On Thursday, I decided to go to MGM Studios. On this day, there were Extra Magic hours at Epcot and Magic Kingdom. MGM was coming off from an evening Extra Magic Hours yesterday and experiences a morning Extra Magic Hour on the 29th. The mean temperature for the day was at 58 degrees while the max temperature was at 70 degrees.
My plan was to get to the park at 7:30am, early enough for the rope drop that happens usually about 10 to 15 minutes before the actual opening time. We took more time getting ready since we tried to catch up on sleep. We got to the park right at 8am.
When I was at MGM last time in 2000, the Mickey hat didn’t exist. I think it looks really tacky and it needs to be moved. Maybe put it in front of the animation building or something. Better yet, get rid of the darn thing. The first thing we went to was Toy Story Mania. We got there at 8:10am and the wait time was already at 60 minutes. We decided to get FastPasses that already went out to 10:55am.
We then decided to walk down Hollywood Boulevard to Rock n Rollercoaster.
When it comes down to it, Rock n Rollercoaster is a priority over Tower of Terror. The capacity for Tower of Terror is far greater than RnR with its two drop towers.
We got in line for RnR at 8:19am.
Once again, we utilized the front row priority and got on the ride at 8:35am.
After RnR, it was time for Tower of Terror.
As you can see, ToT had a posted wait time of 40 minutes. I had a feeling that it was going to be less since it was 8:48am.
Another attempt at an artistic photo
The ToT queue is one of my favorite queues. The scenery outside in the gardens is beautiful and the lobby inside is great.
Thanks to Wizzard, I found out that you can actually buy the owl online.
We got onto the elevator at 9:17am, which made the wait just less than 30 minutes.
After ToT, we decided to trek over to Star Tours. When I did research beforehand, people were saying that photopass photographers would take your picture with your camera. So I gave it a shot.
Our scared pose
These people don’t get paid by the number of passes they sell, so they don’t mind. They will take some more pictures on a photopass card and will give it to you though.
We didn’t do the American Idol show. I heard a lot of mized stuff about it and we were so busy with what we did anyway.
One of the jedi academy training shows was going on when we arrived at 9:40am. The standby time was at 5 minutes.
I was impressed with the redesign of the attraction. The 3-D was good. I wish we came back to do this ride again later in the day to experience a different iteration but we didn’t have time. We decided to head back to Sunset Boulevard to acquire FastPasses for RnR to be used later in the day.
We got the Fastpasses at 10:10am with a return time of 1:25pm.
I planned for us to head to Animation Courtyard to do the Animation Academy class at 10:30am
For our class, we drew Tinker Bell. Our “teacher” said that Tinker Bell is one of the harder characters to draw because of her symmetry. I almost made my Tinker Bell cross-eyed.
We got out of the class at 11am, which was perfect timing to use our Fastpasses on Toy Story Mania.
We were done with the ride at 11:22am. By the time we got out, the standby wait time was at 150 minutes (Wow)
Our next attraction was to catch the 11:50am showing of Lights, Motors Action.
We got in our seats at 11:35am. Disney was testing Fastpasses for the show that was given to guests earlier in the day. We were not able to get any of these since we didn’t know about it. It was the testing phase of Fastpass+
I did manage to get some views from our seats of the park.
The show started on time
Overall, the show was ok but not as good as many people have said. I thought the ratio of the talking between stuff and the actual action scenes was too high. The show ended at 12:35pm, thus my friends and I decided to ride the Studio Backlot Tour.
The tour today is a former shadow of itself. I never went on the original version, but from the videos that I have seen I wish I had. We got there at 12:50pm with just the wait for the group infront of us that was currently at the water set.
I was a bit surprised that the water set was still there. Even though the CMs did show off the effects, they said that due to technical difficulties they couldn’t have performers. I highly doubt that since they just showed all of the effects.
Back in 2000, I remember there being a room that had some of the set to the live action 101 Dalmatians movie like Cruela’s car, the farmhouse barn, and the old mansion. I was surprised to see this instead. But hey you can see props from hit movies such as The Santa Claus 2, Marvin’s Room, and Honey I Blew Up the Kid
I like to call the place that houses all of the vehicles the vehicle prop graveyard.
Catastrophe Canyon is still running, which is a nice sign.
There are rumors that if Cars Land did come to MGM, then it would replace the backlot tour. I honestly wouldn’t mind. MGM used to have real movie sets shooting, thus the backlot tour was actually very interesting. With no live sets anymore, this attraction I feel like is suffering.
We were done with the tour at 1:30pm. The AFI exhibit was after the tour. It was actually very cool to see the costumes and props from famous movies. It was now time to use our FastPasses for RnR.
