UNIVERSAL’S $7 BILLION THREAT TO DISNEY WORLD

BY JACOB PASSY

Epic Universe ups the stakes in the theme-park arms race with its flying dragons and intense Harry Potter ride

Orlando, Fla.

It was an experience straight out of a fairy tale: the chance to meet a dragon. One by one, visitors walked up to an inky black creature named Toothless. When a visitor stroked the top of his head, Toothless closed his eyes and sighed a calm, blissful sound that prompted smiles, laughs and even tears from the crowd. There was no puppeteer pulling strings, no human inside a costume. It was just like being in “How to Train Your Dragon,” and that is the point at Epic Universe, a new theme park that opens Thursday.

Toothless is the first theme-park character guests can interact with and touch that is animatronic, like the realistic robotic figures often used in rides and other attractions. Another dragon flies above the park via drone. Riding a carousel feels like floating among the night sky’s constellations. Flying on a magic elevator alongside Harry Potter to escape a charging Erumpent, a magical creature that resembles a rhinoceros, is stomach churning. Punching power-up blocks while walking through Super Nintendo World is a videogamer’s fantasy.

For about $7 billion, Universal’s parent, Comcast, has built the first major U.S. amusement park to open in over two decades. It is trying to feel like the theme park of the future. The company invested in the highest-end technology to create immersive experiences and rides that make Walt Disney World’s Jungle Cruise and Pirates of the Caribbean seem like museum pieces. Universal secured over 160 patents in developing the park.

The goal in the theme park arms race is vacation-destination supremacy. The new park sits on a 750-acre site and is part of an effort to transform the existing Universal Orlando Resort into a weeklong destination,

said Mark Woodbury, chief executive officer of Universal Destinations and Experiences, the division of Comcast NBCUniversal that operates the company’s theme parks around the globe.

Constructing a theme park requires a massive outlay of capital, but offering new attractions is critical to lure both new and repeat visitors. Epic’s debut comes as some Americans are scaling back vacation plans amid economic concerns. Some international tourists are forgoing trips to the U.S., and consumers are nervous about the economy and the future, according to economic data.

The company pushed back on the idea that its timing is tricky in a quarterly earnings call with investors last month. Comcast executives cited strong demand since ticket sales for Epic began in October. Comcast Chief Financial Officer Jason Armstrong said the company’s quarterly results “indicated stable trends in Orlando,” which gave the company confidence it was “entering the Epic launch from a position of strength.”

A one-day, single-park ticket to Epic Universe starts at $139 plus tax for visitors age 10 and up. Universal is also selling multiday passes that include a day at Epic where the daily cost is lower. By comparison, a similar ticket to Universal’s other two theme parks and Walt Disney World’s four parks starts at $119.

Theme parks are increasingly important to the bottom lines of entertainment companies like Comcast’s Universal and Walt Disney. The park divisions, except for during the Covid-19 pandemic when they were closed, typically provide steady streams of revenue that can help offset less-stable businesses, such as producing feature films, television or building up streaming services.

“You can take disbelief and turn it into someone’s reality,” said Jody Keller, vice president of advanced technology and innovation at Universal Creative, the division that dreams up new ideas for its global slate of theme parks.

Part of running a theme park is managing a perpetual IT operation. The more complex effects and rides get, the more things can go wrong. The stakes are even higher for Universal, since Epic is so technologically ambitious. To build in time to iron out such kinks and see what works, Universal held a soft-opening preview period over several weeks before the park’s official opening. It initially invited employees, influencers, friends and family to test it out, and later sold some tickets to the general public. Not all of its rides and attractions were always open, and work on the park was ongoing. I visited and rode nearly every ride.

The central spine of Epic Universe is called Celestial Park, a surprisingly lush area filled with gardens, fountains and other details meant to evoke an art nouveau aesthetic. Designers drew inspiration from historic World’s Fairs and Copenhagen’s Tivoli Gardens. Guests travel to Epic’s four other worlds through portals, or tunnels surrounded by lights and video screens, unlike other theme parks where lands typically blend into one another.

