Star Wars essentials that diehard fans hoped to see in Galaxy’s Edge and in some cases Walt Disney Imagineering promised will cost the space opera faithful $5,000 to $20,000 to experience aboard the Galactic Starcruiser.
The new Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser hotel debuted on Tuesday, March 1 next door to the Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge themed land at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida.
If the new Star Wars hotel proves popular and lives up to all the hype, a sister ship to the Halcyon could be docking someday soon next to the Galaxy’s Edge themed land at Disneyland.
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Several of the Star Wars experiences on the Galactic Starcruiser began life as Galaxy’s Edge concepts. In a sense they are being realized as Galaxy’s Edge experiences — if you think of the Halcyon as an extension of Batuu, the Star Wars starship and planet created by Imagineering and Lucasfilm.
The challenge for Disneyland and Disney World when it comes to Galaxy’s Edge has always been managing demand. Disney has taken a “yield management” approach that charges top dollar for wildly popular experiences as a way to meet demand and control crowds at its theme parks. It’s basically a pay-to-play model that has filled Mickey Mouse’s already sizable bank vault and enraged fans accustomed to unfettered access to all aspects of Disney’s theme parks.
Disney’s Star Wars conundrum basically boils down to a series of math problems with a simple and singular solution: Galactic Starcruiser.
Disneyland draws approximately 50,000 visitors a day. They all can’t fit into Oga’s Cantina, Rise of the Resistance or Savi’s lightsaber workshop. Disney solves the problem by taking reservations for Oga’s that get snapped up instantly by patrons eager to pay more than $40 for some alien cocktails, charging $20 for Lightning Lane access to Rise of the Resistance and pricing Savi’s build-your-own lightsaber experience at a whooping $220.
The Star Wars hotel holds about 500 visitors — about 1 percent of Disneyland’s daily attendance. Cabins aboard the Halcyon go for $5,000 to $6,000 per cabin for a three-day, two-night voyage. The priciest suite commands $20,000, according to the New York Times. Disney hasn’t talked much about the pricey luxury cabin — but Star Wars canon now includes a honeymoon voyage aboard the Halcyon by Han Solo and Princess Leia Organa. No doubt the Star Wars royalty stayed in the best room available.
The best way to think of the Galactic Starcruiser is as the Club 33 of Galaxy’s Edge — only the well-heeled and deep-pocketed need apply.
The Galactic Starcruiser allows Disney to cater to the top 1 percent of its daily theme park audience, bundle all the elite experiences together and charge thousands for the opportunity — something it could never get away with in Disneyland or Disney World without starting a revolt among Mouseheads.
The rough math suggests Galactic Starcruiser is pulling in more than a quarter million dollars a day. And that’s before factoring in all the extras like $23 space cocktails, $100 Togruta head tails, $150 Padme Amidala cloaks and $450 Halcyon necklaces available onboard during the cruise. That’s more than enough galactic credits to cover the cost of the cruise ship’s entertainment while keeping starcruiser crowds manageable.
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Let’s take a closer look at seven Star Wars essentials missing from Galaxy’s Edge that you’ll find aboard the Galactic Starcruiser.
Astromech droid SK-62O greets visitors on the Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World. (Disney)
1) Droids
Galaxy’s Edge concept art created by Imagineering showed droids serving drinks in a cantina and roaming freely throughout the Star Wars land. Concept art is just that: Conceptual. The Millennium Falcon doesn’t fly over Batuu at Disneyland — even if you can hear spacecraft racing overhead (more on that in a bit).
Droids are an essential part of Star Wars lore — and certainly a key element any fan would expect to see in a Star Wars themed land.
R2-D2 mostly sits idle in Droid Depot, occasionally stirring to life or making rare appearances rolling around the land. But for the most part, animatronic droids are anchored in place outside Droid Depot, scattered throughout the Rise of the Resistance queue and playing disc jockey in Oga’s Cantina.
C-3P0 has dropped by some private events held in Galaxy’s Edge, but the protocol droid hasn’t made any appearances during normal theme park operating hours.
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The SK-62O astromech droid serves as the assistant cruise director aboard the Halcyon, rolling around the atrium and posing for photos with passengers. Logistics droid D3-09 pops up on control panel screens in Halcyon cabins and chats with passengers using artificial intelligence technology. Imagineering concept art shows a ball droid that looks like BB-8 rolling around the ship to the delight of passengers.
