Disney to shut down Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser experience

First announced in 2019, the Galactic Starcruiser experience was, essentially, a Star Wars hotel located at the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida. Guest paid voluminous sums to board the Halcyon starcruiser, stay in a cabin with a virtual view of space, interact with characters from the Star Wars universe, and so on.

It definitely looked like an interesting time, although pretty early on, fans were raising their eyebrows over the price, which hovered around $1,209 per guest per night. Was the experience really sustainable at those prices?

Apparently no, because ABC News reports that the Galactic Starcruiser experience will be shutting down. The final flight will take place from September 28 to 30 of this year.

Why is Disney shutting down the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser experience?

“Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser is one of our most creative projects ever and has been praised by our guests and recognized for setting a new bar for innovation and immersive entertainment,” a spokesperson for Disney said in a statement. “This premium, boutique experience gave us the opportunity to try new things on a smaller scale of 100 rooms, and as we prepare for its final voyage, we will take what we’ve learned to create future experiences that can reach more of our guests and fans.”

Looking too closely at this, I can’t help but read about how they want to “reach more of our guests and fans” as an indication that the Galactic Starcruiser was indeed inaccessible to most people who would otherwise be interested in it, probably because of that price point.

But there are other explanations for why the experience might be closing. This news comes on the same day that Disney announced it was scrapping plans to build a new campus in Lake Nona, Florida, which would have involved moving thousands of staffers and the families from the west coast to the Sunshine State. Outlets like Deadline are interpreting this move as a consequence of Florida governor Ron DeSantis becoming increasingly hostile towards Disney, which is a bizarre stance for a politician to take given how much money and jobs Disney brings into the state.

So maybe the Galactic Starcruiser shutdown is part of that? Or maybe it was just priced too high to ever be sustainable. Maybe a little of both.

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