The Avengers E-Ticket ride coming to the Disneyland resort has evolved over the past seven years from a Wakanda-bound mission aboard the Quinjet into a showdown with King Thanos across the multiverse.
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Construction is under way on the Avengers Infinity Defense attraction as part of an expansion of Avengers Campus set to debut in 2028 at Disney California Adventure that will double the size of the Marvel themed land.
“This is much bigger than most people are anticipating,” Marvel President and Chief Creative Officer Kevin Feige said of the Avengers Campus expansion during the “Disney Worldbuilders” documentary on Disney+.
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Feige wore 3D glasses during the “Worldbuilding” film while experiencing a mock-up of Avengers Infinity Defense at Walt Disney Imagineering in Glendale featuring massive physical sets blended seamlessly with huge media screens.
“What’s astounding is the point of view of the screen moves with you based on where you’re looking,” Feige said in “Worldbuilders.”
Imagineering unveiled a scale model of the Avengers Campus expansion during the D23 fan expo in August at the Anaheim Convention Center.
Newly released concept art showed Ms. Marvel (played by actress Iman Vellani) leading a pre-mission briefing for the new Avengers Infinity Defense attraction.
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Marvel stars Jeremy Renner (Hawkeye), Anthony Mackie (Captain America), Chris Hemsworth (Thor) and Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man) will reprise their roles in the new attraction.
To trace the history of the Infinity Defense attraction, you have to go back to 2019 when Walt Disney Imagineering announced plans for an Avengers E-Ticket ride for a new Marvel themed land set to debut in 2020.
In 2019, the unnamed Avengers E-Ticket was going to feature an all-new ride system unlike any attraction at a Disney theme park.
Disney and Marvel used New York ComicCon 2019 to reveal new details about the Avengers Campus themed land set to debut at Disney California Adventure.
“We’re inventing an all-new ride system for this,” Walt Disney Imagineering’s Scot Drake said during a New York Comic Con 2019 panel. “The demands of these characters and this experience is forcing us to invent and we’re really excited about that. It’s going to be something like you’ve never seen before.”
Riders on the original Marvel attraction envisioned for DCA would have boarded the Avengers Quinjet and embarked on a mission to the Black Panther world of Wakanda alongside the team of superheroes, according to Drake.
“We’re going to transform from this group experience to this individual flight,” Drake said during the Comic Con panel. “This is going to be the basis of our own origin story. We’re going to build back up and get to fight alongside with all the Avengers in this epic battle in Wakanda.”
The yearlong COVID-19 pandemic closure of Disney’s Anaheim theme parks postponed plans to open Avengers Campus until 2021. By that time, the Avengers E-Ticket ride had been put on hold.
Avengers Campus eventually debuted in June 2021 with a Spider-Man attraction, Doctor Strange magic show, Ant-Man and the Wasp restaurant and Marvel character shows and photo ops.
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Then Disney Parks Chairman Josh D’Amaro announced during the D23 Expo in 2022 that Imagineering had gone “back to the drawing board” to develop an entirely new concept for a Marvel Multiverse E-Ticket attraction where the Avengers would battle the King Thanos villain.
In 2023, Imagineering announced the new E-Ticket dark ride coming to Avengers Campus would transport riders aboard a world-jumping spaceship to remote worlds and alternate realities throughout the Marvel multiverse.
The new ride vehicle would feature a design that “combines elements of Tony Stark’s time-suits with Xandarian jump points and Wakandan technology,” Imagineering executive creative director Brent Strong said at the time.
Concept art showed a motion base platform ride vehicle designed to look like an Avengers spaceship passing through a glowing orange wormhole portal.
The new ride vehicles would utilize portal technology to help transport superheroes throughout the Marvel multiverse in a matter of moments, according to the backstory created for the attraction.
“As the story goes, the Avengers are developing new technology that will allow Avengers Campus to become the hub of a new multi-world mission spanning the universe,” Strong said in a video posted to Instagram.
After five years of development, Imagineering finally announced a name for the E-Ticket ride in 2024 during the D23 fan convention in Anaheim.
The Avengers Infinity Defense attraction will take riders on a search for a world-jumping technology developed by Tony Stark that King Thanos is using to wreak havoc on the universe, according to the backstory for the attraction. Recruits will travel to Asgard, Wakanda and New York City alongside Marvel superheroes before facing off against Thanos.
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The Imagineering pavilion at D23 2024 showed off a maquette model of the 12-seat trackless ride vehicle planned for the Avengers Infinity Defense attraction.
Avengers Infinity Defense is expected to employ ride vehicles similar to the ones used on Peter Pan’s Never Land Adventure in Tokyo DisneySea, Transformers: The Ride at Universal Studios Hollywood and Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man at Islands of Adventure.
Imagineering offered a sneak peek at the large-scale sets and immersive video screens planned for Avengers Infinity Defense during the Horizons: A Carousel of Progress showcase in August at the Honda Center in Anaheim.
A video showed Imagineers working on the rock work for a version of Mount Bashenga from the 2018 “Black Panther” movie and a 25-foot-tall version of Thor’s hammer that riders will encounter on Avengers Infinity Defense.
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Hemsworth, Downey and Mackie were shown filming dialogue for the new attraction.
“Bring the fight to Thanos,” Hemsworth said as Thor.
“They are not ready for Thanos,” Downey said as Iron Man.
“Thanos isn’t ready for them,” Mackie said as Captain America.
Hemsworth’s Thor will bid riders farewell after a successful mission.
“Congratulations, everybody,” Hemsworth said as Thor. “If you were any closer, we all would have died, but we didn’t. Well done.”
Disneyland has already built the proverbial “exit through the gift shop” for the attraction and closed the nearby “Doctor Strange: Mysteries of the Mystic Arts” show that could serve as an extended queue for the ride.
Avengers Infinity Defense will debut in 2028 alongside the new Stark Flight Lab thrill ride in the expanded Avengers Campus.
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