Universal’s technological advancements are most evident in the world devoted to the Harry Potter cinematic universe—the third of Universal’s Harry Potter-themed park areas in Orlando. The exterior of the land resembles the magical society in 1920s Paris depicted in the “Fantastic Beasts” film series. Visitors armed with interactive wands can make shop windows come to life; they can also converse with animated talking portraits of historical witches and wizards.

The land’s hallmark attraction, Harry Potter and the Battle at the Ministry, takes riders through an original story set on the day wicked bureaucrat and former Hogwarts headmistress Dolores Umbridge is set to stand trial for her crimes. The ride features a vehicle that simulates the sensation of flying up, down and around the British Ministry of Magic in an enchanted elevator. It blends screen-based illusions and filmed elements with physical sets and animatronics to the point where it can be hard to tell real from virtual.

“It was the first time that I actually questioned my reality while on a ride,” said Sarah Anderson, co-owner of Coaster Studios, a YouTube channel that covers theme parks around the world. She paid to visit Epic. At one point, Anderson said the special effects were so convincing that she thought there were live actors.

What the industry calls dark rides—where the entire attraction is enclosed and full of vivid imagery and surprise twists—have advanced dramatically over the past decade or so. Walt Disney World’s Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance dark ride has been the must-see at-traction since it opened in 2019.

Over in Epic’s misty Dark Universe section, a ride called Monsters Unchained: The Frankenstein Experiment features a 9-foot-tall animatronic of Frankenstein’s monster that, in a thrilling reveal, walks toward guests. The characters’ robotic technology is more realistic than the hydraulic systems of older animatronics, said Peter Weishar, professor and director of the themed graduate experience programs at the University of Central Florida. He visited the park multiple times while it was being built and during its soft opening.

At the Burning Blade Tavern, a windmill regularly bursts into flames—you can feel the heat and smell the garlic from its kitchen from yards away.

Even new versions of existing rides imported from other parks got upgrades. The third iteration of Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge— which already operates at Universal’s parks in Japan and California— employs quicker, higherresolution augmented-reality tech to make objects and characters appear through a special visor.

“While that might seem incremental, it has a huge impact on the experience,” Weishar said. “This is going to be a real big game changer.”

At Comcast, theme parks accounted for roughly $1.88 billion in revenue during the quarter that ended in March, or 6% of the company’s overall revenue, which includes its massive wireless and broadband business. Revenue for its theme-park business was down from the year before, as the California wildfires hurt attendance at its Los Angeles-area park.

For Disney, theme parks are a more significant contributor to its overall financial picture. In the quarter that ended in March, Disney’s theme parks, cruise line and other travel experiences generated $7.94 billion in revenue, accounting for a third of the company’s total revenue. In 2024, the Experiences division’s revenues rose 5%, compared with just 1% for its Entertainment division.

Walt Disney World’s four theme parks dominate attendance in central Florida. Disney’s parks attracted nearly 49 million visitors in 2023, according to estimates from the most recent edition of an annual index released by Aecom and the Themed Entertainment Association. Universal Orlando Resort’s two existing theme parks welcomed nearly 20 million visitors that same year.

Disney executives have said that the addition of Epic Universe to the Orlando market may be good for all the parks in the Orlando area. Big new additions to the tourism industry tend to drive higher attendance overall to both companies’ properties. Even if Disney loses market share to Universal, it may nonetheless benefit from an overall uptick in foot traffic.

Disney has committed to spending billions on its parks in the U.S. in the coming years, including new attractions planned for three of its parks in Florida. This month, the company announced a partnership to build a new resort and theme park in Abu Dhabi.

“We’re always on the offensive,” said Josh D’Amaro, chairman of Disney Experiences, the branch of the company that includes its theme parks and cruise line, at a recent conference. “We’re constantly investing for the long term, fortifying each one of our theme parks.”

Universal is constructing a new, children-oriented theme park in Texas and a horror-themed experience in Las Vegas. It plans to expand its international footprint with a new theme park that it is developing in the United Kingdom and add new attractions to its other U.S. parks.

I actually questioned my reality while on a ride.

Sarah Anderson, co-owner of Coaster Studios YouTube channel.