Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin
Deep within the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World lies your opportunity to battle evil and save the galaxy. Galactic Hero Buzz Lightyear, from the Disney-Pixar hit Toy Story movies, is recruiting Junior Rangers to protect the universe from Evil Emperor Zurg. Recruits should make their way directly to Tomorrowland to join up, or at least to grab a FastPass.
Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin
The queue of Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin take guests through the backstory with a mission briefing straight from an audio-animatronic Buzz Lightyear himself. The room is cleverly scaled to make one feel as if they've been shrunk to toy size, with the mission laid out on a toy instruction sheet. As each guest winds closer to the launch paint they find out that Evil Emperor Zurg is stealing batteries from helpless toys to power a new weapon of destruction and must be stopped! Junior Rangers will have 4 1/2 minutes to help save the helpless toys.
Buzz Lightyear Briefs Junior Rangers on Their Mission
Each ride vehicle, a XP-37 star cruiser, is equipped with two onboard laser cannons that guests control. The cruisers move on a third generation omnimover system that makes the attraction half dark ride, half shooting gallery. The track that the ride takes remains that of the original attraction that located in this spot, the 1972 "If You Had Wings." Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin opened in November 1998 and maintains elements of its predecessors, such as the popular speed tunnel.
XP-37 Star Cruiser Vehicles
Guests use their cannons to fire lasers at targets with the "Z" insignia throughout the neon-lit attraction and you're rewarded with beeping sounds, flashing lights and points! As you battle your way through the Gamma Quadrant and challenge other members in your party for the high score to be displayed on an electronic dashboard. At the end of your mission, you'll receive your official Star Command ranking, based on the points you accumulated by hitting the targets. You can find lots of scoring tips all over the Disney Blog-o-sphere for boosting your point totals to become a Galactic Hero! You may even come across a couple of Hidden Mickeys.
In the final room of Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin watch for the flashing lights ahead of you and be sure to smile for the camera when it's your turn for a photo. Guests will be able to spot their ride photos after they disembark. As with many popular Disney attractions Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin empties out into Buzz's Star Command, a themed gift shop where you can purchase a wide array of Buzz Lightyear merchandise. You can even take home your own army of Little Green Men.
Little Green Men in Buzz's Star Command
Thanks so much to Michael Kappel and Matt Dempsey for use of their galactic images through creative commons. Do you enjoy this fun Tomorrowland attraction? Who is the Galactic Hero in your family? Leave a comment below and tell us the tale of your epic battle.
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JeffC wrote on Wed, 05/15/2013 - 20:04:
We love Buzz Lightyear! Always a must do. Just loads of fun for us. And the line always seems to move along quickly.
I'm famous for horrible scores though. Joe almost always beats me, and by a HUGE margin. He's got mad BL skilz.
I can only beat him if I steal control of the car spinning and jerk it all around.
Side note: I personally like the DL version a little better because the laser cannons are not stationary and you can aim a little better.
SpamGoddess wrote on Thu, 05/16/2013 - 02:05:
I looooove this ride!! Well, at first I hated it because I couldn't get anything to work right, but my second time on it was amazing and I had a SUPER high score. My avatar photo is actually from that ride!! (I was too cheap to purchase it, but now I wish I had! That's the crappy "take a picture of the picture with my phone" version).
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