With Disney having the streaming rights to Doctor Who, and Universal interested in opening a Universal Studios in Bedford, could we see a theme park wars regarding Doctor Who?
I can imagine Universal Studios wanting a Doctor Who Land in their British park because of it being an iconic British brand, but I can’t imagine Disney would be too happy if BBC Studios chose Universal over Disneyland Paris.
We know from DWM that Disney are pleased with how Doctor Who has been performing, and Disney also had the TARDIS briefly in the LA Disneyland. They already have shown an interest in Doctor Who being in a Disney park.
Meanwhile, Universal Studios will probably want to make Britain the USP of their Universal Studios Great Britain park.
Doctor Who could become the most lucrative property in the world of theme parks since the MCU.
Same here. Something where you enter into the TARDIS, and all of the rides are indoor inside the TARDIS, would be ideal. Kind of like the Doctor Who Experience’s walkthrough but on a much bigger scale.
Oh I would kill to go on a dark ride where the train enters the TARDIS doors and then inside you travel up the slopes and into the doors to reveal different areas, a huge world inside that little blue box
Interesting reading this up, considering not much has happened in that regard (to my knowledge at least), I’d doubt there is a Theme Park War going. That said, it certainly would be lovely if perhaps one Day Who gets one or two Rides. I am not sure how likely this really is. There is of course Potential, but it’s still very niche compared to some bigger IPs. Although one could argue that certain IPs in both Disneys and Universals Theme Parks don’t have the same Relevance that they used to, but then again those make points through being easily recognizable.
Who knows, would be lovely to get something along those Lines with Who one day, but I am not holding my Hopes up too much!
It’s too bad that Paramount owns the rights to Star Trek because it’s mindboggling how it doesn’t have an area in a theme park like Star Wars and other popular franchises do[1]. I think that would make more sense to build for an American audience than Doctor Who, but speaking hypothetically I can see Universal acquiring ST over Disney, so there wouldn’t be any so-called conflict between the two IPs anyway. I can see them making some sort of (shooting?) dark ride or flight simulator for DW, that would be pretty cool.
I know they had the Vegas pop-up experience decades ago; not talking about that ↩︎
Considering from what I know Universal is much more open about having IPs that aren’t theirs, I can definitely see them wanting to do something with Star Trek! Surprised to hear that there isn’t much with it, thought that would be at least something worth of note!
My dream is for there to someday a whole Doctor Who section of a theme park, but it would be a bit hard for it to be grounded in one fictional location because the only consistent location in Doctor Who is the TARDIS (which is indoors, so it would be hard to have multiple theme park rides in one building).
Summary
I’ve been to the Mexico section of EPCOT at Disney World in Florida, and there is a large building (I think it was pyramid shaped? It’s been six years, so I don’t remember) that houses a small boat ride, a restaurant, and multiple shops. It’s designed to make one feel like they’re outdoors at night (it’s very impressive). It would be hard for that to apply to Doctor Who rides because roller coasters take up space, and the only recurring locations that I can think of that would be large enough for that are the Citadel on Gallifrey and the new UNIT tower (which I hate).
I’ve never seen Classic Who; are there locations on Gallifrey that pop up frequently? Obviously it could just be a bunch of Doctor Who rides(s) without a themed location, but I do love it when the area around rides is immersive as well. Of course, there could just be a single Doctor Who ride next to other non-Doctor Who rides, but an entire Doctor Who-themed area would be my idea of paradise. I had a short burst of fixating on theme parks last summer that coincided with the Doctor Who special interest coming back, so I’ve thought about this before.
Yeah, that’s the problem. I can think of an idea or two for what the rides would be, but the actual themed area I’m not sure how they would tackle. If push comes to shove, I can see Disney putting a single ride in the UK pavilion of EPCOT, where Mary Poppins was once slated to be. There’s never been a ride there. Park a TARDIS out front, a couple DW options in the gift shop, and maybe retheme the pub or the chippery to make it DW-ified and they’re golden.
My first thought was, if they wanted to give DW a separate land, they could just build the TARDIS and house everything within (bigger on the inside), but that would be one freakishly huge TARDIS. But they could use some Disney magic so only the entrance was the TARDIS and everything else was housed in a building that was shrouded from public view. Disney used to be a pro at disguising show buildings.
Theme parks were my first passion, so I can talk about this forever lol.
They should make a doctor who theme park that’s an exact replica of Winkle’s Wonderland from Zagreus, complete with murderous animatronics voiced by 7th doctor companion actors.
Would work well for Universal Studios Great Britain though, given they will need more indoor areas because you can’t rely on our weather.
Sounds similar to what they did with the walkthrough part of the Doctor Who Experience. Still to this day have no idea how they managed to do that, so it actually felt like you were stepping into this small police box and into a much larger room.
On a serious note, it’s a shame that we haven’t had a more impactful / iconic / recurring place within the show that would work. You could adapt Hedgewick’s World of Wonders from Series 7, or Trap Street from Series 9, but they only appeared once in the last 60 years. Compared to something like Diagon Alley which is a staple of every HP book and film.
I guess they’d just have to present an open area where you could walk to Totter’s Lane to see the TARDIS, and then off to the left is a Trap Street you can discover with shops and monsters within, then maybe there’s a UNIT HQ facade which has some open grounds behind it where you can have another ride, etc.
In fact, you could just invent something akin to Time Fracture. Have a sort of mish mash of Doctor Who locations which have all been jumbled together due to a wibbly wobbly spacey wacey thing - sorted.
