Welcome to Extinct Attractions. This week, it’s time to check out what I consider Disney’s most impressive stunt show.
Last week, Disney announced that we would finally see some substantial progress on the expansion to Walt Disney Studios Park, with the biggest news being that the park would finally be receiving a long-expected name change to Disney Adventure World. It has been a long time since the park was truly geared around the magic of filmmaking, so this change was long over due, though I can’t say I’m fully sold on the name yet. It seems like they could have given it a more distinctive name, but we’ll see if it grows on me with time.
But today’s journey takes us to the earliest days of Walt Disney Studios Park, when the park opened as a sister park to both Disneyland Paris and what was then Disney-MGM Studios. The park had its own Studio Tram Tour and Armageddon-themed effects show that helped immerse people in the world of movie making. With that mission instilled, the powers that be decided to add a stunt show, in the vein of the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular, but this time with the show revolving around cars. People are always fascinated by car chases, so debuting Moteurs…Action! Stunt Show Spectacular on the park’s opening day of March 16, 2002 was a perfect choice to help draw people to the park immediately.
The first thing that stood out when looking at the stage was how big the theater was. In order to have some proper room for the cars to make the stunts realistic, a huge footprint was obviously needed, but things were even more fun because the whole ground was covered in skidmarks, so you knew that some crazy stuff was about to happen. And because it was Disneyland Paris, that action was going to take place in English and French.
Via DLP Report
Before the real meat of the action began, there was a brief montage from the Cars movies which was updated when each movie was released. Then, Lightning himself came out and drove around for a few minutes because how could you possibly have an attraction about cars without the main Cars star?
With the preshow experience complete, a crew member came out to introduce a little clip show of car chases in movies to help set the tone. Once it ended, he introduced the “director” of the “movie” that the audience would see them filming today. The movie itself was all make believe, but it helped ground the show in its stunt show nature. The crew members then continued their information dump by telling the crowd to root for the red “hero” car with the bad guys all driving black cars.
Via DLP Report
With all that information in the memory bank, it was time to see some cool scenes, with the first sequence all car based. They drove all around the arena with drifting and hard stops, all beautifully choreographed. That may sound a bit odd, but it was almost like watching synchronized swimming but with cars. Everything was just so in sync and mesmerizing.
It got even better towards the end of the scene when the hero car appeared driving backwards and completed a 15 foot jump across a chasm followed by a few of the villain cars as well. It was an astonishing stunt to somehow perform backwards, with the audience blown away before it was revealed that they had done a Texas switch with a car designed to look like it was driving backwards switched out for the hero car in the middle of the scene.
Via Park Vault
After the excitement of the first scene, the crew members returned to chat a little bit as they set up the next scene. They showed some “footage” from the fake movie to help establish the next scene, which was going to be more ground-based with a motorcycle chase. The motorcycles proved to be just as fun as the cars, with our hero hopping off of his bike to shoot at the bad guys. His shooting ultimately started a fire with one of the bad guys being light on fire in a very quality fire burn. Is it a stunt show without a good fire burn?
With scene number two in the books, the setup for the third scene took a bit longer, so the crew members brought out a random person from the crowd to help drive one of the cars with a remote control. He seemed to be getting really into it when we saw the other side of the car and a guy on the side of the car driving it hidden from view until then.
After the extra setup for the third scene, it had to be a big one and boy did it deliver. After a bunch of very cool choreographed driving, including the bad guy cars rolling around on their two side wheels, the hero car drove up a tight ramp along the back of a semi truck before landing on another semi and finally ending up on an airbag. It was a pretty insane moment that got the adrenaline pumping.
But they still had one more small scene to help all of the guests get their money’s worth with the hero bursting out of a window and rolling down a ramp into a fire-bursting jump that ended in the area below the guests. It was an action packed ending that really helped drive home the point of how awesome stunts are.
Moteurs … Action! was so popular that just three years later, Disney-MGM Studios copied from Paris (instead of the other way around), with Lights, Motors, Action Extreme Stunt Show making its way into the park as part of the 50th Anniversary Celebration of Disney theme parks. That version of the attraction stuck around until 2016 when it closed to make way for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, but the Parisian version still had enough life in it to stick around until March 13, 2020. It was originally rumored to close sometime later that year, but the park’s COVID closure pushed up the timeline.
Crazily enough, I actually ended up being one of the last to see the show because I was visiting Disneyland Paris during that last week before the COVID shutdown, and I will say that the show was even more fun when enjoyed with a nice mulled wine on a chilly day.
Via Sortir Paris
When the closure was first announced, it seemed like Moteurs … Action! was closing to make way for parts of Avengers Campus, but it was later revealed that it would actually be replaced by another stunt show, this one called Alice & The Queen of Hearts: Back to Wonderland. Not a ton is known about the show yet which will open on May 25th, but we do know that it is going to involve a lot of BMX bikes and the concept art looks pretty awesome.
All in all, Moteurs … Action! Stunt Show Spectacular was an awesome part of Walt Disney Studios Park past. It truly fit the original vision of the park and could hold a lot of guests at one time, making it an attraction the likes of which every theme park needs. It was pretty expensive to run, though, and with the park completely changing its identity, it was certainly time to move on and move forward to the future.
11 Funny Memes Only A Disney Park Lover Will Understand – AllEars.Net
Via All Ears
As always, don’t forget to check out my interactive maps of the Disney Parks throughout the years where you can watch or learn more about all the attractions from every Disney park around the world.
Thanks for reading and have a magical day!