Star Wars Void Experience at Disneyland, The Secrets of the Empire

CAUTION: Spoilers ahead. Do not read if you want the Void experience to be a surprise!
Ohhh….but if you liked Captain Cassian Andor in Rogue One…..youuuu might want to check this out. I’ll explain more in a minute…

Space Mountain. Tower of Terror. Pirates of the Caribbean. Everyone has their favorite ride at Disneyland, right? For a moment, forget all you know about a ride experience, and take in a brief glimpse of what the new Void holds in store for you.

Added in January of 2018, it is one of the newest additions to the growing Downtown Disney area.. The Void has replaced part of the old D23 store (remember where you could buy all the custom phone cases and Star Wars swag?). When you walk up to the storefront, it’s hard to tell what it actually is. There are big pictures of Stormtroopers, but not much else. If you are still inclined to journey into the Void, it’ll cost you about $40.00 a person. I almost didn’t go, just because I wasn’t a diehard Star Wars fan at the time, (but this experience made me a fan for life). I have to call it an experience, because it is not actually a ride at all.
THIS IS A GOOD PLACE TO STOP READING IF YOU DON’T WANT SPOILERS!!!

I’m serious about the spoilers… if you think you might possibly go there in the future, I would highly suggest just closing this article and look up knitting hats for Porgs or something. Part of the magic is not knowing what to expect. But if you’re a long way from Anaheim, keep reading, and I’ll do my best to explain something that is going to change the way we experience…well…everything.

So we paid our $40.00, we went inside, and we waited. The attendants were kind and personable, but wouldn’t really explain why we had to wait or what we could expect. We also had to sign a pretty extensive liability waiver, which, of course, really makes you think… “What the bleep is this really about???” I’m serious about the ambiguity, all they tell you is that it’s a virtual reality experience, that it takes about 30 minutes, and here, sign the waiver. They also give you a wrist band with your name and all your information on it. Then you wait again.

By the time that they finally let you in, the build-up has sort of done its job, and you’re REALLY curious what this thing is. They let you through a door, and quickly close it behind you. Here is where they tell you that you cannot take pictures, yada yada yada. They have you walk in this dark room lit only by obscure red lighting where helmets and chest harnesses are hanging like a meat locker. You have to put away all your belongings in a safe, then you get hooked up to the meat locker looking thing. You put your VR helmet on, and then they unclip you. I thought I was going to fall over, because this chest harness they just put on you is heavy!

They beckon you once again into a small area, and have you stand in front of a big screen…
And then…..

CAPTAIN CASSIAN ANDOR FROM ROGUE ONE STARTS TALKING TO YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh yes! Deigo Luna has reprised his role as Captain Andor, and HE IS IN TROUBLE! With quick glances over his shoulder, he explains that he needs YOUR HELP to retrieve a mysterious box! You will be going undercover as a storm trooper with two friends, and K-2SO is also there as your guide (Or just to yell at you and insult you and make you feel like a complete idiot….but more on that later…).

Finally, it’s time.

Your guide walks you into a small room, and asks you to put your headsets on. Each person gets to choose a different color accent for their Stormtrooper, I imagine so you can tell each other apart once the experience has started. I was with someone who was taller than me, and a 10 year old who was shorter than me. I don’t know how they do it, but when you put the headset on, the actual size of the person is the size of the Stormtrooper you are seeing! (Little Stormtroopers are so CUTE!!!) We waited for a while, getting used to looking at our own hands through the VR headset. Most of the movements were really accurate, and when we moved our arms, the “Stormtrooper” arms moved.

Finally, a door in front of us opened, K-2SO was there to greet us, though he quickly and quietly explained that we were disguised as Stormtroopers, and we shouldn’t make any suspicious movements. To our horror, he led us across a gangplank that was about two feet wide, and right below it was about a 200 foot drop to lava! Now listen, my head knew this was fake, but everything else in my body was telling me this was real! We walked across the lava field to a tiny platform, and it suddenly went up into space, just like this picture:

So imagine this is what you’re flying over, up to a central tower. We get off, and K-2SO leads us inside. A door opens, and inside are three Blasters! Finally! We each pick one up, and you can actually feel the blaster that you’re holding in your hand. So what’s the first thing you do when you get to hold a blaster? Well, pull the trigger, obviously. I do just that, and to my amazement, the blaster shoots, and when I look up, I realize it shot a hole in the ceiling of the room! But dang, stupid me…. We were supposed to be undercover! My pulling the trigger initiates an attack from the real Stormtroopers, as well as a verbal attack from K-2.