Just a bit crowded from this morning (lol). We got to RnR at 1:46pm
Now just before we went on RnR, we decided to get Fastpasses for the attraction again for later. The return time was between 9pm and 10pm jeez. One of my friends overheard some of the CMs talking to each other about how they wanted to get rid of the FastPasses so they can leave their post. My friend told them that she would be willing to take more off their hands. The CM gave my friend an entire set of 4 FastPasses with the same return time. With this, each of us had two active FastPasses for RnR for the 9pm and 10pm time slot.
For our second ride on RnR, we decided to be a 4 person band. I am playing a bass guitar, while my friends are playing guitar, drums, and a singer.
After the ride, it was time to have lunch. We made a reservation for 50s Prime Time Café for 2:30pm before we left for the trip.
One of my friends and I split the Sampling of Mom’s Favorite Recipes. This meal had meatloaf, crispy-fried chicken, and fork tender pot roast. It was very good. I did get the strawberry milkshake which was very good. My friend who was splitting the meal with me got the peanut-butter and jelly milkshake. That was good as well. One of my friends got the crispy-fried chicken entre while the other just got chicken noodle soup. I was disappointed in the waitress wasn’t in character. The nice part of my experience was when the head chief came to our table and talked to us for a while. He was interested in our majors and graduation plans. He was a very nice guy.
After our meal, we decided to go see the Indiana Jones Stunt Show. We got there at 3:30pm for the 4:00pm show.
My friend was chosen to participate for the show. I was extremely jealous since Indiana Jones is one of my favorite trilogies and I had always wanted to be a part of the show (I am purposely excluding the last movie).
I was very disappointed when the ending of the last act was changed. Instead of the mechanic going through the trap door, Indy and the mechanic just punched it out away from the airplane. Indy just knocks him out and then saves Marian. The trap door may not have been working or it could have been a new actor playing the mechanic. Besides that everything else was great.
The show ended at 4:35pm. After the show, my friends and I headed for the Muppets 3-D show
We got there at 4:45pm with a short wait. We were able to watch the entire pre-show feature before the show. I really like The Muppets. It has to do something with the style of humor that they use.
After the show, we decided to go on The Great Movie Ride. As we walked over there, one of my friends checked their phone and saw that the FastPasses for ToT were almost gone. I decided that we should get FastPasses for the ride. I let the girls continue to walk over to Great Movie Ride while my other friend and I went to get the FastPasses.
I was able to get FastPasses for ToT with a return time of 9:25pm. After acquiring the passes, my friend and I met up with the girls to ride the Great Movie Ride.
We got in line at 5:28pm and were on the ride at 5:47pm. Even though I like the Great Movie Ride, it really needs and update.
After the ride, we decided to go watch the last showing of Beauty and the Beast that started at 6:45pm. We got to the theater 30 minutes early. We didn’t mind since it gave us some time to relax for a bit. Beauty and the Beast is my second favorite Disney movie behind Fantasia.
Beauty and the Beast show is great. The costumes are great and the songs are unforgettable. This really is a must see show at MGM.
The show ended at 7:10pm. With the late FastPasses we acquired, we decided to go to the earlier showing of Fantasmic which was scheduled for 8:30pm. With two showings of Fantasmic, you want to try and go to the second showing since it less crowded. We were inside the stadium at 7:15pm.
I was horrified when the pre-show music came on. Most of the songs were remakes of the classic Disney songs. While there were a couple of siongs that were alright, the majority of them were terrible. I thought my ears were going to bleed. Thankfully the show started at 8:30pm.
After the show, we had to rush to use our three FastPasses. We decided to start with RnR, the go to ToT and then back to RnR. We got out of the show at 9:05pm.
We got in line at 9:10pm at RnR and got to the loading zone at 9:22pm.
We wanted to do a picture of us sleeping on the ride
After RnR, we ran over to ToT to use the FastPasses.
For this picture, we tried doing our scared poses. The girls did get blocked a bit by hands however. I like the CM in the front and the little kid in the back
While my friends went to get the on ride picture, I went over and bought a Twilight Zone t shirt. I saw it when I went on ToT in the morning. I quickly bought it. It was a t shirt that had the words “You've just crossed over into... the Twilight Zone” in different colors as you read it. I may post a picture later of it.
After ToT, we ran back over to RnR to use our last FastPass. We got to the line at 10pm and the CM let us on the ride.
For this picture, we wanted to look bored on the ride except for my one friend who didn’t show a lot of emotion in most of the on ride photos. My closed right at the picture which was a bummer
After the ride, we were done. We walked back to the front of the park and left.
Overall,I thought we conquered a lot of MGM. MGM is in great need of an expansion or new area. It's good to hear that plans are in the works. Right now, MGM is starting to experience the same issue with Animal Kingdom. It is the issue of doing MGM in half a day. I still consider it a full day park, but people who want to experience more of Orlando than just Disney, they will either make MGM a half day or skip it entirely.
I plan to have a concluding post about the hotel and stuff after the trip
