Walt Disney World Guests Recall Recent "Chaotic and Insane" Visit, Cast Members Reportedly "Don't Care"

For most people, a trip to Walt Disney World is a magical experience, whether you’ve visited once or a dozen times. Other times, a trip can be not so magical, which is exactly how a recent visit to Hollywood Studios went for one family.

This time of year is always busy at Walt Disney World, with the end of the Christmas and New Year’s crowds blending into the rush of the Walt Disney World Marathon guests, leading to bigger crowds, higher wait times, and stressed cast members. Just prior to New Year’s Eve, Walt Disney World had reportedly seen its busiest day since 2020. In addition, just yesterday, Inside the Magic reported on the high wait times at Disney’s Hollywood Studios and across the other Disney parks.

Genie+ sold out again, an issue that Disney World has been experiencing since before Christmas, and wait times at Hollywood Studios soared over several hours. Unfortunately for one family visiting, high wait times weren’t the only issue they experienced. Speaking directly with Inside the Magic, the family recalled their disappointing day at Hollywood Studios.

The family has been visiting Walt Disney World for years as Disney Vacation Club members and Annual Passholders. They described their recent experience as being like nothing they’ve ever encountered at the parks and took to social media asking, “Does Hollywood studios have a ride that won’t break on us!” The day started with issues booking Virtual Queues for later in the day, setting the family behind before even making it to the park. From there, everything else went downhill.

“Literally every ride, with the exception of Star Tours, went down today,” they recalled. Their first attempt at a ride started at Slinky Dog Dash in Toy Story Land, which broke almost as soon as they stepped in line. From there, guests were directed to try Toy Story Mania or Alien Swirling Saucers, and the family decided to try Mania. “The wait started at 55 minutes. Within 5 minutes it was at 75, then jumped to 150 because it just kept breaking down,” they stated. Trying for Alien Swirling Saucers next, they said the posted wait time of 35 minutes didn’t seem too bad until one side of the attraction broke down, forcing guests in lines for both sides to be shuffled into one. Tower of Terror was no better, according to the family.

“They would literally let one or two guests from stand-by go and then let 20 to 30 Lightning Lanes go. I’ve never seen anything like it.” For their wait of about 100 hours, a woman they spoke with in the Lightning Lane said she had only waited about 10 minutes. When the family returned to Slinky later in the day, they had the opposite experience, only waiting 8 minutes in a Lightning Lane compared to the 300 minute stand-by wait. “They were pushing Lightning Lane like no tomorrow.”

The day only got worse with an unfortunate encounter in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge with a Photopass cast member. “We’re a big party of 8,” the family explained. “We’ve been telling Photopass the whole time: we want group pictures of the 8 of us and then separate family photos, just so they know what to expect. We didn’t have any issues with that until Galaxy’s Edge.” When explaining the situation to the Photopass cast member, he reportedly replied, “respectfully, I don’t care,” and proceeded to take their photos. “Sucked the fun out for me,” they explained online.

“We thought he was playing a role since we were in Galaxy’s Edge.” But they were so confused by the encounter that they decided to visit Guest Services, who told them directly that Photopass doesn’t play roles and that they were very sorry for the disappointing experience.

The rest of their day continued in a similar way, as they explained that “literally every ride with the exception of star tours went down today. It was chaos and insane.”  “I still love Disney,” they said, “but honestly, Universal blew the doors off this time,” stating that in their experience Universal seemed to have handled the New Year’s Eve crowds far better than Disney did. The crowds at Hollywood Studios were extraordinarily high this week, not only due to the holiday and marathon crowds, but also potentially due to an influx of guests wanting to ride Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith before the ride closes on January 8 for an indefinite refurbishment period.

Although this is only one family’s experience, it isn’t hard to guess that with the amount of people in the park yesterday that they weren’t the only ones having a bad day. It’s only the start of a new year, and a rough time managing the crowds. It’s expected to start to slow down in the next few weeks, but we can understand the disappointment with such an unmagical experience.

Have you ever had a string of bad luck during a Disney visit? Did it ruin your trip? Let us know in the comments below!

Please note that the story outlined in this article is based on a personal Disney Parks guest experience. No two guest experiences are alike, and this article does not necessarily align with Inside the Magic’s personal views on the Disney Parks or their operations.