DHS/Toy Story Land "Early Morning Magic" (EMM) FAQ & Discussion

[Figment Mom]

For those who have done this event, are both sides of AS2 usually open? They were both open when did this event once in the past. This morning only one side is open. It’s very disappointing. There is a long line. We’ve waited through 4 rides and are still waiting.

To top things off, my DD and I had problems entering the park (our bands weren’t synching to our annual passes), and we were sent to guest services, which was a huge ordeal. We were at least given FPs for SDD. We got to TSL almost 20 minutes after the event had begun. Our morning is off to a bad start...let’s hope it gets better from here.

I'm here today so I can't answer your question as to if they've had both sides open but I did notice they opened the other side near the end of the event today.

I'm sorry your morning didn't get off to a great start.

 

[jhoannam]

This morning only one side is open. It’s very disappointing. There is a long line. We’ve waited through 4 rides and are still waiting.

This is very disappointed, they are clearly selling more tickets to the event AND are reducing capacity? I would let Disney know that you aren't pleased with this event, this isn't the correct way to do these special hard ticket events.

 

[jhoannam]

I'm here today so I can't answer your question as to if they've had both sides open but I did notice they opened the other side near the end of the event today.

I'm sorry your morning didn't get off to a great start.

What did you think of the event? I saw that SDD was at 20 minutes the entire time.

 

[Figment Mom]

I'm very glad I got a ticket to today's EMM.

Got to the Pop bus stop at 6:30. Bus came just a few minutes later.

There was no "no bag line" at security but I went up the middle and they waved me through to the metal detector.

Next you go to a CM with an ipad to get checked in. Then you go to another CM to get a wristband. Finally you line up at the tapstyles.

They let us in right at 7. They direct you to the left past 50s PT and Indiana Jones to Backlot.

You can turn right and go towards Toy Story Land but then you're waiting 30 minutes, so I swung left to Backlot and grabbed a couple of pastries and some juice before walking over to the arches where they hold you until 7:30.

It was actually 7:32 when they led us back.



I was near the front so I went straight to SDD and walked onto the 3rd dog.

Did Alien Swirling Saucers as a walk on, and then walked onto TSM.


After that I did SDD 3 more times. I didn't usually pay attention to time but it was a very short wait. Last ride I waited 7 minutes.


Just before 9 I decided to go to Sunset Blvd. I was behind the rope drop crowd, but many were going to TOT and I chose RNRC.



Everyone ahead of me went in the standby line. I walked on single rider and was the first person back there, making it on the first car of the morning.





Went back to Backlot and got the chicken and donuts and some yogurt, juice, and tea. (They accidentally gave me two entrees. I only ate 1!)



I would 100% do this again.

 

[dancergirlsmom]

What did you think of the event? I saw that SDD was at 20 minutes the entire time.

I would love to know this too. I was looking at the wait time on MDE. We are going next week and hoping it isn't too bad.

 

[Figment Mom]

What did you think of the event? I saw that SDD was at 20 minutes the entire time.

I just posted more details above, but I definitely didnt wait 20 minutes on any of my 4x on SDD this morning.

 

[ColoradoMom12]

I just posted more details above, but I definitely didnt wait 20 minutes on any of my 4x on SDD this morning.

This. We were there this morning, too, and didn’t wait 20 minutes for SDD (we did when we attended this event last November, though; I had my reservations about doing it again due to the long waits we encountered then). The longest we waited was 13 minutes (our first ride); after that it was much shorter. They opened the second side of AS2 towards the end of the event, and after that, we walked right on several times in a row, all the way until about 9:30. Then we used our bonus SDD FP, got breakfast just before 10, and went to the Frozen singalong.

