Fantasmic! at Disney's Hollywood Studios now closed for refurbishment

May 01, 2023 in "Fantasmic!"

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Fantasmic! reopening night show - November 4 2022

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Posted: Monday May 1, 2023 1:00pm ET by WDWMAGIC Staff

Fantasmic! at Disney's Hollywood Studios is now closed for routine maintenance.

Fantasmic! will be closed May 1 and 2

The closure begins today May 1, 2023, and Fantasmic! is planned to resume on May 3 with showtimes at 9pm and 10:30pm.

Fantasmic! reopening night show - November 4 2022

Fantasmic! returned to Walt Disney World in early November 2022, with updated lighting, lasers, audio, pyro, and an all-new 5-minute sequence replacing the former Pocahontas scene.

Fantasmic! reopening night show - November 4 2022

The new sequence features heroic moments from Disney movies, including on-stage appearances by Pocahontas, Mulan, Moana, Aladdin, and Frozen's Elsa.

Fantasmic! reopening night show - November 4 2022

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ToTBellHopJul 19, 2024

“Are the powers of Mountain’s incredible imagination strong enough and bright enough to withstand the evil forces that invade Mountain’s dream? You are about to find out. For we now invite you to join Mountain and experience Fantasmount! A journey beyond your wildest imagination.”

gerararJul 19, 2024

A fun F! fail occurred during tonight's (7/18) 10:30pm show. Sorcerer Mickey was missing atop the mountain during the finale as the lift probably malfunctioned live during the show. The supposed B-mode in this situation would be Sorcerer Mickey at the bottom of the stage doing the choreography dance (no Tuxedo Mickey in this case). It's very rare to see this kind of tech fail happen, and especially captured on video! As a side note, the finale pyro, mainly the barge comets and mimes, haven't been working for the past couple weeks. They are supposedly being refurbished currently. Livestream (timestamp embedded):

Disney MadduxMar 21, 2024

Well... I saw the second-to-last Fantasmic right before covid shut everything down. After waiting for 3 years (no longer a passholder), I was finally going to see Fantasmic again at the end of a long-planned Hollywood Studios day with friends (that was also supposed to happen before covid). Got the dining package, and... Show cancelled because of a storm. Now today, after a fun day mostly at Epcot for a friend's birthday, we decided to end it by headed to DHS and seeing Fantasmic, as they had never seen it before. Got front row seats, and all I can say is: Just as, if not more beautiful than the day I last saw it. Absolutely loved the new scenes, the fountains actually being used well now throughout the entire show, and that new lighting??? Phenomenal. Well worth the wait.

SquishyMar 06, 2024

The DCA frozen show was using blacktrax I think.

gerararMar 06, 2024

I'm pretty sure they use the manual spots that are on those scissor lifts in the back and on top of the control booth, which are used during the intro, princess medley, Aladdin, etc. For Moana, I believe they use a combo of manual spots and lights on the overhead rigs that are time coded. Can see in this screenshot that one manual spot operated by a tech in the back stays on Moana through her run across the stage and until the "I Am Moana" lyric. Blacktrax would be interesting and nice, but they don't even use those in the stage shows at DL and WDW afaik.

SquishyMar 06, 2024

I believe they're using blacktrax to track the performer, not manual tracking.

DCBakerFeb 23, 2024

Beginning March 10, Fantasmic! moves to an 8:30pm showtime through April 23. For the week of March 10 (except March 13 due to an After Hours event), the second showing of Fantasmic! is scheduled for 10pm.

RhinocerousJan 31, 2024

I have no knowledge of how the Fantasmic lights are set up. In modern theatrical lighting design, follow spots will typically be tied into specific light cues, the same as any other lighting instrument. The Fantasmic lights may very well be synchronized to the musical score, which would result in the light “timing off” when the cue changed.

gerararJan 30, 2024

Moana dropped the Heart of Te Fiti during her segment. Thought this was a pretty cool fail as the manual followspot stayed on her as she backtracked to pick up the prop. Interesting thing to note are the followspots are on a timer, rather than controlled by the tech operating it, since it turned off before the CM could finish their run across the stage. The static lights still ran as normal even though no one was there on cue.

Disgruntled WaltJan 15, 2024

Join me on an investigation... : They only introduced the mines with the return of the show. Bear with me... 1999 - The Comets were as they are now (as of Jan 9 or 10): And in 2005 as well: And in 2011: And in 2017 (thanks @marni1971): And in 2020: HOWEVER, when the show returned in 2022, it had the mines: Hp1VoUmVgP4:1712 Therefore: It appears this change is a return to normalcy! Hurrah!

TouchdownJan 15, 2024

The new comets are more accurate to the short. I like them.

Disgruntled WaltJan 15, 2024

Interesting, I think I like the new comets better. More majestic.

gerararJan 15, 2024

There's been some major pyro changes in the finale. The comets with mines have been replaced with larger comets with longer tails. This seems like the pyro/comets used in the previous version pre-Covid and before the 2022 version. Wonder if this is a "budget" cut or simply a change in pyro supplies. (1/7 old pyro, 1/13 new pyro) Not sure what I prefer, but the newer comets are brighter and "more" colorful in a way. Here's a comparison video I made. The pyro change happened sometime in the past week, on either 1/9 or 1/10.

Starship824Jan 14, 2024

The quality of the water screens heavily depends on the wind that night so if it's really windy it's they won't be very clear and will be a lot harder to see. They also upgraded the projections during the 2022 update.