Walt Disney World simply wrapped up a quiet summer time, opening a pair high quality stage exhibits and new nighttime parade, however no new sights or any “reply” to Epic Universe. The shock sleeper of the season was Cool Child Summer season, which introduced new family-focused experiences to Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, and Animal Kingdom. This explains the teachings discovered from this shock success that punched above its weight and made some magical recollections.
In case you missed it, Cool Child Summer season featured dance events, additional character appearances, hands-on actions, and a variety of interactivity. Highlights included the Goofy takeover of CommuniCore Corridor at EPCOT, in any other case often known as GoofyCore Corridor. As an alternative of being a pageant heart, GoofyCore Corridor was a Goofy-led immersive expertise, with video games with foolish twists, like Crazy Limbo and Parachutes ‘n’ Pipsqueaks all in wonderful air con.
Over at Animation Courtyard at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, there have been video games and crafts, magicians and soar rope performers, shock character appearances, and a energetic indoor DJ dance get together the place little ones can develop into additional indoctrinated into the Cult of the Scorching Canine Track. It was an analogous story in Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom, the place there have been dance events, sing-alongs, and different such silliness.
Along with this, characters have been additionally out within the parks sooner than regular for Walt Disney World resort resort visitors through the day by day Early Entry interval. How this occurred was by no means actually defined in official Walt Disney World communications, however my commentary was that it usually occurred as a pop-up, free roaming ‘avenue get together’ kinda deal, with particular music reducing into the traditional background loops and signaling the arrival of characters.
Equally, visitors staying at Artwork of Animation, Pop Century, Caribbean Seashore and Wilderness Lodge have been all capable of take pleasure in extra Disney-themed actions designed for households with children. This included character visits with set look occasions that will help you plan your day and an expanded itinerary of issues to do with your loved ones all through your keep at these 4 resorts. So principally, the Character Caravan however with a broadcast schedule.
Anecdotally, I additionally observed extra shock & delight “Character Paloozas” throughout my most up-to-date go to to Walt Disney World.
For many who are unfamiliar with them, Character Paloozas are spontaneous meet & greets with numerous uncommon characters in out of the best way places. They normally occur fairly near backstage entry factors, for fast entry and exits.
The true goal of Character Paloozas is giving Solid Members on the job coaching in decrease stakes environments. That is additionally why the characters featured are uncommon or rare-ish, because the “character integrity” bar is decrease. Massive Al or Wendell performers have way more, ahem, autonomy for interactions than Mickey Mouse, who should keep on-brand.
I’ve all the time thought that Character Paloozas are among the best issues Walt Disney World does with meet & greets, although the aim is usually about coaching in a decrease stress setting. Now we have fond recollections from the Toontown Teardrop manner again within the day, and nonetheless take pleasure in stumbling upon a Character Palooza every now and then. It’s the stuff of sudden magical recollections.
The sheer quantity of Character Paloozas I noticed within the lead-up to Labor Day might’ve been due to some large waves of School Program arrivals. It in all probability had extra to do with that than being a shock Cool Child Summer season providing or paradigm shift in character encounters.
I’m however together with Character Paloozas as one thing Walt Disney World ought to do extra, purposefully, exterior of Solid Member coaching. They’re win-win, and an instance of Walt Disney World getting one thing proper, possibly with out realizing how impactful it’s to the visitor expertise.
As for Cool Child Summer season, it was nothing particular this 12 months on paper. The unique announcement struck me as an “occasion” that was thrown collectively in a short time as Walt Disney World tried to market to households and fight mainstream media reviews that Walt Disney World was “turning its again” on center class households with kids. (See Disney’s Response to Rising Prices Criticism.)
In observe, Cool Child Summer season was the scrappy little occasion that brightened up days and introduced a little bit of magic to blighted corners of the parks. Animation Courtyard felt like a useless mall that was somewhat-alive for the primary time in years. Simply in observing children fishing with ‘Trip’ Goofy, coloring with Clarabelle or participating in antics with Donald, my sturdy suspicion is that visitor satisfaction was larger amongst those that visited Animation Courtyard than those that didn’t. I extremely doubt that was true earlier than this summer time!
Animation Courtyard was probably the most pronounced instance, however Cool Child Summer season injected a variety of pleasure round numerous hotspots of the parks. I’d likewise hazard a guess that the households who stopped for particular moments with the characters behind Cinderella Fortress had higher qualitative experiences than those that raced on to Peter Pan’s Flight. Similar goes for individuals who took the time to decelerate in Storybook Circus, Discovery Island or in GoofyCore Corridor.
Nobody goes to accuse Walt Disney World of dreaming too large with Cool Child Summer season. As seasonal occasions go, it was a minor one. There wasn’t a lot of a decor package deal to talk of, and it was thrown into a number of underutilized venues round Walt Disney World. So simply to be abundantly clear, we’re not saying it was really nice or imploring you to plan a visit round Cool Child Summer season in 2026.
It additionally had a blink and also you’ll miss it high quality. I wouldn’t be stunned if over half of visitors visiting this summer time had no clue Cool Child Summer season occurred. Not simply that they couldn’t establish it by title (that quantity might be even larger), however that in addition they didn’t expertise something I’ve simply described.
Cool Child Summer season was straightforward to miss. For those who weren’t eligible for Early Entry or didn’t keep at on of the handful of lodges with additional choices, you wouldn’t have skilled that. For those who didn’t enterprise into some out of the best way places the place it was held (they’re underutilized for a purpose!), you additionally wouldn’t have seen any of that.
