Why Shanghai Disneyland:
After spending a week in Shanghai and nearby cities such as Suzhou, Hangzhou, and Nanjing, Maisie and I had some free time and were looking for something fun to do. We noticed that we could visit Shanghai Disneyland, the newest Disney park opening in 2016. Maisie is a Disney fan (she once watched every Disney film in chronological order) and together we visited Euro-Disney in Paris. Tickets over the weekend were sold out but we were able to get a Friday ticket for a very reasonable $80 USD (about half the price as the US) which included a dinner voucher. The system to pay by credit card was not working and had to purchase it using WeChat Pay – perhaps it would have been different had I purchased the ticket in the US. Interestingly, I never received a ticket in my email or on the Shanghai Disneyland app.
March 29, 2024: Slightly Off
Maisie and I took the subway to the Disney Park stop. The journey took about an hour. Nearly everybody was Chinese, but we did notice a white American gay couple donning their mouse ears and Disney shirts.
From the subway station, it was a 10-minute walk to the entry gate. There, we waited in a long line for security and then a much shorter line to scan into the park. As it turned out, the ticket was linked to my passport so there was no printed ticket. The park employees simply scanned my passport to get in. The vast majority of the crowd was adults in their 20’s and 30’s. We saw few children.
Maisie loved seeing the outfit choices of the other park-goers. A large percentage of the women wore Lolita/wedding dress-style clothing. Many people also wore Zootopia costumes. Maisie said that makes sense because China is a very law-abiding country and Zootopia is about a girl who really wants to be a cop.
Disney apparently tried very hard to design the park to cater to the Chinese customer. This was done not only to attract customers and increase revenue but also to appease the government. Disney is a global symbol of the United States and capitalism and they likely needed to tread very carefully to be allowed to operate. Disney apparently thought through it all from the park layout to the characters chosen to feature to the food.
At the same time, Disney needed to train their staff up to their brand’s standards. I was told they had to teach their staff to smile and wave at customers, which is not something Chinese people do.
Most staff members know the necessary English words to do their job. Their name tags have both a Chinese and English name. I found it funny that some staff had transliterations of their Chinese name, but others picked out an English name. Just like Chinese students abroad, the English names are real names but are not commonly used for people our age. For example, the security guard’s English name was Geraldine.
The first thing I noticed were the differences in the layout. All the rest of Disney’s “Castle parks” (Anaheim, Orlando, Paris, Hong Kong, Tokyo) have nearly identical layouts where guests enter along Main Street USA before reaching the castle at the center of the hub with spokes containing Frontierland, Fantasyland and Tomorrowland. At Shanghai, Disney mixed it up a little bit (but not too much). Main Street USA became Mickey Avenue which looks the same but does not have USA in its name.
Frontierland (which celebrates the western expansion of the United States) is gone and Tomorrowland was moved from the right side of the park to the left. The right side of the park is home to Adventure Isle. We decided to start our day there.
My first impression of the park is that it takes up a lot of space and is very spread out.
Our first ride of the day was Pirates of the Caribbean: Battle for the Sunken Treasure which is in its own land called Treasure Cove which looks like a Caribbean port. Every Disney castle park has Pirate of the Caribbean, but we were told that the Shanghai version was quite different. The line took 40 minutes but moved. All signs (including theming such as BEWARE!) was written in both Chinese and English. However, the animatronic characters (including Johnny Depp) only spoke Chinese. Eventually we boarded the vessel.
Pirates started out like the rides in the other Disney parks drifting near the Blue Bayou restaurant, but things started to change quickly. The boat twisted in the water and changed speeds. The sets also contained large video screens making it appear that we were deep underwater. A kraken swam by. The most dramatic set contained two corporeal full-size galleons engaged in cannon fire. We entered the hull of one galleon to witness Jack Sparrow and Davy Jones engaged in a sword fight. Then, suddenly, the boat sped backwards along a roller coaster track. Quite the experience!
Our next ride was Soarin’. The ride first appeared in California Adventure, the secondary Anaheim park, where the queue is themed like an aircraft hangar. But here in Shanghai, the ride is themed like a mystic Peruvian-ish mountain temple presided over by a raven goddess who can transport you to different places. On the ride, we boarded seats which lifted us up into the air to see scenes of famous landmarks around the world. These landmarks included the Great Wall, Giza, Neuschwanstein Castle, Monument Valley, the Taj Mahal (where they sprayed an Indian spice scents) and, of course, Shanghai. The Shanghai scene is only shown at the version in Shanghai Disneyland, and I noticed that the video quality of Shanghai was noticeably worse than the other cities. The ride was fun, but the 90-minute wait was brutal.
