Disney Villains Land is ‘beyond Big Thunder’: Everything we know about Magic Kingdom’s expansion
The new Disney Villains Land will expand Magic Kingdom “beyond Big Thunder,” but where is that and what does it mean?
Updated Aug. 11, 2024; originally published April 8, 2024.
Disney officially announced Villains Land as the long-awaited answer to the query “What’s beyond Big Thunder Mountain?” at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom in Florida. The news was met with thunderous applause during D23: The Ultimate Disney Fan Event on Aug. 10, 2024.
What is ‘beyond Big Thunder’?
The phrase “beyond Big Thunder” refers to a future expansion of Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World in Florida.
Disney will build new attractions on currently undeveloped land, located past Frontierland’s Big Thunder Mountain Railroad roller coaster, thus “beyond Big Thunder,” as seen in aerial photography by bioreconstruct throughout this story.
Introducing Villains Land at Magic Kingdom
What, precisely, does one find “beyond Big Thunder,” pray tell? The answer is Villains Land, a new area of Magic Kingdom devoted to the bad guys. Villains Land will contain two attractions, as well as new and unique dining and shopping experiences.
Disney has not yet revealed which types of attractions will be found in Villains Land, but concept art depicts what appears to be a roller coaster track.
Additionally, Disney has not outright specified which Disney villains will star in the attractions of Villains Land. However, Maleficent in dragon form is featured prominently in the artwork, as is an aesthetic that matches the character’s lair in “Sleeping Beauty.”
The following Disney villains appeared in an official Disney TikTok video announcing the project, for what it’s worth:
- Evil Queen (“Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”)
- Chernabog (“Fantasia”)
- Lady Tremaine (“Cinderella”)
- Queen of Hearts (“Alice in Wonderland”)
- Captain Hook (“Peter Pan”)
- Maleficent (“Sleeping Beauty”)
- Cruella de Vil (“One Hundred and One Dalmatians”)
- Madame Mim (“The Sword in the Stone”)
- Kaa (“The Jungle Book”)
- The Horned King (“The Black Cauldron”)
- Ursula (“The Little Mermaid”)
- Gaston (“Beauty and the Beast”)
- Jafar (“Aladdin”)
- Scare (“The Lion King”)
- Yzma (“The Emperor’s New Groove”)
- Doctor Facilier (“The Princess and the Frog”)
- Mother Gothel (“Tangled”)
- King Magnifico (“Wish”)
Where will Villains Land be located in Magic Kingdom, exactly?
Other than, well, beyond Big Thunder, Disney hasn’t indicated a specific site map for this expansion, but we can speculate with some clues.
The upcoming Magic Kingdom expansion will span 12-14 acres, according to the Orlando Sentinel. By comparison, the Sentinel noted, New Fantasyland — the 2009-2014 project that introduced attractions based on “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” “Dumbo,” “The Little Mermaid,” and “Beauty and the Beast” — increased the park’s size by 11 acres.
In the photo below, Big Thunder is the orange-brown structure in the center middle, with New Fantasyland’s added acreage to the right of the brightly-colored circus tents. No need to squint; we’re about to zoom in closer.
Using the scale the Sentinel mentioned as a barometer of sorts, we can see how an area about the size of New Fantasyland (excluding Storybook Circus, which was repurposed land rather than additional space) could be wedged into what are currently woods north of Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and the Rivers of America.
As another comparison, Pandora – The World of Avatar at Animal Kingdom is 12 acres, while Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge at Disneyland Park and Disney’s Hollywood Studios is 14 acres.
The “beyond Big Thunder” expansion will almost certainly extend beyond the Walt Disney World Railroad track, which currently serves as the berm for most of the park.
Based on the size of the expansion, it remains to be seen whether the project will displace Floridian Way (a backstage road), but it’s unlikely to displace Floridian Place (a public road, which begins at the utmost north end of Walt Disney World property and eventually leads to Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa before merging with World Drive).
In any case, the expansion pad “beyond Big Thunder” is a significant parcel of land.
Where will guests enter and exit the Villains Land expansion?
Disney hasn’t revealed exactly how the expansion will connect with existing Magic Kingdom areas.
Eyeballing the prospective area, possible passageways to Villains Land could be located either between Tiana’s Bayou Adventure and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (top right of the photo below), or on the other side of the Rivers of America near Haunted Mansion (top left of photo below) if that attraction’s queue were reconfigured, or both. An entrance from Fantasyland isn’t impossible, but may be more cumbersome given how things are situated.
Depending on the extent of the redevelopment of existing land, it wouldn’t be completely unwarranted to imagine Tom Sawyer Island’s footprint decreasing, thus leading to a narrower Rivers of America and potentially new soil along the bend of Big Thunder that currently crests the water.
There’s also Disney’s upcoming “Cars” attractions to consider. Two rides based on that Pixar film will be built in a “reimagined” area of Frontierland, but Disney hasn’t announced where exactly that will be.
No matter where Villains Land is built or how guests will access the new attractions once they open, Disney will likely have to contend with and adapt existing Magic Kingdom real estate in some capacity; be that backstage facilities, onstage areas, or both.
