Star Trek, One Piece, Jujutsu Kaisen, Back to the Future, Dungeons & Dragons, plus the worlds of Super Nintendo and Harry Potter will take over Universal Studios Hollywood at Universal Fan Fest Nights. The West Coast park will be premiering an after-hours event that will immerse fans into their favorite fandom universes in new creative ways. Similar in tone to the Disney parks’ regular themed fan nights, Fan Fest Nights will combine the kinds of walkthrough experiences already seen at Halloween Horror Nights with a whole host of new interactive events—like joining an actual bridge battle in space aboard the USS Enterprise, or a new adventure in the realms of Dungeons & Dragons,
io9 recently attended a preview of the event at Citywalk’s Universal Cinema to get a first look at the cinematic concepts that will come to life over the course of a few experimental weeks. The West Coat might not be getting the Epic Universe Park any time soon, but Fan Fest Nights seeks to seasonally counter-program the success Universal has had at Halloween with its own way of bringing more genre universes to the original Universal Studios park. Scott Strobl, executive vice president and general manager of Universal Studios Hollywood, introduced the events as “very similar to what we do with Halloween. It’s going to be in the evening after the regular park closes.”
“This is going to be impressive,” Strobl continued. “The Back to the Future movies originated here on this lot and there’s no better place than Universal Studios Hollywood.” Similar to Halloween Horror Nights, the offerings will include a mix of experiences, food, and merchandise to leverage immersion. “We’re going to really lean into both our food and retail and have that in integral parts. So you’re really going to be able to actually taste and feel and touch these worlds and understand them.”
Regardless of when you attend—while there will be multiple Fan Fest Nights, they will all have all of these experiences on offer—each will kick off as soon as you get into the park with the Block Party Festival, described by Stephen Siercks, Universal Studios Hollywood’s Senior Director of Entertainment Production, as a sort of Horror-Nights-meets-Comic-Con: “Guests can look forward to group meetups, cosplay celebrations, trivia, [and] live music takeovers. We know that community is a big part of the fandom of these genres, so it’s important to carve out space to celebrate the fans themselves.” But from there, each night will split off into its own thing. Let’s take a look at the first wave of themed nights to come, starting with perhaps the most intriguing idea Universal is playing with in these experiences.
Star Trek – Red Alert
The most audacious feature is part of the Star Trek night, Red Alert, where sci-fi fans will be able to participate in a mission aboard TNG‘s iconic Enterprise-D—not unlike the old Las Vegas Trek attraction which served as the blueprint for experiences like Galaxy’s Edge, now with its own authentically unique Star Trek story. “We’re working directly with Paramount, collaborating to create a brand new story while anchoring in a very iconic and familiar environment. It’s also a new type of walkthrough attraction,” Siercks teased. “We’re calling this a pulsed story-based experience, which provides us the ability to take in environments like never before.”
Set at the Starfleet Museum as seen in Picard, guests will be invited to an exclusive tour of the Enterprise-D, but of course, an experience called Red Alert means you’re going to get action—a mysterious entity will start wreaking havoc, whisking you all the way through iconic TNG environments like the Enterprise‘s shuttle bay and sickbay, and even a Turbolift that will take you to the legendary bridge of the ship. And it’s not just a recreation: it’s the real deal.
“As part of the Picard series, the Paramount team actually built a full recreation of the bridge and we’re able to, through that partnership with Paramount, bring that experience to our guests.” Siercks explained, before teasing that, perhaps nostalgically similar to Star Trek: The Experience, Red Alert will find a way to give fans the feeling of being beamed through a transporter. I’m not even that big of a Trekkie, but I’m excited to boldly go here, because this sounds amazingly chaotic—especially if we get some classic Trek aliens unleashed in a Horror Nights fashion!
Back to the Future – Destination Hill Valley
As Strobl mentioned during the presentation, Universal is the home of Back to the Future‘s production—and although events like Secret Cinema have done takeovers to recreate locations from the movie for special screenings, Universal fans have always wondered why a similar experience hasn’t been part of the park before. Well, wonder no longer!