What we’re saying is that there’s room for refining and bettering on the idea with a full 12 months of lead-time to plan the 2026 Cool Child Summer season. That the occasion has potential and its good concepts might (and may!) be applied full-time, past summer time.
Most significantly, Cool Child Summer season demonstrated Walt Disney World lastly “will get” the enchantment of Disneyland-style free roaming characters. That is one thing we’ve been discussing right here for some time, particularly again with the debut of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge in 2019.
One of many largest questions at the moment was whether or not free-roaming characters would translate to Walt Disney World given visitor demographics. The priority was that once-in-a-lifetime visitors needed posed pictures with characters, to not “play” with them.
That is regardless of free-roaming characters being a staple of the Disneyland expertise for years. So a lot of Disneyland’s greatest moments with characters unfold in an natural and spontaneous method as characters like Mary Poppins, Peter Pan, or the Evil Queen wander the park.
(It additionally helped that Cool Child Summer season didn’t completely eschew conventional meet & greets in favor of character ‘play’ experiences; Animation Courtyard added a variety of each. We’re cognizant that many first-timers need the picture of their children posing with characters, getting an autograph, and so on. This isn’t an both/or proposition. And as an entire, DHS has quietly develop into an awesome park for assembly characters.)
Based mostly on my observations, Cool Child Summer season definitively demonstrated that spontaneous character experiences not solely work at Walt Disney World, however are an enormous hit with visitors. Animation Courtyard was the most effective proof of this, and I hope what was supplied there this summer time was proof of idea for the kind of ‘play’ that’ll be featured within the reimagined Walt Disney Studios Lot.
There’s one thing particular about these spontaneous encounters, getting an opportunity to briefly play with characters versus posing for a photograph, assembly-line type. That is the stuff that ‘core recollections’ are fabricated from. Though Cool Child Summer season clearly didn’t come anyplace close to being an “reply” to Epic Universe, I wouldn’t be in the least stunned if a few of the character encounters at Walt Disney World left equally highly effective lasting impressions.
Hyperbolic because it might sound, that is formative stuff. We’ve typically confused that it’s the “little issues” that kind the inspiration of nostalgia and sentimentality, and forge new Walt Disney World followers within the course of. Clearly blockbuster new sights and lands are necessary, however getting these little issues proper is the ‘secret sauce’ for Walt Disney World.
Though Cool Child Summer season was nothing noteworthy on paper, and undoubtedly not the kind of factor anybody deliberate journeys round (apart from Walt Disney World’s unprecedented summer time reductions that basically supplied 2019 pricing), it did handle to punch above its weight and provide one thing particular to lots of the visitors who obtained to expertise it.
The seasonal occasion additionally steered that Walt Disney World is lastly beginning to get the enchantment of taking part in with characters or having spontaneous and memorably interactions, and may use Cool Child Summer season as a template for future character encounters. That alone could be an enormous win, and truthfully, it’s form of wild that they didn’t be taught this lesson from Disneyland a decade or extra in the past.
As for the seasonal occasion itself, I’m cautiously optimistic about Cool Child Summer season getting a sophomore season in 2026. Hopefully the inaugural 12 months was a studying expertise, and it returns greater and higher subsequent 12 months with (presumably) extra lead-time for planning it. Though that is in regards to the character part, I hope extra emphasis is positioned on the cool facet of Cool Child Summer season, as there are such a lot of artistic methods for Walt Disney World to assist visitors beat the summer time warmth.
Relating to characters, the large factor on my want record for some time has been 90s nostalgia. The latest Vacation spot D23 did this rather well each with its panels and the distinctive Kuzcotopia Night time at Storm Lagoon. Hopefully that was proof-of-concept for in-park choices, and possibly even a tough ticket occasion.
Doing extra with Disney Afternoon, Disney Channel, and cult classics animated movies from the late Nineteen Nineties could be superior. Individuals my age adore these animated movies from the second half of the Nineteen Nineties, together with Rescue Rangers, Darkwing Duck, TaleSpin, and DuckTales. We’re additionally now the target market of the parks, whether or not we’re Childless Disney Millennials or mother and father who wish to share our personal childhood nostalgia with our children.
As lined beforehand in our Prime 10 Uncommon Characters We Want Walt Disney World Would Convey Again, we are able to’t be the one millennials who would overpay for a 90s nite at Magic Kingdom or Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Perhaps Walt Disney World might weave that along with Cool Child Summer season, and pull deeper from the 2000s playbook by providing a “Pirates, Princesses & Buddies Occasion.”
Regardless, I’m wanting ahead to seeing what they do with the occasion in 2026, and hopefully we don’t have to attend virtually a 12 months to see Walt Disney World apply classes discovered from this summer time to spontaneous character encounters across the parks. There’s great unrealized potential for Disney to leverage its beloved characters in playful methods, and the chance to make new lifetime followers of the parks by way of these little moments of magic.
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YOUR THOUGHTS
Did you expertise any of the character encounters throughout Cool Child Summer season? What did you consider these spontaneous experiences? Any particular lasting recollections from ‘taking part in’ with the characters? Do you hope Walt Disney World learns classes from this particular occasion and applies them year-round? Will you be visiting for Cool Child Summer season 2.0 if the occasion is expanded upon and improved in 2026? Ideas on the brand new character experiences/encounters on the parks & resorts this summer time? Any questions? Listening to your suggestions about your experiences is each attention-grabbing to us and useful to different readers, so please share your ideas or questions under within the feedback!