Hollywood Studios is the 2nd most important park to have Genie Plus at, just behind Magic Kingdom (be sure to check out my Magic Kingdom Genie Plus strategy in a different post). Although Hollywood Studios does not have as many rides as Magic Kingdom, the rides that are in this park are all extremely popular and therefore tend to have extremely long lines, averaging an hour or more wait per ride. Unless you want to spend the majority of your day waiting in frustratingly slow lines, I highly recommend splurging on Genie Plus for Hollywood Studios. Disney has caught on that Genie Plus is extremely helpful in Hollywood Studios, making it the 2nd most expensive park to buy Genie Plus for (behind Magic Kingdom), coming in around $24 per person per day.
Genie Plus Strategy
As I explained above, I think Genie Plus is worth the extra expense for Hollywood Studios. A large portion of the rides in Hollywood Studios are new, meaning they are very popular. The rides that aren't new, such as Tower of Terror and Rockin' Rollercoaster, have stood the test of time and are still almost as popular as the new rides. This means that almost all of the rides in Hollywood Studios have very long lines throughout the day and it can be frustrating to spend such a long time waiting in a cramped, hot line. Genie Plus will allow you to ride all of these popular rides once during the day, skipping the stand-by lines. Utilizing Genie Plus saves you time to enjoy the old-timey ambience of Hollywood Studios, potentially leave the park to grab a meal elsewhere, or take a dip in your resort pool if you would like to. Hollywood Studios is also connected to the Skyliner, which will bring you to the Boardwalk area- a great spot to grab lunch or play a round of mini-golf for a mid-day break.
You can purchase Genie Plus anytime after midnight on the day you wish to use it. Then, you can book your first Lightening Lane at 7:00am. For Hollywood Studios, I will always recommend booking your first Lightening Lane as Slinky Dog Dash. This is one of the most sought-after Lightening Lanes and it is very possible you may not get a return time until noon or later. But that is okay, because you can still accomplish a lot with my Genie Plus Strategy, laid out in detail below.
Whether or not you plan to use Genie Plus at Hollywood Studios, I recommend taking advantage of the morning Extra Magic Hours. This is a perk given to all guests staying at a Disney Resort, which allows them to enter any of the 4 parks 30 minutes before the park officially opens to the general public. Due to the popularity of most of the rides in Hollywood Studios, utilizing the morning Extra Magic Hours will allow you to ride one or two of the rides before the park gets very busy. However, plan on having a very early morning on your Hollywood Studios day.
Hollywood Studios officially opens at 8:30am, which means that those guests utilizing morning Extra Magic Hours get entry to the park at 8:00am. In order to take full advantage of this perk, you should plan on boarding Disney transportation by 6:45am to get you to the park around 7:00am. This ensures you will be towards the front of the pack forming at the gates of Hollywood Studios. When the employees at the gate get the official signal, usually around 7:40am, guests are allowed to start entering the park and making their way to the ride they want to rope drop. Entry to the ride will be at the official start of the morning Extra Magic Hours.
With a Genie Plus plan, I recommend rope dropping Rise of the Resistance in Galaxy's Edge. I am not a Star Wars fan and in fact fell asleep trying to make myself watch a Star Wars movie in anticipation of going to Galaxy's Edge for the first. That being said, I love Galaxy's Edge. There is so much detail in the theming, from the set design, to the food and drink, to the sound effects. You truly feel like you are in Star Wars. Try to speedwalk through all of this to get to Rise of the Resistance, which shouldn't be hard because it will become clear that everyone is speedwalking to the exact same spot as you. Everytime I have followed this strategy I have been in the first group to board the ride.
The reason I recommend rope dropping Rise of the Resistance is because Rise is not included in Genie Plus. It is the one ride at Hollywood Studios that you have to pay a separate fee to skip the stand-by line (an Individual Lightening Lane), which I will personally never do. It is one thing to pay $20 to skip the stand-by lines all day at the park, but to pay $20 for a one-time ride on Rise is not worth it in my opinion. If you don't rope drop Rise, you will either have to wait an average of 90 minutes (or more) to ride or you can pay for the Individual Lightening Lane. That is why it's so important to get on first thing in the morning. If this isn't enlightening, I don't know what is- by the time we got off Rise after morning Extra Magic Hours rope dropping it, the wait time was already up to 75 minutes.
After departing Rise of the Resistance, I advise making your way to Tower of Terror. Yes, it does require some zig-zagging across the park, but the wait for this ride during the early morning hours is usually quite low, since most people are pre-occupied with getting on Rise of the Resistance or Slinky Dog Dash. By this time, you have already rope dropped Rise, and you have a Slinky Dog Lightening Lane waiting for you to use in a couple of hours. Now you can hop on Tower of Terror, with what's sure to be a maximum 15 minute wait. Maybe even ride 2 times in a row if lines are short enough and your stomach can handle it!
Once done with Tower of Terror, it is getting close to your opportunity to book your second Lightening Lane. If your 1st Lightening Lane is more than 2 hours after the official opening of the park, you are able to book your 2nd Lightening Lane at the 2 hour mark. For Hollywood Studios, that would be 10:30am. I would recommend Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway for your 2nd Lightening Lane pick. This is a very popular, and newish ride, which replaced the Great Movie Ride in 2020. It is a cute ride with a theme song that is sure to be stuck in your head for the rest of the day. "Nothing can stop us now...."
