Theme Park Ride Review – King Kong 360 3-D at Universal Studios Hollywood

Thursday night (June 24) I was lucky enough to be one of the first to see the unveiling of the newly rebuilt King Kong ride at Universal Studios Hollywood. My friend works there as a driver and invited me as her guest to the special employee’s preview night. Since she is normally one of the people driving the tram through the ride, we actually got to go to the front of the line – straight from the driver’s locker room. Talk about going behind the scenes, it was fantastic.

When I heard that the new attraction was going to different than before, I was skeptical. The fun of the original King Kong was getting shaken around on the bridge, the big beast breathing his hot banana breath on you as the tram was tossed back and forth like a toy. Replacing all of that with a big 3-D screen? I didn’t think it would work.

Boy was I ever wrong. As soon as we got in there we were instantly transported into the jungle and they made that tram do things I never thought it could. The effect was similar to what you experience on ‘The Simpsons Ride’ – motion responding to images on screen (with the added effects of wind, spattering water and even stinky breath). On ‘The Simpsons Ride’ I was amazed at how they can make you feel like you’re on a roller coaster even though you never leave the ground. Never in a million years did I think they could pull off the same thing with a massive tram.

I’ll tell y’all right now that I screamed like a little girl in pigtails. So much stuff happens, though I don’t want to spoil it by giving it away. Suffice to say that I think I’m gonna need to ride it many more times to see everything that happens, since the images completely surround the tram and there is stuff happening no matter where you look.

Oh, and a word to the wise - sit in either of the last two cars on the tram and you’ll get a better show throughout and a great thrill towards the end.

Overall I was totally impressed with ‘King Kong 360 3-D’ and I’m sure that when the public gets to see it, many people are going to agree with me.