How Disney World's new Tron coaster opens 'next chapter' for film series

The long-awaited sequel to Joseph Kosinski's 2010 blockbuster Tron: Legacy is here... but you'll have to brave a 60-mile-per-hour launch if you want to experience the digital revolution.

A new portal into the Tron series' iconic Grid — first traversed by Jeff Bridges in 1982's original film, about a computer hacker navigating gladiatorial combat in a cyber world — is set to open at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom park on April 4. Ahead of its debut, EW had an exclusive chat with Disney Imagineer Chris Beatty about how the jaw-dropping attraction made a reverse jump from the screen to a real-life continuation of the beloved franchise.

Abigail Nilsson / Disney Parks Tron Lightcycle Run at Disney World's Magic Kingdom park

Disney Imagineers first collaborated with Tron: Legacy filmmakers on how best to tap a ride into the Grid

"We'll meet with the film directors and the original writers and talk about things that inspired them. Not just the aesthetics or look or visual design, but the narrative. What was that character's story arc? If they were to come back in a sequel or come back in another chapter in the adventure, how do you think they were shaped by the moments that took place?" Beatty tells EW. "A lot of hours go in with the design teams to bring those movie stories life. We take that [info] and [apply it as we] come up with the next chapter. It's a back-and-forth process — we check in with them, just to make sure that visually we're continuing that arc."

The result of their meetings — primarily with the 2010 film's production design team, he says — was to both lightly extend the narrative of Tron: Legacy while also putting riders directly into an imagined scenario inspired by the films without giving a "book report" on what they already saw on the big screen.

"You want to deliver on that vision and what people fell in love with on the screen," he explains. "Why start from scratch? We want to extend this world, not create something completely different."

Years of development, "tons of sketches," and fine-tuning led Imagineers to discover a new Grid portal in Orlando

Once they decided on a look and feel for the attraction — lots of neon, heavy synth-wave vibes, and one huge, enveloping canopy dotted with jaw-dropping electronic lights — Imagineers devised how they'd transport riders into the Grid. Beatty says that the lightcycle sequences from Legacy provided the most natural basis for a thrilling experience.

"We wanted to give guests the opportunity to be a competitor on the Grid and looking at that competition. The best way to do that is to say we're more of a sequel," he says, adding that the team built countless models and tested numerous different versions of the ride system until landing on a concept that placed riders into mini replications of the film's vehicles, with guests ultimately navigating the initial 60-mile-per-hour launch positioned on their lightcycles just as Tron characters are in the films. "We're happening after the events of the second film, it lets us open those multiple portals around the world and entry into the universe in that way. Those are the first three narrative story themes or moments to define what it would be."

Abigail Nilsson / Disney Parks Tron Lightcycle Run at Magic Kingdom

The "ride" itself is only half of the Tron Lightcycle Run experience

After opening the first Tron coaster in 2016 at Shanghai Disneyland in collaboration with manufacturer Vekoma, Beatty says the team knew almost immediately that they needed to bring the attraction to U.S. audiences. But they didn't want to simply build a carbon copy of the existing ride, so they tweaked story and design elements as they translated the experience.

Shanghai's version takes place immediately after Tron: Legacy, and Disney World's iteration carries the plot. Beatty calls this the "second portal into the Grid," meaning both rides are connected to each other in the Disney Parks-verse.

"As you approach the ride, you come into the concourse — this is the first setup where you get to see the lightcycle coming out into the canopy," Beatty explains. "It's electric, it's alive, you get this amazing visual stimulation. You get to see our digitizer, which is from the film. It's this big canon that will take you down and zap you and derez you and take you into the world of Tron."

Indeed, a giant digitizer lifted right out of Kosinski's movie — which pulses with noise, different lighting elements, and more as you queue for the attraction — looms over the portal into the show building. Shortly thereafter, freshly digitized guests make their way to the Grid via a breathtaking sync chamber, which serves as one of the most theatrical beginnings of any Disney attraction in history. An announcer prompts you to "prepare to be digitized" into the film's world, and the wall in front of you seems to disappear, revealing a team of lightcycles blasting off in the chamber below.

From there, guests board the cycles and engage in a thrilling race against the opposing orange team, which begins with the aforementioned (very intense) launch, and continues once the vehicles re-enter the building. Inside, riders encounter a mix of physical props and "digital sets," as Beatty calls them, that had to be meticulously synced with the motion of the ride.

"Our lead designer has ridden it over 500 times, making sure that every time you ride it's that perfect marriage of technology and ride system to make you feel like you're really there in that moment," Beatty says.

Tron Lightcycle Run represents current Disney World technology at its finest, but also offers a glimpse into the Tron series' future

"It's a conversation around where does this story take place? Are we going back in time to the original film? Are we in the second film, in that storyline? Or, are we in a sequel? Are we leaning forward?" Beatty says of his team's process of weaving the ride into the world of a pre-existing series of films and TV shows. "We decided we'd like to do that next chapter. We are the participants in this story."

When asked if the ride incorporates any teasers about where the Tron series is headed — especially since it's been announced that Jared Leto will headline a third movie in the franchise — Beatty replies, "No, not right now in this attraction." He briefly pauses before dropping an exciting teaser about what's to come on the digital horizon: "That doesn't mean we haven't left the door open to say we know there's more coming and we can slide those moments in where possible. But, not officially... yet."

Beatty promises that Imagineers have anticipated for narrative and aesthetic evolutions as new entries are released. "We're always in touch with the filmmakers and have an eye to the future," he shares. "We always leave ourselves that window open to add, update, and bring some of those new story elements or characters in. It's something we, as Imagineers, keep in the back of our minds."

Tron Lightcycle Run opens April 4 at Disney World's Magic Kingdom park in Orlando, Fla. See EW's exclusive preview of the new attraction in the photos above and in the video at the top of the article.

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