Destination Hill Valley, centered around the Courthouse Square just as Marty McFly saw it when he was whisked back to 1955, will feature a host of character actors making appearances as events from the film play out over the course of the night through song and dance—including of course, the iconic Enchantment Under the Sea dance, with Marty showing up to rock out through the night. Destination Hill Valley will climax with a recreation of the end of the film, including the storm over the square as the DeLorean made its way back to the future.
This night sounds super promising, and we hope doesn’t turn out to be a logistical nightmare. We’d be just as happy if somehow they played the original Back to the Future attraction movie as an overlay on the Simpsons ride too—it’s still one of the rides many unanimously feel is a downgrade from its Amblin glory days.
Dungeons & Dragons – Secrets of Waterdeep
Siercks described the Dungeons & Dragons event as a bit of LARPing, or live-action role-play. “For casual fans, it’s a traditional quest. Something has been stolen and we’ve been recruited to help find it. For fans of Dungeons & Dragons, even more is in store. Iconic characters, fan-favorite environments and Easter eggs dot the way as we get deeper and deeper into the story.”
The story will take place on the Sword Coast, in the town of Waterdeep, as fans join the Harpers faction to save Waterdeep from the legendary beholder, Xanathar. “Similar to Star Trek, its a pulse story-based experience that we get to experience in groups of people. And it begins with a feeling that every D&D fan wants: the ability from playing the game to being thrust into the game as part of our pre-show experience,” Siercks explained.
Secrets of Waterdeep will climax with an actual showdown with Xanathar himself over a powerful staff—with the beholder making an appearance as a practical creature, akin to the Alien vs. Predator house using a practical Queen prop at Halloween Horror Nights. “We’re partnering with Jim Henson Creature Company, one of the best in the business, to develop Xanathar. This is going to be an interactive character that [becomes] the villain of our experience in an interactive and experiential way,” Siercks teased.
One Piece – The Grand Pirate Gathering
One Piece is finally making its way into the stateside Universal Parks, thanks to their partnership with Universal Studios Japan in Osaka, where the Waterworld attraction has a seasonal One Piece overlay and pirate action stunt-show. While we were hoping Universal Studios Hollywood would be getting the same show for Fan Fest Nights, we’ll only be getting meet and greets with the Straw Hats (including, of course, Luffy himself), as well as themed food and merchandise, as the streets are taken over with a One Piece theming. It’s a little underwhelming, especially when One Piece already has a great presence in other Universal parks, but at least it’s something. We won’t hold it against them too much, because we’re holding out hope it will be brought over in a future Fan Fest if this year proves popular. We would have accepted the show in Japanese with subtitle projections, just saying!
Jujutsu Kaisen – Hunger of the Cursed
Another Universal Studios Japan collab that was briefly teased, Jujutsu Kaisen will make its way into Hollywood Studios via a made-for-parks animated short that will play in the DreamWorks theater. Hopefully it’ll be a fun screening experience with its motion seats, which are way better than most movie theaters’ 4DX chairs.
Super Nintendo World and Wizarding World
Siercks revealed a few more offerings that would be debuted through Fan Fest Nights, before becoming available during normal operating hours at the parks later this year. Nintendo fans will be among the first to meet Yoshi in park and participate in a gamified exploration in the form of a scavenger hunt for Yoshi eggs hidden throughout Super Nintendo World—culminating in the chance to meet a multi-colored Yoshi. Beyond Mario’s dino pal, the park will feature Mario-themed drone displays throughout the night.
The already-established Wizarding World area of the park will get a new projection over Hogwarts Castle, as well as meet and greets with creatures from the Fantastic Beasts movies (why are they still trying to make those happen?). We’re still bummed Universal Studios Hollywood didn’t get a Wicked meet and greet with Elphaba and Glinda. Universal Studios Florida did for one weekend, as did Universal’s park in Singapore, complete with a talking Wizard head and Ozian performers, to boot. It’s what the people want now, and we hope to Oz Universal’s favorite witches swoop in sooner rather than later at Fan Fest Nights or the park by Wicked: For Good’s release.
For tickets and more Universal Fan Fest details visit here.
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