You Mean This Disney Nighttime Show Could Have Had DRONES?!

The Disneyland Resort is full of nighttime entertainment.

At Disneyland, you can enjoy Fantasmic!, which has finally re-opened with a new and updated show two times a night on weekends at 9PM and 10PM. For the Halloween season, Disneyland’s current projection/fireworks show is Halloween Screams. The show, which starts at 9:30PM, features Halloween-themed projections on the castle, and on select nights, the skies around the park light up with fireworks. However, it is not only Disneyland that has nighttime entertainment offerings. Simply cross the esplanade and head into Disney California Adventure. 

Since 2015, to celebrate Disneyland’s 60th anniversary, World of Color has been entertaining visitors of California Adventure. This show features water, projections, lasers, fog, and even fire. While the show has seen multiple iterations for holidays and other celebrations, the original show actually planned to have another element.

2015 is the same year that the first Intel drone show debuted in Germany. Walt Disney Imagineering Vice President for Parades and Spectaculars Steven Davison recently shared at D23 during the Magic After Dark panel that World of Color planned to use aerial drones as part of the show. 

During the panel, Davidson said, “They [drones] were supposed to premiere at this water thing across the street we won’t talk about.” In this quote, he is referencing California Adventure, which is right across the street from where the panel was taking place.

According to the Orange Country Register, “Disneyland ultimately backed out of plans to include aerial drones in the “World of Color” water show after U.S. government regulations placed restrictions on the nighttime spectaculars featuring flying robots that Walt Disney Imagineering helped pioneer.”

However, it did not take long for drones to be featured in a Disney project. While many people know that Disney Dreams that Soar premiered at Disney Springs this summer, it was not the first drone show to debut there. In 2016, Disney Springs was home to the limited-time holiday drone show Starbright Holidays, which used 300 of Intel’s drones.

Disneyland Paris recently debuted drones in the parks with its nighttime shows, Disney D-Light, and Disney Electrical Sky Parade. Drones were even used at Comic-Con this year, as Marvel Entertainment debuted a Deadpool and Wolverine drone show in San Diego.

Now that drones are being used more and more, does this mean that a drone show could come to the Disneyland Resort? Davidson said “There’s so many restrictions in America with the use of drones, we’re finally getting a chance to actually look at them and use them.”

We could see more drone shows pop up across the Disney parks, as Disney has filed permits for different drone concepts, like drone displays that mimic fireworks and drone-controlled puppets.

While it would have been cool to have drones be part of World of Color, we are glad that Disney is continuing to develop their drone technology. As always, keep following along with AllEars to stay up to date with all the latest Disney news.

Have you been able to see World of Color — ONE? Do you think drones would make a cool addition to the show? Let us know in the comments!

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