by Beth Keating
News/Analysis
DisneyBizJournal.com
May 19, 2022
While some EPCOT guests, such as annual passholders and D23 members, have been able to get a sneak peek at the new Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind ride, the coaster will officially open to the general public in just a week, on May 27. (By the way, see Ray Keating’s DisneyBizJournal.com review of the ride here.) If you want to maximize your chances of getting to save the galaxy with the Guardians, there are a few things you need to know before hitting up the park.
For starters, when the ride opens, there will not be a stand-by line, which means that you will either have to buy your way onto a Starjumper via a limited number of Individual Lightning Lane openings, or you will have to snag one of the free virtual queue spots, either at 7 am or 2 pm.
And, no doubt about it, those seats will go faster than a jump to lightspeed. So, if you show up at EPCOT expecting to stroll over and hop on a line and shuffle your way to the front, you’ll be disappointed if you haven’t booked a ride in advance. Best to make your acquaintance with the ins-and-outs of your My Disney Experience (MDE) app now, so that you are not let down on the morning of your visit. You can’t waste time fiddling with setting up links when everyone else is blazing their way through the virtual queue request that day.
This week, Disney Parks Blog released information on how the virtual queue system will be set up for this ride. (By the way, make sure you have both a valid ticket and a park reservation for the day and for EPCOT before attempting the process.)
Virtual Queue
Beginning at 7 am on the day of your park reservation, you will be able to check for an available (free) boarding group via the My Disney Experience app, and request access to the virtual queue. (Go find this spot on your app NOW, so you don’t waste precious time that morning!) You can actually request access before you leave your resort, or on your way to the park, but the countdown begins precisely at 7 am. If Remy’s Ratatouille and Rise of the Resistance, both of which used virtual queues upon their opening, are any indication, the spots will be gone in mere seconds. No kidding.
If you and your travel party are successful in obtaining a boarding group, the MDE app will assign you a boarding group number, and you will wait for that group to be called before making your way back to the ride, sometime later in the morning. (You’ll get a notification on your phone via the My Disney Experience app when it’s time to come back, but keep checking so you know when your time is getting close, so that you don’t get on line for a different ride or sit down to eat and miss your window accidentally.)
If you weren’t successful in getting one of those coveted spots at 7 am, you can try again in the afternoon. At 1 pm, you can again request a boarding group on the MDE app via the virtual queue, through the same process, but the only catch is that for the afternoon requests, you must actually be inside of EPCOT to join the virtual queue. (And if you already rode in the morning, you can’t request a second ride during the afternoon boarding groups.)
One last shot at a boarding group exists at 6 pm, but only if you are staying at a Disney Deluxe Resort, Disney Deluxe Villa Resort or other select hotels. On certain dates, Disney offers extended evening theme park hours to those guests, and Deluxe hotel guests can make use of the third shot at getting a boarding group on those days. (Deluxe hotel guests do not need to be in EPCOT to request to join during the 6 pm boarding group process). Additional information, including tips for getting into the virtual queue, is available at disneyworld.com/virtualqueue.
Individual Lightning Lane
If you don’t mind shelling out the additional cash, you can also try for an “Individual Lightning Lane” entry. Guests can purchase Individual Lightning Lane entry in the My Disney Experience app by using the Disney Genie service on the same day of their visit. (Prices weren’t released yet for the ride, and they do vary by day and season, but as a comparison, the top tier Rise of the Resistance is currently $15 per person.) Individual Lightning Lane is subject to limited availability, and again, those seats go – well, lightning fast. Guests at Disney resort hotels can purchase Individual Lightning Lane rides starting at 7 am on the day of their visit. Other guests can make their purchase when the park opens. For more information on Lightning Lane access, go to disneyworld.disney.go.com/genie/lightning-lane/.
Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind is billed as a “family-thrill attraction” that is a completely new generation of storytelling rollercoaster, with the “first ever reverse-launch.” Located in World Discovery at EPCOT, it’s also one of the largest indoor coasters in the world, and the Starjumper cars rotate 360 degrees in the dark to direct guests’ attention to the action going on around them in both projections and set pieces during their intergalactic chase. A selection of six different songs provide the soundtrack to the ride, and guests don’t know in advance which song they’ll be treated to. Kids must be at least 42 inches tall to ride.
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Beth Keating is a theme parks, restaurant and entertainment reporter for DisneyBizJournal.
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