We ate lunch at a tribal-themed café. I ordered a truffle beef rice bowl. At $15 USD, this was the most expensive item on the menu but was still a good deal by US theme park standards. The food was delicious, and I did not have to wait at all despite eating at the prime lunch hour. Like in the rest of China, Alipay and WeChat were the only accepted methods of payment. They had a sign claiming to accept credit cards but did not actually have a reader.
There are two other rides in the eastern part of the park: a rapids ride and a highly rated ropes course. The rapids had a 120-minute wait and the ropes course was closed for a multi-week refurbishment. After checking the app, we decided to head over to Fantasyland to check out Peter Pan’s Flight, which apparently had a shorter line than normal. The equivalent ride at Disney World in Orlando for some reason has the longest wait in the park. After the long walk, we arrived only to discover that the line was now at a normal length (45 minutes). We waited and boarded the dark ride. Compared to the US versions, the ride was similar except there was a lot more technology involved including video boards. Even though the ride was not very thrilling, I enjoyed it.
Next, we visited Toy Story Land which has two main rides. The most thrilling ride, a glorified pirate ship ride had a 90 minutes wait so instead we waited 45 minutes to ride the Slinky Dog, which was a glorified “Music Express” caterpillar ride. While the theming was cute, I was not impressed by the rides. One thing I noticed were the Green Army Men characters were rebranded as Green Construction Workers and did not carry fake weapons.
Our disappointment continued in Tomorrowland. Again, the theming was amazing: unlike the retro space age architecture in the other parks, Shanghai’s Tomorrowland truly felt futuristic. However, the main ride, Tron, the park’s only roller coaster, was broken down with no estimated reopening.
The other ride options were Buzz Lightyear, a dark ride where you sit in a car and shoot targets and the Jetpacks, a glorified version of Dumbo. We enjoyed Buzz Lightyear but were disappointed by the Jetpacks where we waited more than an hour for a 60 second ride.
I was getting frustrated at this point, but we decided to press on. We wanted to visit Zootopia land, the newest addition to the park, but there was a 2-hour line to enter the land and another 50-minute wait to ride the ride.
Instead, we backtracked to the rapids (via a pitstop to drink a delicious passionfruit milkshake) which was a 75-minute wait. The wait was slightly more tolerable because of the phone games Disney installed into the line which included searching for specific details in the theming. Maisie and I were nervous because were in the 2% of riders who did not purchase a poncho, but we did not end up getting wet. The ride was fun but not as good as Splash Mountain.
By this point, it was 15:00 and we were running out of rides. Near the castle, we found an Alice in Wonderland walk-through maze which was full of girls doing photoshoots.
Then we did a Snow White walk-through attraction inside the castle. We enjoyed being able to see the inside of the castle. The castle also has a fancy banquet hall, but it was over $50/person to eat there, making it one of China’s most expensive restaurants.
Finally, we waited 45 minutes to ride a boat through fountain versions of classic Disney scene. This was the only place in the park where we saw any reference to Mulan.
By this point, I had developed a full-on migraine headache. The only non-broken ride left to ride was Zootopia and we were not going to wait three hours to ride it. We got dinner using the voucher, but I was in too bad shape to eat. We then walked back to the subway and headed home. The subway ride back was one of the most miserable experiences of my life but we made it and I was able to get Advil, drink water and go to sleep (the remedy for almost everything). The next day, I woke up pain-free.
Final Thoughts:
I enjoyed seeing the differences between Shanghai Disneyland and parks in Western countries. The staff was all very helpful and spoke the best English in China. The ultimate highlight was the food, which was a fun fusion of Western and Chinese food. I loved everything I ate. With one glaring exception, the theming was impressive.
Visitors to the park in the past complained about the behavior of the Chinese parkgoers. Apparently line cutting and spitting are common. I did not notice that and had no issues regarding the behavior of the other guests.
The biggest problem with the park is ride quality. Pirates was amazing, full stop. However, the park has only two thrill rides the Rapids and Tron (plus arguably the ropes course). This is not enough. The other rides are impressive with their tech, but it was not enough.
Another major issue was ride maintenance. Most of the best rides (Ropes Course, Tron, Zootopia) were broken for most/all day. Many of the medium-thrill ride: Slinky Dog, Jetpacks were worse than carnival rides. This is not acceptable.
The final issue, which somewhat stems from the broken rides was the long lines. I never waited less than 40 minutes for any ride.
In short, I would not recommend visiting Shanghai Disneyland unless you have exhausted all other activities in Shanghai. The park is not good enough to justify spending a day. Moreover, if you have traveled all the way to China, I would prefer to see Chinese things instead of a Chinese version of an American thing.
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