Original Star Wars Land: Never Built Disney Studios Part 1

 Never Built Disney Studios

Star Wars Galaxy's Edge opened in 2019 at both Disneyland and Disney's Hollywood Studios as the first land dedicated solely to the Star Wars franchise in any Disney theme park. It featured an original planet known as Batuu and took place during the Disney produced sequel trilogy between two of the films.

But this was not the initial plan for a Star Wars-themed land in a Disney Park, and the initial plans barely resembled what eventually came to be.

Rumors stated that the land was set to replace Echo Lake, so that it could be built around the already existing Star Tours attraction, which would remain but be given a facelift to fit a location on a new planet, Tatooine. 

Rumors for Star Wars land grew for years prior to Galaxy's Edge getting announced, but they all followed the same general idea, Echo Lake being replaced by Tatooine from the original trilogy. Gertie the Dinosaur and the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular would have been torn down to make way for an all-new land based on one of the most iconic locations in sci-fi history.

The land was rumored to feature two major additions, an exact recreation of Mos Eisley Cantina, one of the most famous locations from the films, and a new major attraction. Details on this ride were vague, but topics like pod racing were brought up.

So how were these rumors so wrong? The answer is they weren't.

This land was prepared in large part prior to the sequel trilogy even being a concept. When Disney planned their own films it was only natural that the land would evolve to better fit their future plans for the franchise.

We never got any concept art or exact details for the original concept of Disney's Star Wars-themed land, but what it evolved into is nonetheless a feat of Disney Imagineering.

Thanks for joining us for the first entry in a new series exploring the never built rides and attractions of Disney MGM Studios and Disney's Hollywood Studios. Be sure to come back next week when we explore Roger Rabbit's Hollywood.