Disney World’s Splash Mountain Closes Subsequent Month, Makeover Due in 2024

Disney World’s Splash Mountain will shut on Jan. 23, 2023, Disney mentioned Friday. The closure is a step towards the enduring trip being redone across the 2009 film The Princess and the Frog — it is set to reopen as Tiana’s Bayou Journey in late 2024.

If you wish to trip the unique Splash Mountain at Florida’s Magic Kingdom park, Sunday, Jan. 22 can be your final probability to take action, as famous by Nexstar reporter Scott Gustin. The reinvention comes after the attraction was criticized for being based mostly on the racially problematic 1946 film Tune of the South (movie historian Karina Longworth launched a superb documentary collection on this in 2019).

The brand new model of the trip will observe on from the occasions of The Princess and the Frog and take guests on a visit by way of Louisiana waters as Princess Tiana and alligator pal Louis gear up for a Mardi Gras celebration.

“Fireflies will mild up the evening and invite you deeper into the bayou … virtually like they’re waving you ahead. Lovely zydeco music will fill the air,” Carmen Smith, Disney Imagineering senior vp for artistic growth, wrote in a weblog put up. “Zydeco is a particular mix of rhythm and blues that was born in Louisiana, and if you hear it, you may really feel such as you’ve really stepped into Tiana’s world.”

Disney revealed a rendering, giving us a way of Tiana’s Bayou Journey, having beforehand proven us the trip in diorama type.

Subsequent month’s closure applies solely to Splash Mountain in Florida’s Magic Kingdom. The trip additionally exists in California’s Disneyland, however Disney mentioned particulars of that closure “can be shared at a later date.” So you’ve a bit extra time to attempt the unique model earlier than it is gone.

The Princess and the Frog is on the market to stream on Disney Plus, and its princess will return in follow-up collection Tiana (although the discharge date for that’s unclear).