Imagineering has conducted play tests with droids at Disneyland, but the lovable robots face unusual obstacles at theme parks not found in outer space. Little kids love to hug the child-size droids and even climb on top of the robots. That makes Disney’s armada of lawyers very nervous. It’s also the same reason we’re unlikely to ever see the small and boxy wheeled MSE-6-series repair bots scurrying around Galaxy’s Edge — the mouse droids are trip-and-fall hazards waiting to happen. The closest we’re likely to get: Mouse droid popcorn buckets at Kat Saka’s Kettle in Galaxy’s Edge.
Rodian keyboardist Ouannii chats with visitors on the Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World. (Disney)
2) Aliens
Imagineering talked endlessly before Galaxy’s Edge opened in 2019 about a ferocious and grumpy bounty hunter named Harko who would regularly hang out at Oga’s Cantina. A commonly heard refrain: Don’t be surprised if the alien bounty hunter taps you on the shoulder looking for the loot you owe space pirate Hondo Ohnaka for damaging the Millennium Falcon.
Harko hasn’t made it to Batuu yet — and neither have any of the promised Star Wars aliens that were supposed to inhabit the land.
Outside of Chewbacca, who shows up in Galaxy’s Edge and on Galactic Starcruiser, Disney’s version of the Star Wars universe has been free of the familiar aliens that fans hoped to see walking around Black Spire Outpost. Disneylanders have been long accustomed to seeing the Wookiee in Tomorrowland for meet-and-greet opportunities with Darth Vader long before Galaxy’s Edge was even a glimmer of an idea.
Human characters like Rey Skywalker, Kylo Ren and Resistance spy Vi Moradi populate Galaxy’s Edge, but aliens like Dok Ondar and Hondo Ohnaka are mostly bolted-in-place animatronics. There’s an animatronic dianoga near the bathrooms and plush toys in the Creature Stall, but Star Wars aliens don’t roam Galaxy’s Edge posing for photos with visitors.
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Imagineering envisioned a ride concept with a wooly mammoth-like creature offering visitors rides around Galaxy’s Edge on the back of the beast inside a canopy-covered mount. An alien creature known as Elee would have walked a path between the landspeeder garage and the Resistance area. The Galaxy’s Edge concept ended up gathering dust on the shelf largely because of capacity issues.
Galactic Starcruiser has several alien walk-around characters. Pantoran captain Riyola Keevan commands the Halcyon while Twi’lek singer Gaya performs in the starship’s dinner theater accompanied by Rodian keyboardist Ouannii. Reptilian Rodians like the bounty hunter Greedo killed by Han Solo have bulbous eyes, slender snouts, pointed ears and twin antennae. Ouannii chats with Halcyon passengers between shows in the Star Wars language of Huttese which can make for confusing and humorous conversations.
Gaya performs in the Crown of Corellia dining room on the Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World. (Disney)
3) Dinner Theater
Gaya is the headliner of the Star Wars dinner theater once planned for Galaxy’s Edge that made the jump to the Galactic Starcruiser.
Imagineering initially envisioned Gaya as an underworld boss who owned the Kalikori Club restaurant and lounge next to Oga’s Cantina in an abandoned concept created for the twin Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge themed lands in California and Florida.
Imagineers have hinted Gaya may also know a thing or two about coaxium, the Star Wars hyperfuel used on starships that plays a central role in the Rise of the Resistance attractions at Disneyland and Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
Imagineering has been sprinkling Gaya-related Easter Eggs throughout Galaxy’s Edge with the pop star’s “Oola Shuka” song in regular rotation at Oga’s Cantina. According to her backstory, Gaya is a mezzo soprano with a funky, jazzy neo-soul musical style.
The Twi’lek singer hails from the outer rim Star Wars planet of Ryloth, home to a humanoid species distinguished by the lekku appendages protruding from their skulls.
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Imagineering concepts envisioned the Kalikori Club as an old bath house and spice den that had been converted into a dinner theater restaurant owned by Gaya. She instead headlines the Crown of Corellia dining room on the Galactic Starcruiser.
