Some of Your Favorite Disney Rides Were Almost MUCH Different

It’s no secret that even the best pieces of art go through many changes during the creative process. There are demo versions of music’s most successful songs, and even the biggest books and movies go through countless rewrites and edits.

So it should come as no surprise that Disney attractions — works of art in their own right — go through the same process. In fact, some of the most popular Disney attractions initially started off an an idea unrecognizable to fans today.

These six legendary Disney attractions were almost much different than they turned out.

Pirates of the Caribbean Was Almost a Walkthrough

Thanks to the blockbuster film series, Pirates of the Caribbean is arguably the most famous “ride” in Disney’s theme park canon… which makes it all the more ironic that the attraction initially wasn’t planned to be a ride at all. 

When planning first began for a pirate-based attraction early on in Disneyland’s life, the thought was to design a pirate wax museum. Guests would be guided through through various heavily-themed rooms, each of which would feature wax recreations of some of history’s most famous buccaneers, as well as special effects. Planning for the wax museum iteration got so far that a large “basement” was dug out in the then-under-construction New Orleans Square to hold the attraction. However the walkthrough was never meant to be. 

There were two major reasons the wax museum was never built: The first was practical. Simply put, Disneyland was too popular. The operations team fought back hard against the idea of an inherently low capacity wax museum, arguing the the low hourly capacity attraction (which would likely be slowed even more by the inevitable straggler guest losing their group) simply would not work at the highly attended park. 

This second reason was improved technology. Walt Disney Imagineering famously designed four attractions for the 1964 New York World’s Fair, the most famous of which was the boat-based It’s a Small World. Disney wanted to replicate the attraction’s ride system (beyond the already planned packing up and moving It’s a Small World across the country) and saw the pirate ride as the perfect spot. 

The “basement” which was originally set to house the whole pirate attraction became just the ride’s opening scenes (home of the infamous caverns) while the rest of the new flume attraction’s ride took place in a newly constructed show building outside Disneyland’s train tracks. 

Pirates of the Caribbean as we know and love it today opened in 1967.  

Haunted Mansion Was Envisioned as Deathly Serious

Much like its New Orleans Square neighbor Pirates of the Caribbean, The Haunted Mansion went through years of development changes before finally opening to the public. 

From Harper Goff’s very first drawings of Mickey Mouse Park — the precursor plan to Disneyland that Walt Disney panned to build across the street from the Disney Studio complex in Burbank — a scary “haunted house” attraction of some kind was included. 

Initially planned as a walkthrough (noting a pattern here?), plans for this haunted house continued to be sketched out during the first decade of Disneyland’s existence. Imagineer Ken Anderson began writing potential backstories for the attraction, while his colleagues Yale Gracey and Rolly Crumb began developing magic-based illusions and bizarre accoutrements including coffin clocks, candle men, talking chairs, and man-eating plants respectively. 

 

By the mid-1960s, the Haunted Mansion (the facade of which had been constructed and teasing guests with an imminent arrival since 1963) was planned to be a frightening walkthrough attraction utilizing ideas from Anderson and Gracey’s, while Crump’s oddities were to be housed in a connected restaurant known as the Museum of the Weird, similar to Pirates of the Caribbean’s Blue Bayou. 

The concept of the Mansion was completely retooled following Walt Disney’s death in 1966.  For starters, it was changed from a walkthrough to a ride that would utilize the omnimover ride system first introduced to the park in Adventure Through Inner Space. 

Secondly, Imagineers Claude Coates and Marc Davis took over creative leadership on the attraction. Coates, a well-known background artist and set designer on numerous Disney films, wanted to craft a spooky, atmospheric attraction that would genuinely scare guests. On the other hand, Davis wanted the Mansion to be a comic’s pontification on death, full of the tip of broad sight gags he had successfully integrated into The Jungle Cruise. 

The two differing viewpoints clashed often, especially without Walt Disney around to issue a final edict one way or another. So, instead of choosing, Disney simply decided to do both. When the Haunted Mansion opened in 1969, the first half is full of Coates’ freaky, genuinely frightening atmosphere (including numerous bizarre pieces originally designed by Rolly Crump for the Museum of the Weird) while the second hall (beginning with Madame Leota’s seance) was chock full of Marc Davis’s trademark brand of humorous gags. 

Big Thunder Mountain Was Initially a Second Fiddle Attraction:

These days, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad is an anchor attraction at Disney parks around the world. The “Wildest Ride in the Wilderness” is one of the most famous of Disney’s vast “mountain range” of coasters, and even has the entirety of Frontierland built around it in Disneyland Paris. Beyond the parks, the attraction’s backstory has been fleshed out through comic books and other products. All of which is pretty impressive, given the fact that Big Thunder was initially planned to be nothing more than a secondary attraction. 

