Disneyland Paris – Walt Disney Studios

The Walt Disney Studios park is getting ready to explode with so many more additions to it. Avenger’s Campus, has now opened (we missed it by about 3 months) but we will definitely explore this section with a fine toothed comb, being the massive Marvel fans that we are.

We saw the concept art for Avenger’s Campus, and the new area for Frozen and Star Wars, and they look Epic! This park is definitely catching up with Hollywood Studios. With these major expansions, I think this could be a park you’d maybe want to hit up first, because it is going to get sooo busy.

All of this work going on meant a lot of area closures for us. But it kind of worked in our favour. Apart from Crush’s Coaster (we had no intention of going on anyway) we didn’t really wait too long for anything, but we will get onto that further down the blog. It worked in our favour because it allowed us to take this park at a slower pace, which allowed us to see the finer details.

The Park

Walt Disney Studios has definitely taken a page out of the California Adventure Park and Hollywood Studios park book. Hollywood themed, and housing many Pixar attractions.

Our favourite part about this park has to be the entrance. It totally caught us off guard. It’s an indoor walkway, with shops and restaurants, and bright flashing lights. Proper old school Hollywood. And it helped that Mickey was always there to greet us on entering and wave us ‘a beintot!’ upon leaving.

On reflection, the park as it is, is very tiny. Whilst doing the parent swap on rides, we definitely lapped the park two or three times, easily.

The Areas

The Walt Disney Studio Park is divided up into five different areas. Front Lot, Toon Studios, Production Courtyard, Backlot and, since leaving the park, Avengers Campus has opened up. Our two favourite areas were The Front Lot and Toon Studios.

The Front Lot is the moment you scan you ticket and you are in the park. It’s an outdoor space, with beautiful palm trees and statues dotted around, and you have a great view of the water tower, the Earffel Tower! You can find toilets and shops here too!

Toon Studios is where all of the fun is at. The Frozen show, Mickey and the Magician show, Toy Story Playland and La Place de Remy. This area of the park is so much fun, from thrilling rides, to amazing character meets. You’ll find yourself here a lot, especially with little ones. Toon Studios, I feel, is where you’ll hang out most.

Food and drink

We didn’t eat too much in this park, but the food we had was great – a lot of burger and chips, but they were always so tasty, and filling. We ate in the indoor walkway, were you can find plenty of food options.

Each time we grabbed a bite to eat we got the Black Widow meal or the kid’s meals, all consisting of a drink, burger, chips and a snack like a Spiderman Ice Lolly. But all in, we never ate too much at Studios, there seemed to be a lot of snack options though.

Character meets

We met Buzz Lightyear and Jessie in the Toon Studios area right next to Crush’s coaster. Buzz was the first of the Toy Story cast Dexter met. Buzz is his absolute hero, and we had been dying for this moment to happen. Meeting Buzz, you could tell Dexter was totally star-struck. He walked up to him starring at him. He gave him a fist bump, and a kiss on the chin. When meeting Jessie, Dexter gained more confidence and went in for a SECOND cuddle with her. He was totally in awe of her, which we didn’t expect.

Aside to character meets, we saw a few other characters from a distance. Lightening McQueen drove past us, which is so cool to see because he is legit a car! We followed Pluto as he was walking through the park. And whilst we were waiting for Stitch Live, we saw The Incredibles zip around on Segways.

Rides

Now that Avenger’s Campus has opened, the Studio Park seems to feel more grown up than the Disneyland Park, with rides like Tower of Terror – a proper tummy turner.

During our visit, we didn’t feel like there was an abundance of actual rides to go on. We went on Ratatouille a few times thanks to the parent swap – and a very kind cast member allowed the three of us to go on the ride all together. Rich went on Tower of Terror a few times. We went on everything apart from parachute drop and Crush’s Coaster.

One ride that we think should have higher height/age restrictions on is Slinky Dog. Dexter was allowed on it, but not allowed to sit on our knee. He was far too tiny for this ride, we had to hold him in place for the duration, and it doesn’t half pick up some speed, which meant that Rich and I kept sliding all over the place. Small children shouldn’t be allowed on this.

One ride that really surprised us, and allowed us to rest our legs a little, was the Cars Road Trip ride. It is very much like the back lot tour in Universal California. Not too long, but a nice relaxing break (and you may get a little wet).

Shows

There are a few shows you can watch in this park, we watched Stitch Live, which was a massive hit with Dexter – it’s like Turtle Talk in Epcot, so funny!

The Disney Junior Dream Factory, was something we didn’t expect to love as much as we did. This show involved Minnie, Mickey and Disney Junior friends (whom we didn’t know, but still loved). Lots of songs, and it was just an all round fun show to watch. Definitely recommend this to anyone visiting with young children.

And then we watched Mickey and the Magician, and we only just made it, which meant we didn’t have to wait in line. We had to dump our buggy and run in. This show was great, so many different films were intertwined into this, which kept Dexter distracted for a while as new things were always appearing. We would definitely try and see this show again. It was pure Disney magic.

Photo Pass Opportunities

We didn’t have too many photo opportunities in this park. Our first one was at the Walt Disney statue in the main courtyard. Then we got a few on Tower of Terror, then meeting the Toy Story characters. With Avenger’s Campus, and new lands opening in the next few years, I imagine the Photo Pass opportunities are going to be more widely available.

Parent Swap

We definitely got a lot of use out of the parent swap in this park, meaning we had a few rides on Tower of Terror and Ratatouille. Read more about parent swap in our Disneyland Park blog.

Overall

This park is a lot of fun, and now with expansions it definitely means more time can be spent here. It definitely feels like the bigger kids will get more out of this park, but that isn’t to say little ones wouldn’t love it too, because Dexter was in awe of it.

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