Marvel Super Hero Island

Marvel Super Hero Island is an area at Universal Orlando's Islands of Adventure park in Orlando, Florida that is themed after popular Marvel Comics superheroes. The island is home to four attractions, including The Incredible Hulk and The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man. Marvel Super Hero Island’s architecture and theming is modeled after a Marvel comic book, with a comic book color scheme, amplified angles, and cutouts of many of the most popular Marvel characters.

What is today known as Marvel Super Hero Island was originally going to be an area known as "Gotham Island", featuring Batman and Gotham City, which was inspired by Tim Burton's 1989 Batman film staring Michael Keaton. As a result of the film's success and the success of Universal Studios Florida that opened in 1990, Universal Parks & Resorts' overlord MCA Inc. and Warner Bros. began entering negotiations in the early 1990s for theme park rights to DC Comics for the "second gate" adjacent to Universal Studios Florida, originally known as "Cartoon World" (later changed to Islands of Adventure). Ultimately, the deal fell through,^[1] as Six Flags quickly acquired the full license to DC Comics, as well as the heated dispute regarding royalty payment for the characters' park presence between Warner Bros. and Universal.

Meanwhile, Marvel Entertainment Group, Inc. was in dire financial straits that they sold off its characters' rights to several major movie studios, including Universal Pictures (which was also owned by MCA). MCA then eventually negotiated with Marvel for the theme park rights to Marvel characters and signed an agreement on March 22, 1994. This contract stipulated that "MCA will construct a complex of attractions, stores and food venues heavily themed around the Marvel properties" under the Marvel Universe banner at the second gate.^[2] The agreement remains in perpetuity (aka good faith), or indefinitely, unless Universal decides to close the Marvel Universe area, stop making payments for property usage, or Marvel opts out of the contract providing that it needs a reasonable explanation that Universal is mishandling the usage of their property.^[2]

Construction of Islands of Adventure began in 1997, with the Marvel Universe area being officially named "Marvel Super Hero Island". Islands of Adventure opened up to soft openings on March 27, 1999, and officially opened two months later on May 28. Marvel Super Hero Island is among the five of the original islands in the park.

Marvel Super Hero Island currently features four attractions.

The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man is a motion-based 3D dark ride, which was considered a huge technological achievement, combining 3-D film, ride movement, and special effects for the very first time. The ride takes place in New York City and features Spider-Man taking on the Sinister Syndicate, when it is learned that they seize the Statue of Liberty with an anti-gravity gun and threatens to destroy the statue if New York City does not surrender to them. Guests enters through the Daily Bugle with empty offices and apparently all of the reporters have fled in the midst of the carnage. With no reporters left, the Bugle's Editor-in-Chief J. Jonah Jameson hatches a plan to send guests as would-be-reporters to cover the story in the news-gathering vehicle, known as the SCOOP.

The Incredible Hulk is a launched roller coaster themed after comic book superhero character, the Hulk. From the 1999 to 2015, guests entered the science laboratory of Dr. Bruce Banner with many televisions showing a cartoon of the story centered around the Hulk. After the Hulk roller coaster was opened in 2016 as part of the refurbishment, a new, original storyline was added with a completely redesigned queue experience that places guests inside a perilous scientific experiment led by General Thaddeus Ross, which shows CGI animations of test subjects being exposed to gamma radiation and being transformed into Hulk-like creatures.

Doctor Doom's Fearfall is a space shot ride based around the Fantastic Four's main villain, Doctor Doom. The plot involves Doom's latest invention by using the guests' fear as part of an effort to defeat the Fantastic Four. The guests becomes a subject of Dr. Doom and traps them so he can have their fear extracted.

Storm Force Acceleraton is a teacup ride themed after a popular member of X-Men, Storm. Riders are made to spin around in order to power the Accelatron, a device that amplify the mutants' abilities, to allow the X-Men, Professor X and Storm, to defeat Magneto.

Marvel Super Hero Island is also home to dining and merchandise shops. Cafe 4 is a futuristic command center-like restaurant themed after characters from the Fantastic Four universe, featuring a cafeteria with Italian-American cuisine options. Captain America Diner is a restaurant themed around Captain America and other members of the Avengers (e.g., Iron Man, Thor, Scarlet Witch, Ant-Man, etc) as well as its related villains, featuring typical fast foods like cheeseburgers, chicken sandwiches, chicken fingers, crispy chicken salads, and more. Merchandise items can be bought from a variety of themed stores including Spider-Man Shop (which guests exits from The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man ride), Marvel Alterniverse Store, Comic Book Shop, and Oakley.

On August 28, 2009, The Walt Disney Company (Universal's biggest rival in the theme park market) agreed to purchase Marvel Entertainment for $4 billion. The deal was finalized on December 31, 2009 in which Disney acquired full ownership on the company.^[3] Universal stated that the acquisition would not impact its theme park licensing agreement with Marvel and Disney CEO Bob Iger acknowledged that Disney would continue to honor any contracts that Marvel currently has with Disney competitors.^[4] The 1994 agreement signed between Marvel and Universal governs the use of Marvel properties in non-Universal theme parks and dictates what parks in the region can use such properties. Per contract in regional terms, Walt Disney World and Tokyo Disney Resort cannot use any Marvel characters in Japan (The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man ride cloned from Islands of Adventure has been operating at Universal Studios Japan since 2004) and the United States east of the Mississippi River, as Islands of Adventure holds exclusive rights to dozens of Marvel characters. The clause also includes other characters in the same "family" (See Characters used at Marvel Super Hero Island section below), including villains such as Red Skull from Captain America and Loki from Thor. In addition, Disney is not allowed to use the Marvel name in Japan and the United States east and west of the Mississippi River, nor can create a Marvel simulator ride within 60 miles of any Universal theme park in the U.S. (similiar treatment also applies to Japan) regardless of whether the Marvel characters are used by Universal or not.^[2]

The Disneyland Resort is not constrained by the agreement, as the contract also states it could utilize any Marvel character west of the Mississippi whether used by Universal or not,^[2] as well as Universal Studios Hollywood abandoning its theme park agreement with Marvel in 2008. However, the resort is still bound by the clause of not using the Marvel name and a simulator ride containing any Marvel character. Outside the United States other than Japan, Hong Kong Disneyland, Shanghai Disneyland Park, and Disneyland Paris are permitted to use the Marvel name as well as any type of ride they want (as they do not have any Universal theme park within the same region and distance as them) and incorporates meet and greets with any Marvel heroes regularly. Both Hong Kong Disneyland and Disney California Adventure have opened Marvel attractions since the acquisition, with Iron Man Experience at the former and Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: Breakout! at the latter.

Meanwhile, Disney World has taken other measures to promote its Marvel properties within the Resort. For example, monorail trains have been wrapped in advertisements promoting films such as The Avengers and Iron Man 3. As these monorail trains featured Marvel characters, they were operated only on the Resort and Express lines of the Walt Disney World Monorail System, which run entirely outside the theme parks, unlike the Epcot line, which enters and loops through its namesake park. The resort does have a Marvel-themed store, Super Hero Headquarters. However, it is also located outside of park gates in Disney Springs. Marvel characters not connected with the ones at Islands of Adventure also appears at Disney's Hollywood Studios in form of meet and greets, such as Star-Lord and Gamora from Guardians of the Galaxy,^[5][6] Baymax and Hiro from Big Hero 6,^[7] as well as Doctor Strange.^[8]

The following list of characters are or may be seen at Marvel Super Hero Island. This includes from actual costume appearances to 2D drawings all around buildings to videos seen at attractions.