Galaxy’s Edge still has room for the dinner theater concept at Disneyland — but shifting the concept to Galactic Starcruiser allows Disney to manage demand and bundle the cost into the cruise.
What could Disneyland have charged for a Star Wars dinner theater show? It’s hard to say, but a Club 33 fixed price five-course meal costs $179 with wine pairing.
Rey Skywalker battles Kylo Ren on the Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World. (Disney)
4) Stunt Show
A constantly unfurling storyline that emerges throughout the three-day, two-night Halcyon experience concludes with a lightsaber battle between Kylo Ren and Rey Skywalker.
The grand finale of the cruise that unfolds on a bridge above the ship’s atrium looks strikingly similar to a stunt show that made only a single appearance in Galaxy’s Edge.
A stunt show during a Galaxy’s Edge opening night press event at Disneyland in 2019 featured a dozen actors, special effects, blaster fire and pyrotechnics on the stage above the landspeeder garage.
Galaxy’s Edge has several stages near the Millennium Falcon, X-Wing fighter and landspeeder garage that sit largely unused for anything other than socially distanced meet-and-greet locations.
Kylo Ren makes an entrance on the TIE Echelon assault shuttle stage that feels like the beginning of a show that ultimately never happens.
The Lightsaber Training Pod onboard the Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World. (Disney)
5) Lightsaber Training
From a storytelling standpoint, it would make sense to undergo lightsaber training after building your own hilt at Savi’s Workshop in Galaxy’s Edge.
Young padawans will have to book a voyage aboard the Halcyon to learn the ways of the Force like Luke Skywalker did with the Marksman-H training remote.
One of the highlights of the Galactic Starcruiser experience is a lightsaber lesson where passengers learn to wield the Jedi weapon while facing off against a remote training device.
Lightsaber trainers known as Saja guide about 15 passengers at a time who must deflect low-level energy blasts fired by a wall-mounted training remote.
Savi’s Workshop drew big crowds anxious to build their own lightsabers when Galaxy’s Edge first opened at Disneyland. It would have been difficult for Disneyland to charge a premium for lightsaber training add-on — especially after offering the free Jedi Training Academy for years in Tomorrowland.
Moving the in-demand experience to the Halcyon allowed Disney to bill lightsaber training as a buzz-worthy activity only available at the new Star Wars hotel.
The Sublight Lounge onboard the Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World. (Disney)
6) Musical Score
Imagineering made the deliberate decision not to have composer John Williams’ classic Star Wars scores playing as background music in Galaxy’s Edge.
Batuu visitors hear an ambient marketplace soundscape and the occasional starship whooshing overhead — with music largely relegated to indoor spaces.
DJ R-3X spins a soundtrack described as Jawa meets new age meets 1980s pop inside Oga’s Cantina. Local Black Spire radio station BSO 401.72 broadcasts in Galaxy’s Edge bathrooms — known as refreshers in Star Wars parlance. Thematic symphonic scores are largely reserved for indoor attractions within the land.
Williams created the Grammy-winning “Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Symphonic Suite” just for the themed land — but you have to search to find it. The Galaxy’s Edge theme song plays in Savi’s Workshop and on the Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run flight simulator attraction.
The symphonic Star Wars musical themes and motifs play a central role on the Galactic Starcruiser — with the music surging during key fight scenes onboard the ship during the stunt show finale between Kylo and Rey.
Passengers celebrate aboard the Galactic Starcruiser at Walt Disney World. (Disney)
7) Celebrations
For more than 40 years, “Star Wars” movies have ended with medal ceremonies and post-battle celebrations.
The last night on the Halcyon concludes with what Disney describes as a spectacular finale party.
Disney excels at celebrations — from parades to nighttime spectaculars to festivals — all of which remain missing from Galaxy’s Edge.
Early blueprints indicated a parade route would run through Black Spire Outpost — adding life to land that can often feel dead without any kinetic outdoor activity. Fireworks burst above the towering spires of Batuu on many nights without explanation — a natural storytelling spot for Disneyland to drop in a Williams score or two and create a Star Wars nighttime spectacular. The Halcyon’s alien menu would provide an outstanding inspiration for a Star Wars food festival – whenever the Halcyon is in port, timed to Life Day or in honor of May the Fourth Be With You.