As we’ve discussed before, Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom was originally scheduled to include the Western River Expedition – a magnum opus water flume dark ride from the mind of Imagineer Marc Davis – instead of Pirates of the Caribbean. The attraction was to be housed in a massive show building complex disguised to look like a mountain range known as Thunder Mesa. 

Thunder Mesa was planned to be so large that the top of the building was scheduled to include a “runaway train roller coaster” designed by Davis’ protégée Tony Baxter. That’s right, the initial genesis of Big Thunder was simply supposed to be a small coaster meant to add life to the larger Thunder Mesa Complex. 

As you’re no doubt aware, neither Western River Expedition nor Thunder Mesa was ever built, due to a mixture of budget issues and Disney World guest complaints essentially forcing the company to add a shortened version of Pirates of the Caribbean, much to the chagrin of Marc Davis. The legendary Imagineer was further enraged when Tony Baxter pitches the idea of Big Thunder Mountain as a standalone attraction first in Disneyland and then Walt Disney World, with the latter version being constructed on the exact plot that had once been set aside for Thunder Mesa. Allegedly, Davis never spoke to Baxter again after this “betrayal.”

Space Mountain Goes Outdoors

Since the first version of Space Mountain opened at Walt Disney World in 1975, the indoor coaster-like attraction has been replicated (sometimes more faithfully than others) at Disney’s properties around the world, becoming the company’s best known thrill attraction. 

A major part of the ride’s appeal comes from the fact that most versions take place completely inside a dark show building, mimicking outer space with the added bonus of making guests feel they’re traveling faster than they are thanks to not being able to see where they’re going, which makes it somewhat shocking to know that original plans for Space mountain called for an outdoor portion. 

When Walt Disney and John Hench first began discussing ideas for a “spaceport” roller coaster to be built at Disneyland in the early 1960s, Hench came up with a novel idea for the ride’s climax. The legendary Imagineer envisioned the attractions rocket-like coaster trains shooting out the top of the building, then circling the round structure on tracks affixed to the side of the building. 

The technological limitations of the time put an end to the “spaceport” project as envisioned by Hench, and the Imagineers who designed Space Mountain a decade later chose to completely omit the outdoor portion.

The Tower of Terror… Starring Mel Brooks?

The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror is often cited as one of Disney’s best attractions of the Post-Walt Era. Often praised as much for for it’s in-depth queue and highly developed story as it is for its inventive ride system. However, the ride almost didn’t have said backstory or queue at all. Instead, it was at one point scheduled to be fixed to… legendary director Mel Brooks. 

In the early 1990s, Disney Imagineering began planning a new expansion to the the then-newly-opened Disney/MGM Studios theme park. At the insistence of then-CEO Michael Eisner, the team brought the idea to director Mel Brooks, who Eisner wanted to bring into the park’s fold. 

Working with the legendary director of films like Space Balls and Young Frankenstein, the Imagineers came up with the concept of a haunted hotel attraction that would be hosted by Brooks, and feature scenes from several of his films. However, this version of the attraction never made it past the development stage, as Brooks backed out. 

Clearly that was for the best, as the Imagineers eventually decided to combine a free-fall attraction based on a ride system that was originally planned for EuroDisneyland’s Frontierland with the Twilight Zone intellectual party to create the attraction we know and love today. 

The Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster Without Aerosmith

Over 20 years after it’s opening, The Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith is still one of Hollywood Studios mist in-demand attractions, partially due to the way the indoor-coaster integrates the music of the “Bad Bad Boys of Boston” seamlessly into the ride experience. However, the coaster wasn’t even built with Aerosmith in mind. 

In fact, when construction on the coaster and it’s surrounding show building began in 1998, Disney didn’t have a music artist lined up for the soundtrack. According to theme park legend, the company contacted numerous rock bands including KISS, U2, and even the Rolling Stones about starring on the attraction. However, the company wasn’t able to come to financial terms with any of them. 

Since Disney had announced that the ride would open for the oars 20th anniversary in 1999, Disney was quickly running into a time crunch. Salvation came when Aerosmith had a massive #1 hit with “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” from the Disney film Armageddon. Thanks to this already fruitful relationship, the two sides were able to come to a financial agreement, and the rest is Disney and rock & roll history. 

Do you think any of these Disney attractions would have been better with their original stories intact? Let us know in the comments below. 

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