Blue-sky journey to Magic Kingdom’s Villains Land
Straying from tradition, Disney didn’t outright announce the “beyond Big Thunder” project, at least not initially. Instead, at D23 Expo 2022, three executives — Josh D’Amaro (chairman of Disney Experiences), Jennifer Lee (chief creative officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios), and Chris Beatty (creative portfolio executive at Walt Disney Imagineering) — shared potential plans for the Magic Kingdom expansion.
Photo courtesy of Disney
At that time, D’Amaro, Lee, and Beatty named Disney villains, “Coco,” and “Encanto” as examples of “what could be” over the horizon line, as shown in the blue-sky concept art below (which Disney stressed was a preliminary design, not indicative of the project’s final plan).
When Disney executives first teased the possibility of the expansion at D23 Expo 2022, they posed hypothetical questions to the audience:
- “What if we could climb onboard the back of [an] alebrije and fly into the land of the dead with our family, just like the Riveras in ‘Coco’?”
- “What if you could walk into the Madrigals’ casita [from ‘Encanto’]? … What if you could step up to a door and discover your own magical gift?”
At Destination D23 2023, Bruce Vaughn (chief creative officer of Walt Disney Imagineering) joined D’Amaro to ever so briefly mention that “beyond Big Thunder” was still in the works.
At an Imagineering press event in April 2024, Michael Hundgen, a Walt Disney World site portfolio executive, again mentioned the expansion to invited guests. It seems that a handful of media outlets, including the Orlando Sentinel, took this as official confirmation that “beyond Big Thunder” had graduated from a hypothetical, and that Disney was committed to moving forward with the project.
Photo by Blake Taylor
At D23: The Ultimate Disney Fan Event (the event formerly known as D23 Expo) 2024, D’Amaro officially revealed definite plans to a Disney villains-themed land to be built at Magic Kingdom “beyond Big Thunder.” In the same presentation, D’Amaro confirmed plans for an “Encanto” attraction had shifted to Disney’s Animal Kingdom. The executive did not announce any “Coco” attractions for Disney World (though did reveal a “Coco” boat ride coming to Disney California Adventure).
When will Villains Land ‘beyond Big Thunder’ open?
Unfortunately, it’s too early to speculate any opening time frames. While initial site prep work is underway at the future site of Villains Land at Magic Kingdom, the area may take several years to be built.
As a comparison, Disney’s turn-around on Pandora and Galaxy’s Edge were both almost exactly 3.5 years, when measuring the time between construction commencing and the lands opening.
Didn’t Disneyland expand like this recently?
Yes and no. Imagineers expanded Disneyland Park in California to add Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, which opened there in 2019 (along with its almost-twin counterpart in Florida). The placement of Galaxy’s Edge at Disneyland is roughly the equivalent of where Disney will expand Magic Kingdom with Villains Land.
Below are aerial views of Magic Kingdom and Disneyland. In particular, note how the railroad track at Magic Kingdom (the thin pair of lines that begins in the photo as parallel to Big Thunder) currently travels a simple curve. That’s how Disneyland’s track previously looked in its equivalent of that spot; during the construction of Galaxy’s Edge, Imagineers rerouted Disneyland’s railroad track, winding the curve back and forth to accommodate the Galaxy’s Edge layout (and famously adding the first left turn in the attraction’s history).
The two plots aren’t exactly alike — for one, Big Thunder itself is located on opposite sides of the Rivers of America in California and Florida — but seeing how Imagineers tackled that project may give us some insight into what’s ahead for Magic Kingdom.
In the 2019 photos below by bioreconstruct, we can get a better idea of how Disneyland utilized a comparably-sized acreage as “beyond Big Thunder” to build Villains Land.
Will anything close in Magic Kingdom to make way for Villains Land?
The “beyond Big Thunder” Villains Land project is an expansion in every sense of the word. This new area will add acreage to Magic Kingdom rather than replace existing attractions. At this time, Disney has not announced that anything will permanently close at Magic Kingdom as a result of the expansion.
In the short term, it’s possible that several attractions may temporarily close to accommodate construction, depending on where exactly the expansion will be located. Such attractions may or may not include Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Tom Sawyer Island, Liberty Belle Riverboat, and the Walt Disney World Railroad. The last of those only just reopened in December 2022 following a four-year closure during the construction of Tron Lightcycle / Run, which occupied a portion of the train’s route.
When will Disney announce more information?
Disney frequently utilizes the Disney Parks Blog to announce major news about its theme parks.
In April 2024, the company debuted “We Call It Imagineering,” a recurring YouTube series with behind-the-scenes sneak peeks inside the past, present, and future of Disney attractions.
Disney may turn to either of these outlets — or another means — to distribute future information about the “beyond Big Thunder” Villains Land expansion at Magic Kingdom.
Disney history repeats itself
Though Disney’s publicity approach for “beyond Big Thunder” has been nontraditional in leading up to the project’s formal announcement, it’s not unprecedented. The company enlisted a similar tactic on a much larger scale in the ’90s; not just with one area of a park, but with two entire theme parks. Read more about how “beyond Big Thunder” echoes Disney history in our previous story.
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