General timing of nighttime shows

Hayduke

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Jan 11, 2018
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We'll be in UO first week of November--right after HHN. Curious if anyone has general historical memory of when the night time light shows (like Dark Arks, and the cinema thing on the lake in USF) start? I'm trying to get a few dinner reservations set, and would like them to be early enough that we could watch one of the light shows after.
 
I was there last week. At that time, the Dark Arts projection show was starting at 7:55 on a night where closing time was 8. I assume they run it more when there is more time after sunset and before park close?
 
Was there the last two night they do it at park close 8 pm and I think also right at sunset like 715 but probably in November only once because of the earlier sunset. The death eaters are walking around and they are VERY cool !!
 
We'll be there that same time and I don't have much faith we'll see the Dark Arts show. Parks close earlier typically that week and went Universal announced Dark Arts was coming back it said through 10/31.
Hopefully that changes and we're able to experience it!
 

Was there the last two night they do it at park close 8 pm and I think also right at sunset like 715 but probably in November only once because of the earlier sunset. The death eaters are walking around and they are VERY cool !!
I was completely surprised to see the death eaters in Hogsmeade tonight!
 
I went back tonight to see the death eaters, they came out at 7:00. There was definitely a dark arts castle show at 7:40, I saw it starting as I was walking over the bridge to Velocicoaster, not positive but it was probably the first show of the night. I think there was another one after that, saw a few fireworks from it (about 8:05) as I was leaving the park (after getting lucky by getting the front row on velocicoaster!)

Honestly, I can’t remember how long the show lasted, possibly there was only 1 at 7:40? I don’t remember it being that long though when I saw it Friday.
 
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Do they not do this sort of thing other times of the year? Is there anything we can expect to see in early January?
 
Do they not do this sort of thing other times of the year? Is there anything we can expect to see in early January?

They do run the night time shows through most of the year, depending on park hours.

The lights show on Hogwarts just changes things up depending on the season. For most of the year they have a "regular" show that typically runs several times a night, but at Halloween the last few years there has been a special "Dark Arts" version. Also I believe they have a different version during Christmas season.

The Cinematic Spectacular that is over on the USF side typically runs nightly as well.

The caveat is the park hours. If the park hours are on the shorter side (during a low season, or like now when Studios closes early for Halloween Horror Nights) they might not run because it's not dark enough. But during these low season periods if the parks close earlier, that's usually during the week but they'll have longer hours on weekend where they will run the night-time shows.

So for you in January, I'd wager you'd be able to see both (Hogwarts in IOA, Cinematic Spectacular in USF) as it gets dark early even if the parks are say only open to 7ish.
 
They do run the night time shows through most of the year, depending on park hours.

The lights show on Hogwarts just changes things up depending on the season. For most of the year they have a "regular" show that typically runs several times a night, but at Halloween the last few years there has been a special "Dark Arts" version. Also I believe they have a different version during Christmas season.

The Cinematic Spectacular that is over on the USF side typically runs nightly as well.

The caveat is the park hours. If the park hours are on the shorter side (during a low season, or like now when Studios closes early for Halloween Horror Nights) they might not run because it's not dark enough. But during these low season periods if the parks close earlier, that's usually during the week but they'll have longer hours on weekend where they will run the night-time shows.

So for you in January, I'd wager you'd be able to see both (Hogwarts in IOA, Cinematic Spectacular in USF) as it gets dark early even if the parks are say only open to 7ish.
Thank you so much for that rundown!
 
Do they still do the Dark Arts show if the park closes at 7:00pm? I just looked at our dates and two of the nights the park closes at 7:00pm.
 












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