At this point, you have a couple options. First, you could check the My Disney Experience App to see the wait time for Rockin' Rollercoaster. Rockin' Rollercoaster is located right by Tower of Terror, making it easy to knock them both out while at that end of Sunset Boulevard. The wait time shouldn't be too long yet, but if its more than 30 minutes I would recommend waiting until you can book a Lightening Lane.
Alternatively, you may be hungry about this time, since you had such an early start. If that's the case, I recommend heading towards Toy Story Land, where you can grab a great breakfast bowl at Andy's Lunchbox and check out the theming of the Land. This is a great way to kill some time before the Lightening Lane return times start hitting.
A fun ride to go on while hanging out in Toy Story Land is the Alien Swirling Saucers. If the wait is 20 minutes or less, I say go for it. It looks like a kiddie ride, but is actually a lot of fun, and I was laughing the entire time I rode it. Just make sure you hold onto your ears!
This is the point of the day where Genie Plus comes in clutch. You will be able to ride the Slinky Dog Lightening Lane that you've been holding since 7:00am and afterward will likely be able to head right to your Runaway Railway Lightening Lane, depending on the return time you were able to get. I secretly get a VIP feeling, walking past the grumpy looking standby line (it's less fun being in the stand-by line watching Lightening Lane folks walk by you and get right on the ride).
After tapping into your second Lightening Lane, you can book your next Lightening Lane, which under the circumstances, would be either Rockin' Rollercoaster or Milennium Falcon. I would personally go with Milennium Falcon because Galaxy's Edge is right next to Toy Story Land and it will give you some time to explore the theming. You can always save your Rockin' Rollercoaster Lightening Lane until later in the evening, to pair with a nighttime Tower of Terror ride. I love riding Tower of Terror at night, and since you rode it earlier in the day by utilizing the morning Extra Magic Hours, you still have the opportunity to use a Lightening Lane on it!
A few attractions that I do not think you will need to use a Lightening Lane on:
1) A Frozen Sing Along Celebration- This stage show gets crowded but takes place in a huge theater with lots of seating. I have showed up to the theater 10 minutes before showtime and still been able to get a seat. It is very funny and definitely worth checking out.
2) Star Tours- This is an old Star Wars ride that is not even located in Galaxy's Edge. Due to the much newer Star Wars rides, not a lot of people get in line to ride this. The line usually sits around a 10 minute wait. I'm not a big simulator fan, and this ride always makes me nauseous and gives me a headache. I would much rather do some shopping on Sunset Boulevard while my boyfriend gets his Star Wars kicks.
3) Beauty and the Beast Stage show and Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular - I haven't attended these shows the past few times I've visited Hollywood Studios. Both have outdoor seating, which is hot and humid. They are also the same show every visit and don't warrant seeing multiple times, in my opinion.
If you follow this strategy and also utilize the My Disney Experience App wait times, you can easily ride all of the rides in Hollywood Studios, some more than once. Hollywood Studios is a difficult park to conquer without some form of "fast pass." There are just too many popular rides.
Your day at Hollywood Studios should end with the Fantasmic nighttime show. This is a show that includes light displays on the water, characters, a water parade, and fireworks. It is the perfect way to cap off your day and definitely shouldn't be missed. This show takes place each night at 9pm.
Hollywood Studios Strategy Without Genie Plus
While I do highly recommend utilizing Genie Plus while in Hollywood Studios, it is definitely still possible to take on the park without Genie Plus. The morning Extra Magic Hours will be your best friend here and you should really plan on arriving at the park even earlier than what I suggested in my Genie Plus strategy. That is because so much of your success hinges on if you can beat the crowds during the morning Extra Magic Hours.
Since I am not a huge Star Wars fan, I would not prioritize Rise of the Resistance if I was choosing not to use Genie Plus that day. Instead, I would morning Extra Magic Hours rope drop Slinky Dog Dash. This ride consistently has a long line throughout the entire day and is the most popular ride in Hollywood Studios, behind or possibly equal to Rise of the Resistance. For that reason, if you want to avoid waiting over an hour at any point during the day for Slinky Dog (which I advise, seeing as Slinky Dog is only a 2 minute ride), it is best to get on it first thing in the morning before crowds get too large.
After Slinky Dog, I suggest the same strategy as above. Head down Sunset Boulevard to wipe out Tower of Terror and Rockin' Rollercoaster. You should be able to knock both of those out with relatively low waits during the early morning hours. However, by the time you are done with these, wait times will have grown and you won't find much reprieve at any of the rides. Thankfully, you have already gotten the 3 biggest rides done during the morning Extra Magic Hours. Utilize the My Disney Experience App to view wait times and knock out the rides in that order. You should plan on a lengthy wait for both Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway and Smugglers Run. They will be long, miserable, and seemingly never ending. However, you saved $20 per person by not buying Genie Plus, so you can at least feel good about that.
Hollywood Studios is definitely doable without Genie Plus, but you should be prepared to wait in a lot of lines. There are no rides in the park that have minimal waits, like there may be at other parks. You can always take a break with the Frozen Sing Along show or the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular, as there are not usually waits for those.
Final Thoughts
I am not one to unnecessarily spend money, and in fact it pains me to have to purchase Genie Plus on top of the already expensive park ticket at Disney World. However, I have come to accept that Genie Plus really is the key to making the most of your day and getting to experience everything a park has to offer. Hollywood Studios is definitely doable without Genie Plus, but you should be prepared to wait in a lot of lines. There are no rides in the park that have minimal waits, like there may be at other parks. In the end, it comes down to how much you would like to accomplish, and if the extra cost is worth it to you. Hopefully either of my strategies, Genie Plus or non-Genie Plus, will help you have a magical day at Hollywood Studios.
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