In all the huge news that was revealed during the last four days of Star Wars Celebration in Orlando, you may have missed the tidbit that Star Tours: The Adventures Continue will be getting a new destination – the planet Crait. The planet is rich with minerals and was previously a mining colony for the Rebellion. If you watch the Star Wars: The Last Jedi trailer, look for the scene with the skimmers flying low of over the salt flats facing the First Order AT-AT walkers on the horizon.
Star Tours: The Adventures Continue was designed to be easily updated with new segments. When the Imagineers last added a new scene, for The Force Awakens, they made it so everyone saw that scene, while the other two were randomized. That made for some awkward time-bending journeys, but it was fun if you just went with it.
That said, I’d like to see Disney add a couple variations instead of just one and to add some rules so you don’t see Darth Vader and Kylo Ren on the same trip. That shouldn’t be possible.
There is an open question as to what will happen with Star Tours once the new Star Wars-themed land opens. We know that all plans for the new land indicate that Star Tours won’t be moved. There is no particular reason Disney would need to shut Star Tours down either. There are other franchises that have multiple experiences in the park (Alice in Wonderland at Disneyland, for instance). But it would be odd to have the experiences far apart (nearly completely across the park at Disneyland).
Then, there’s the fact that the same thing that makes Star Tours: The Adventures Continue so easily update-able means that those same motion simulators could be reprogrammed into an entirely new ride. The Iron Man attraction at Hong Kong Disneyland is essentially Star Tours with a Marvel theme. Disneyland would have no problem adding Marvel attraction, but that’s a whole’nother kettle of fish in Orlando where Marvel, especially The Avenger and X-men are a no go. Perhaps something Guardians of the Galaxy related. That would be a relatively quick overlay for Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Just swap out the Milano for the Star-Speeder 3000 in the queue and Groot for C-3PO and there you go.
No date was given for the new scene from The Last Jedi to be added to Star Tours. The scene from The Force Awakens was added around a month before the movie debuted, so there’s that for an idea.