Both pieces of concept art capture the vibrancy of this world, and  with the orange marigolds, moody blue skies, and colorful banners giving us a feast for the eyes. ​​Add in Coco's music, and there is going to be a lot going on here, meaning the ride's presumptive leisurely pace will be something to treasure as guests crane their necks to look at every detail. Perhaps because these images share some of the iconography from EPCOT's original El Rio del Tiempo (or the current Gran Fiesta Tour), my mind initial projects this as a it's a small world after all style attraction but I'm hopeful the Imagineers will push the technology further than that. This is in no way a slight to small world - a must do attraction no matter which park I'm in around the world - but more a hope that the US parks get some of the cutting edge dark rides we've seen at other parks around the world.

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Tokyo and Paris have both added new Frozen attractions in recent years, and while the one in Paris looks perfectly good, Tokyo's version has some astonishing moments that take it from a nice dark ride to a must do attraction which causes guests to book vacation packages to give them an opportunity to secure a fast pass to the attraction (the frozen Anna animatronic coming to life at the 2:22 mark in the linked clip made me audibly gasp when I first saw it live). My hope is that the Imagineers can make this Coco attraction on that kind of level. This will mean swinging for the fences with next level effects and animatronics, rather than relying on two dimensional set pieces, and more limited characters.

 

DCA is getting a level of attention at the moment which hasn't been seen since the park was re-tooled back in 2012. With an expanded Avengers Campus, new (albeit possible delayed) Avatar land, and this Coco attraction, the park will gain four new attractions but use the two largest areas of land left for expansion. In short, other than Avatar being a prolonged rollout, it's possible that this is the last new attraction we get at DCA for some time. A high capacity, cutting edge attraction could help bring balance to the southern half of the park and drive guests away from the eastern side of the park in the morning, which is likely to be heavily trafficked when the expanded Avengers Campus comes online, adding to the stampede to Radiator Springs at rope drop. Adding another top tier attraction would also be a potential boost to lightning lane multi-pass, which is a little limited at DCA, with Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, and sometimes Soarin' and Midway Mania being the only attractions that really need a fast pass on many park days.

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​​​The iconography, story, and cultural significance of día de los muertos offers an incredibly rich design toolkit to draw from. The stylized calaveras (skulls), the papel picardo banners, the marigolds, and the alebrijes (brightly coloured, mythical creatures featured in Coco) are all iconic visuals and simply riding through a Mexican town during this celebration would make a good attraction, even without the additional narrative of the Coco characters. The "spooky" elements of the story will allow Imagineers to dip into their Haunted Mansion toolkit and we'll hopefully get some cutting edge animatronics of Miguel, Hector, or Ernesto.

 

Given the richness of the Coco story though, it would be a shame if guests are simply given this standalone boat ride without any other story elements that we'd expect in a themed "land". ​One element I would have really like to see in a new Coco land is for them to really lean into the nighttime appeal, as we have with Radiator Springs on the other side of the park, or with Pandora at Animal Kingdom (when it's rarely open, that is). This wouldn't just be about being fun at night with entertainment and available drinks, but potentially designing the entire mini-land to seamlessly transform into a dia de los muertos celebration at the flick of switch thanks to the lighting package and well placed skulls which come to life under neon or black light. However, other than perhaps a really nice themed entry plaza - perhaps like we have in the France and Norway pavilions leadings into Remy's Ratatouille Adventure and Frozen Ever After - it is doubtful there is going to be room to do much else, as we'll get into now.

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Location

Once the pieces began to fall into place that the new Avatar land would take over the northeast corner of the park, and that Coco was clearly being fast tracked ("Plans are drawn. Dirt is moving"), it became fairly clear that this new boat ride was going to slot somewhere around the Incredicoaster. This was of course confirmed by the June 2025 announcement which locked in those two announcements. Specifically for Coco we learned that it:

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"will be built near Paradise Gardens Park and Pixar Pier, in areas that are predominantly backstage today. Construction on this attraction is set to begin backstage this fall" (Disney Parks Blog)"

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There were several moving pieces to consider when it came to building in this area:

1. This backstage area includes the space in which the parade floats are housed, as well as the access route to get them into the parks.

2. The backstage access road for operations and emergency vehicles runs through this area and will need to be preserved or moved.

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Let's map these issues out:​