summer. (Update: Wednesday, April 11 Universal is now holding Team Member previews for the ride, so the odds of a public soft opening before the media event just got even better. Second update: Saturday, April 14 And now it has soft-opened to guests.)
Fast & Furious: Supercharged is a plussed version of the final encounter on the Studio Tour at Universal Studios Hollywood, which opened in 2015. In this new installation, you will walk into the hangout for the Fast & Furious family (built on the site of the former Disaster! ride), seeing many of their modified street racers, before entering Tej's high-tech War Room.
Eventually, you will board buses that will take you into the heart of the action, a high-speed chase and battle with Owen Shaw and his henchmen, in which Dominic Toretto and his crew ultimately save the day.
Yeah, that's just too obvious to be considered a spoiler, right? Anyway, the fun here literally is the chase rather than the destination, which - as with all major new attractions - will be a gift shop.
We will be there on May 2, so keep watching Theme Park Insider for full coverage.
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An exciting new addition to the Universal Orlando Resort! Disney set the tone for screen based rides by choosing to make their crowning achievement in PTWoA a next level Soarin'. I expect a solid showing from Universal here. Please help us forget Race Through New York.
I’ll be there on May 3rd and 4th, hopefully it will be open!
I was starting to get worried about it not being open by my mid-June trip. Another outlet published some behind the scenes photos of the attraction last week that appeared to be a long way from being finished (still assembling ride vehicles). I always found Earthquake/Disaster pretty "meh" (you know an attraction is mediocre when the best thing about it is Christopher Walken), so the bar is not terribly high here.
I hope you can face the screen instead of looking to the side like another tram ride.
Noooooo I'm leaving end of April:(
Another screen ride ... good grief.
I'll be there May 1st through 7th. Hopefully I can at least get a soft open preview! I had been thinking and hoping Universal could do a Fast and Furious ride for many years now. I really was hoping for a "Test Track" portion to a F&F ride but sadly that's not happening. I like the franchise although it's not near the top of my favorite movies and they have really gotten extreme over the last 3-4 movies. But I'm just really hoping this will be better than Fallon and at least comparable to Skull Island.
so "technical rehearsals" should start next week?
Everyone says "like Kong" as if that is a bad thing. Kong is fantastic!
Kong looks amazing from the outsize, with those giant gates and flames. The music they pulled from the Peter Jackson movie to underscore the experience is perfect. The trackless ride vehicles are unique, and the team of drivers with slightly different stories and backgrounds makes it very re-rideable. The queue is amazing -- the shamen animatronic is top notch and the fire and audio effects set a creepy tone. The scare-actors are a nice touch. The ride itself is well executed and the 3-D tunnel is immersive -- so much so that you see something new every time. That Kong animatronic at the end is so immense, lifelike, and extremely expressive.
So, for the haters that say "just like Kong" -- I hope they can pull off that level of amazingness with The Fast and The Furious!
I recently went on the tram tour in Universal Studios Hollywood and I saw the Kong and the Fast and Furious bits. I can't honestly say that I'd spend a lot of time waiting in line and/or going on the "plussed" version of the show.
It sounds as though Universal is doing the same thing that it did with "Race Through New York" and deliberately counting your experience in the queue as a part of the ride. I'm not sure the public has come around to buying in to that idea yet.
All that said, I'd be happy to be blown away and proven wrong.
FnF has been completed for several months. Getting the Ride vehicle (similar to Kong) operating has been the delay. Queue lines are the bright spot. Ride itself will be quite underwhelming for those expecting anything other than watching videos from a bus.
The queue is always part of the experience at a theme park, as is the walk up to that queue. The whole experience should count as part of the package. This is what separates a THEME park from an AMUSEMENT park.
The tram tour in Hollywood doesn't compare in any way to the Kong attraction in Orlando. It's way better in a number of ways, described in detail above.
I am not really too excited about this ride, but Kong is a great solid attraction. I got to sit in the front row and our "animatronic" driver was so detailed. She had her nails polished and jewelry on!! Sitting in different rows of the ride you notice totally different things. I could never see the details of the robot driver in the middle or back rows. I'm ready for Universal to move on to another project as it seems Creative was basically told by Comcast to make a Fast & Furious ride....which will not go fast and will not be furious.....
What Universal needs is more screen-based attractions.
which will not go fast and will not be furious.....
Yeah. It’s almost as bad as an Avatar land with no Na’vi in it.
While I usually heap praise on Universal I gotta say I was underwhelmed with the Hollywood version of the attraction. Sorry but a ride that's about the thrill of racing that doesn't actually move is a big missed opportunity imo. If they want to use screens that's fine then a hybrid ride system would have worked well, with a race portion a la Test Trak/ RSR, but there should be some sort of unsimulated High speed element to the ride. Hopefully the upcoming Mariokart ride will wow us.
I'm not sure how being underwhelmed with the Hollywood version has anything to do with the plussed version in Orlando. They are different animals entirely. Example: Kong.
I agree with you that a Test Track type system might have been interesting, but there is a more limited amount of action (other than going fast) that could be safely created in that approach. From an engineering perspective, the safest way to do high-speed car crashes and action is simulation.
I expect Mario Kart to be more practical, but not Test Track fast, and therefore something that can be designed to be both fun and safe.
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We’re at Universal until the 6th May. Fingers crossed for a soft opening at least. Looking forward to hearing back from the previews