The Coaster Critic's Blog

Islands of Adventure's Hulk Coaster is Incredible
Islands of Adventure's Incredible Hulk is one of the best looking coasters you'll find anywhere. The twisted mess of bright green track is built partially over the park's lake. Hulk's enclosed lift hill and massive cobra roll and vertical loops dominate the skyline at Islands of Adventure. The layout is right on top of the park, but not to its detriment. Hulk is perfectly integrated into the walking paths and spectators are frozen in their tracks as they pass under the marvel.

The experience starts with the pre-ride theming of the queue made to look like a scientific facility straight from the comic book. The station is a futuristic gamma radiation chamber responsible for turning Bruce Banner into the Hulk. Riders climb aboard the suped up, comfortable, four across trains in anticipation of an unforgettable ride.

Hulk has one of the best opening sequences I've ever experienced. First, riders are launched 0 to 40 mph (via a tire propelled launch system) up the enclosed lift hill. 40 miles per hour is nothing extreme, but riding through the long tube, up into the light of day only to be spun upside down by a zero-g roll over 100' in the air is unbelievable. This is easily one of my favorite all-time inversions. It just has to be experienced. After the roll, the train plummets back down towards the lake and then back up into a super-sized cobra roll (seen here) offering two more high altitude inversions. Next, the train enters a massive vertical loop. The trains dives into an underground mist filled tunnel, flies back up and does a sweeping helix around the enclosed lift hill.

From here on, Hulk loses its great pacing. Immediately after the helix the train enters a quick corkscrew, then a smaller tighter vertical loop that wraps around an upcoming brake run. After a few more turns riders are pulled into the brake run as they pass through the previous loop. Then they drop down and into the final inversion, another corkscrew, and after a few more turns you hit the station brakes. While I'm glad that the ride doesn't just end after the incredible opening sequence, the second half seems crammed and a lot less interesting than the first half. The back half is also uncharacteristically rough for a Bolliger & Mabillard coaster. Even B&M's loopers are usually very smooth and forgiving. These tighter inversions supply a little head bang. The banging's not unforgivable, but definitely noticeable. Here's a view of the crowded back half.

The Hulk is an amazing roller coaster and truly a one-of-a-kind ride. The theming, originality, and overall rideability are top-knotch and I want to give it a 10. But The Hulk falls just short. See my rating scale here. Final Rating - 9.5 (Excellent Approaching Superior)

Check out this onride video of the Incredible Hulk @ Islands of Adventure. It looks faster than I remember:

Harry Potter Attraction Planned for Universal's Islands of Adventure
Warner Brothers and Universal will be teaming up for a new Harry Potter attraction at Orlando's Universal Islands of Adventure. It has been described as the world’s first fully immersive Harry Potter themed environment. Also, as a theme park within a theme park.

Guests will be able to visit the village of Hogsmeade, the mysterious Forbidden Forest, and even Hogwarts castle. The 'Wizarding World of Harry Potter' is expected to open in 2009. An opening that puts it between the Half-Blood Prince (2008) and Deathly Hollow (2010) movies.

Check out the full story at ThrillNetwork

Roller Coasters in Hollywood
This Thursday I'm counting down my top three coaster movie appearances. Coincidently, all three happen to be in horror/thrillers. A few honorable mentions go to: Fatal Attraction, Big, and Titanic.

Coaster @ Playland Park
Fear (1996)
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Reese Witherspoon, William L. Petersen, Alyssa Milano
This must have been a break out role for Wahlberg. He shows his acting chops as a psycho boyfriend to Reese Witherspoon. William Petersen from CSI (the Vegas incarnation) play's the protective father. I think this movie is pretty much every girls father's nightmare. Witherspoon and Wahlberg's characters have an intimate moment aboard a wooden coaster aptly named 'Coaster'.


Incredible Hulk @ Islands of Adventure
House on Haunted Hill (1999)
Starring: Geoffrey Rush, Taye Diggs, Famke Jansen, Bridgette Wilson, Chris Kattan & Ali Larter
A millionaire offers a group of diverse people $1,000,000 to spend the night in a haunted house with a horrifying past. The movie opens with the newly opened Incredible Hulk coaster. It's operating in a park owned by the Vincent Price-esque millionaire played by Geoffrey Rush. There's a good 3 minutes or more of footage of the first half of Hulk over the lake. At one point, the track becomes detached and a train flies off the track. The next train's riders scream for their lives thinking they'll meet the same fate. But, just as they reach the broken track it comes back together. Later, you see that the train that fell off of the track was filled with dummies with mechanicized flailing arms. This is about the most unbelievable feature for a coaster to have, but it made for an entertaining enough moment.

Corkscrew @ Playland Park
Final Destination 3 (2006)
Starring: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Ryan Merriman, Chris Lemche, Gina Holden
The Corkscrew at Playland Park in Vancouver, British Columbia plays a major role in Final Destination 3. In reality, it's a very tame coaster, but thanks to a nice dosage of CG effects, Devil's Flight is a monster of a coaster. One of the riders has a premonition of the disaster that's about to happen so she, and several other riders are released fromt the train before it departs. The remaining riders experience a ride from hell. Their restraints become inoperable and they are thrown from the ride at high speeds while the coaster does more loops than you would find at an entire park. After the ride, the surviving riders are picked off one at a time because they cheated death by getting off of Devil's Flight before the accident. The deaths are some of the most gruesome imaginable, but it is an interesting twist on the teenage slasher flicks. Check out my full review.

Looking for more? Coasters-Net has a pretty good list of movie and tv coaster appearances.

Got a suggestion or comment about my Top 3? Leave a comment below.

The Flipside of Roller Coaster Accidents
There's been a lot of news lately about coaster accidents. You're still a lot safer on a roller coaster than pretty much all other moving vehicles. It's the percieved danger that makes it fun. In a car chances of death are 1 in 18,000 and in a plane chances of death are 1 in 350,000. You even have a better chance of dying from parts falling off an airplane (1 in 10,000,000). In comparison, you have a 1 in 1.5 billiion chance of being fatally injured on a coaster. I'll take my chances on that 15-story, looping steel coaster any day over a drive on the Capital Beltway.

Usually the accidents on roller coasters have been a result of rider negligence (ie. standing up or slipping out of a restraint) or a pre-existing condition that someone had prior to riding the coaster. And here's a story of the Incredible Hulk at Islands of Adventure actually saving a life.