Here’s our first look inside Rapunzel’s Lantern Festival, a new dark ride at Tokyo DisneySea’s Fantasy Springs based on Disney Animation’s Tangled. The attraction is a boat ride not unlike Pirates of the Caribbean that takes you through the story of Rapunzel’s dream to see the floating lanterns glow—and discover that her “mother” kidnapped her to use her magical long hair for eternal youth, and that maybe she’s her kingdom’s lost princess.
The Disney Princess era of CG animation kicked off with 2010's Disney release Tangled starring Mandy Moore as the long-haired Princess Rapunzel, and Zachary Levi as her reluctant rescuer turned true love Flynn Rider. It’s exciting that the Disney hit finally gets a classic fairytale ride of its own, albeit in Japan first. So you’ll have to travel far to go on Rapunzel’s Lantern Festival—though there’s some hope it may come to Disneyland eventually as part of its recently announced expansion. Take a look at the ride in action below in a video from Disney Parks; images in the gallery ahead also show the incredible work from Imagineering in bringing this ride from animation to life.