I have no idea what the issue was with our Magic Bands this morning. The guest relations CM seemed equally confused. It appeared to be a glitch no one had ever encountered before. We had arrived (at the entrance) about 7:25 kept tapping our magic bands and getting the flashing blue light. The CM with the tablet wasn’t sure what to do with us and sent us to guest services. The CM working there seemed to never have seen anything like it. All of our information was showing up when she scanned my magic band (my annual pass as well as the EMM ticket), but for some reason it wasn’t synching to let us into the park. DD’s was doing the same. The CM tried giving us both new AP cards, but those ended up not working either. The whole thing was a giant mess. Finally they were able to override the glitch and somehow manually add things to the account to let us in. I was very upset by this time and asked if we could have a partial refund as we had missed out on almost 20 minutes of the event. We were instead given FPs for SDD...not bad. I still would have preferred a partial refund, but I didn’t want DD to be upset if they gave us the refund but took the FPs away so I left it alone. We arrived in TSL at 8:03 AM.

 

[disneyworldsk]

i'm worried about this because our first day of vacation/tickets is 8/26 emm dhs so i'm concerned a glitch on mb will occur. i will be there bright and early.

 

[ColoradoMom12]

i'm worried about this because our first day of vacation/tickets is 8/26 emm dhs so i'm concerned a glitch on mb will occur. i will be there bright and early.

Being there early is a wise idea. I cut things close this morning. I figured we knew what we were doing, we had done done it before, so my plan was to arrive so that we could have our wristbands on by 7:25 and walk through the park just as TSL was opening. It all worked out fine until the MB glitch. We are passholders and have been on vacation for the past 8 days. This is the first time we’ve ever experienced this, not just on this trip but any of our past Disney trips as well. I got the feeling from all of the CMs we interacted with this morning that whatever happened to DD and I this morning doesn’t happen often. Even at guest relations, the CM seemed uncertain what to do with us! Still, it’s a good idea to not cut things as close as I did this morning. Getting there early is a much safer plan! I will make sure I leave ample time if we decide to do this again in the future. Hope you have a great time!!

 

[hvanes]

We also attended this morning (7/29). My family of 7 has thanked me about a dozen times for surprising them.

We got to DHS at about 7 and were heading to line up by 7:10. Folks in front of us were angry that they sent us around the lake (towards Backlot) rather than allowing people to go straight back. Part of our group went to line up and a few of us grabbed a pastry and juice and walked and ate. As a pp mentioned, we were walked back at 7:32. Our group was on Slinky at 7:43. When we got off, we were completely fooled by the 20-minute wait sign so we did TSMM twice. They were using the FP line.

After a couple rides on TSMM, we decided to chance the "20-minute" wait on SDD. We waited 11 minutes and decided to ride it again. We then tried Aliens (both sides were open) and returned to SDD one last time. I noticed it was almost 9 so we decided to head to breakfast. Right after we took one last pic by Woody, the regular crowd started coming down the street.

There was no wait for breakfast at this point, and seating was abundant.

We rode SDD 4x, TSMM 2x, and Aliens x1. A couple of us also had a quick bathroom break at one point. We could've easily hopped in line once more, but everyone was really hungry and wanted to go sit and eat. We had a 5-minute wait for Star Tours after we finished breakfast at about 9:30.

I was so tempted to cancel this several times over the past few weeks, but I'm so glad I didn't! We got so much done, and we thought breakfast was good. After the quick start to our morning, we were able to slow things down and have a much more relaxing day.

 

[dachsie]

We are going 8/28. I think we want to do the meet and greet first and then head to SDD. Our last trip was 2017 so we have not seen TSL yet to know where everything is. What side of the line going in should be position ourselves in to get to the meet and greet first - I assume they are out from the time it starts right?

If you want to do the meet and greet first, stay to the left. Depending on when they let you in, if before 7:30 - you could easily hop on AS2 and then get in line for the M&G. If its right at 7:30 then I would go to the M&G. They characters usually come out 7:30-7:35

 

[mmackeymouse]

Wow, surprised to see the people happy with 7/29 because ours was not so happy. It was for sure oversold. At 8:10, we hadn't been on a single ride yet. So disappointing. They didn't let us back early, so really, we probably didn't get back to TSL until 7:32-7:35.