The Stormtroopers come fast and we have to start firing back. Tracers help you see where you’re shooting, so we have slightly better accuracy than the Stormtroopers in the movies. At some point I start feeling a really weird and uncomfortable feeling in my chest, and that’s when it dawns on me, I’m being shot! The really heavy chest piece I’m wearing is zapping me every time the Stormtroopers hit me! Dang! This shit just got real! I hide behind a door, and I can escape some of the blasts.

So I’m going to skip some of the details just so that I don’t give everything away, but let’s just assume that we beat the Stormtroopers, run away, and then get attacked by more Stormtroopers. This happens a couple of times before we finally run out a door, and get trapped on a ledge. There is no way back inside, and below us is a field of lava. Now let me explain this, when we put our hand on the wall, we can feel the wall. We are literally trapped, both in the VR world, and in our physical real world!

Now here comes the best part of the whole experience… PLEASE DON’T READ IF YOU WANT TO LEAVE A FEW SPOILERS!!!! IT IS SOOOOO WORTH IT!!!

Okay, you were warned!

We’re stuck on this ledge, no way out, and lava below us. The other two people with me are trapped on the left side of the ledge, and I’m hunkered behind a lip on the right side of the ledge for cover. Stormtroopers are coming from everywhere on scaffolding above and below us, when suddenly these big slug things start seething out from the lava below us. K-2 instructs us to shoot, so we start dispatching them with ease. But they keep coming, and now they aren’t dying so easily. This is when I realize, I CAN FEEL THE HEAT FROM THESE SUCKERS. Right in front of me, it’s hot! I can even smell the molten lava. We keep shooting, and kill them…all except for one, which keeps getting closer and closer. K-2 orders us to give it all we can. The heat from this creature is getting more and more intense, it’s right in our face, it’s uncomfortable. Right when we think we’re going to be slug-goners, the creature falls, and a door behind us opens.

The last part I’ll tell you about is K-2SO being a total brat while we’re being shot at. Let’s just say, practice on one of those “Simon Says” from the 80’s before you do this part. You have to follow a complex sequence of colors and buttons, all while being cramped in a dead-end corridor having Stormtroopers shooting at you. K-2 is not nice, and even now I’m amazed how much a condescending robot really got to me!

The ending culminates in a lightsaber battle, which we are sadly not a part of. Sort of abruptly, we realize the Void experience is over, and the attendant starts giving us directions again. I’m not sure how you could easily transition from this VR experience back to the real world, but I felt like I was being jerked back to consciousness after a nightmare.

We left the small room looking back and forth, ready for a Stormtrooper to jump out at me from around the corner. On our way back to the meat-locker area, we got a glimpse of our other family members, still in the thick of some unknown battle. They were yelling and shooting their blasters, and just seeing them so engaged made me realize how real this experience is.

My pulse was still racing when we collected our items and made our way back to the store front where new patrons were anxiously waiting, looking at their wristbands and signing their liability waivers. I seriously wish I had taken my pulse before and after, because I was jacked up for a long time after.

Everyone in our family that did it was amazed, and wished we could go again right away. We all agreed on one thing: this is the future of “experiences” at Disneyland, and everywhere else. It was real. Imagine all the places you could go! They way that we felt being shot, felt the heat of the slug monsters, smelled the burning char of the lava, this was a whole-body experience.

I would suggest the Void experience to most people, but not all. After talking with a friend who is a combat veteran, he agreed that this might be too real, and PTSD could be an issue for some people. (I wish they said something about that in the liability waiver, because I feel like they could put someone in a position they might not want to be in).

But for most people who are looking for that next “thrill”, the Void experience is it! I also think that Rogue One fans will really like to get a glimpse of Captain Andor pre-R1, and feel like they are a part of the rebellion!
The $40.00 was so worth it, and I will do this every time I go to Disneyland. You can also buy an optional picture at the end for $15.00, which is a great way to remember this awesome experience! So there it is!
Have you experienced The Void? Did I miss anything in the heat of the battle? I think there may have been more, so leave a comment if you remember something that I forgot!

(Original Star Wars images property of Lucasfilms/DIsney)