Mickey Mouse is the most iconic creation of Walt Disney, and still represents the company as a whole to this day. But until the recent addition of Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway, there was never a major attraction dedicated to telling a story based on the iconic characters. That does not mean however that one was not planned.
As part of the never-built circus-themed expansion to Disneyland, a Mickey Mouse-themed dark ride would be planned to be added to Disneyland.
Little is known about this concept, as most of the information in regards to it is only in relation to a publicly shown model and a few pieces of concept art.
This ride was to be based on classic Mickey Mouse shorts and not tell a narrative story, instead merely working as something of a best hits attraction of the various Mickey stories from throughout the years.
It would have done in the style of the other Fantasyland dark rides, with smaller-scale sets and animatronics taking you through various individual scenes. Think something along the lines of Snow White's Scary Adventures or more specifically Pinocchio's Daring Journey which was designed at about the same time, merely substituting these characters for ones from the Mickey and Friends family.
This would have been fit in with the backstory of a circus by being presented not as a narrative ride like the other Fantasyland attractions, but as a fair attraction presenting the best of Mickey, utilizing its location as a storytelling advantage.
The Mickey ride, alongside the rest of the Dumbo-themed circus land and the attached land Discovery Bay would never be built as Disney shifted its focus elsewhere, but they are interesting "what ifs" in Disney Parks history. Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway is a very different ride than this vision of a Mickey ride, and it would have been interesting to see how this turned out.
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