We got in a (what appeared to be) short-ish line for Woody and Bo immediately. This line took 35 minutes. There were only a few groups ahead of us, but between all the autographs and taking 8 different combinations of photos per group....it took way too long, but it was what my nephew wanted to do.

Anyway, we were okay with it, as we had read that SDD lines decreased as the event went on, so we figured we'd still get a few rides on it. But not the case for us. It was a 20 minute wait. And, as we had an infant that one member of our party wait outside with, there wasn't the opportunity to do it again, as by that point it was after 8:30. We finally went on AS2 and Midway Mania, and by that time, the event was over.

We are on the fence on whether it was worth it or not. If we had gotten back early like some groups have, that would have made a world of difference. If the Woody line would have moved a bit more expeditiously, it would have helped. SDD being a 20 minute wait, though was the biggest gut punch.

 

[mmackeymouse]

I just posted more details above, but I definitely didnt wait 20 minutes on any of my 4x on SDD this morning.

We were there 7/29 as well, and was in line for SDD at approximately 8:10, and our wait WAS 20 minutes. It is so strange how some people can have different experiences.

I dunno if we just had bad timing, but we didn't want to risk a 20 minute wait again, so we only did Slinky once.

 

[ambellina]

FINALLY got an opening for Monday morning. I'm thinking we'll line up for SDD first and then see where the day takes us from there.

 

[disneyworldsk]

i recommend doing sdd first only because when i went in november we did it first and after that it broke down the rest of the time so at least we got to ride it and experience it.

 

[hvanes]

We were there 7/29 as well, and was in line for SDD at approximately 8:10, and our wait WAS 20 minutes. It is so strange how some people can have different experiences.

I dunno if we just had bad timing, but we didn't want to risk a 20 minute wait again, so we only did Slinky once.

This is so interesting. Did you have an odd or even number in your party? We had an odd number and that line was significantly shorter than the even line, except for our last ride. I wonder if that plays much of a role in wait times...?

Ugh... The event is great if all goes well, but it's pretty costly if it doesn't!

 

[hvanes]

FINALLY got an opening for Monday morning. I'm thinking we'll line up for SDD first and then see where the day takes us from there.

This was our strategy. SDD is great, but it also helps that we all LOVE TSMM. That was a 5-minute wait all morning, so if we had to resort to only that after SDD, we probably still would've been satisfied.

It also helped that all my kids have either "outgrown" character meets or are painfully shy of them, so we didn't need to allot time for photos. Those lines looked to be the slowest moving, unfortunately.

 

[ColoradoMom12]

We were there 7/29 as well, and was in line for SDD at approximately 8:10, and our wait WAS 20 minutes. It is so strange how some people can have different experiences.

I dunno if we just had bad timing, but we didn't want to risk a 20 minute wait again, so we only did Slinky once.

This was our experience in November. We encountered actual 20 minute waits for SDD. It was frustrating enough that I really had to think hard about whether or not I’d do it again for our July trip. Ultimately I chose to do it based partly on event reviews here as well as the fact that it’s an early morning event. We are early risers and like to take advantage of anything that’s available in the earlier part of the the morning, especially in the summer as it’s usually cooler then.

It helped in November that DD and I don’t enjoy TSMM (she has zero experience with video games so isn’t really sure what to do, and the ride itself gives me motion sickness). We did one of the meet and greets but spent most of time on the aliens...we especially loved the holiday music they had on that ride in November! It was equally fun without the festive music this time.

 

[Coach Holden]

We just did EMM this morning and after reading many people’s trip reports I had certain expectations. Walked into TSL at 7:32am at the front of the pack, and only were able to ride TSM x2 and SDD x2. Its amazing how little that allotted time actually is.

 

[Boardgaming]

We just did EMM this morning and after reading many people’s trip reports I had certain expectations. Walked into TSL at 7:32am at the front of the pack, and only were able to ride TSM x2 and SDD x2. Its amazing how little that allotted time actually is.

I was there this morning with my party of 4. We didn’t do any character greets. We ride TSMMx2 SDDx4 and 1 ride on alien swirling saucers. We thought it was great!