Walt Disney Imagineering has confirmed that Millennium Falcon: Smuggler’s Run was originally designed with five different missions, but due to budget and time restraints, the attractions opened with only one at both Disneyland and Walt Disney World.

Millennium Falcon: Smuggler’s Run

An article shared by the Wall Street Journal recently shed light on several past projects, difficulties, and successes within the Walt Disney Imagineering branch of The Walt Disney Company over the past few years. Imagineers take their roles seriously with immense pride in what they accomplish:

Imagineers are a distinctly diverse group of craftspeople, with skills ranging from costume design to mechanical engineering to project management. They hold 831 active patents for technologies, including multidirectional moving floors and rotating roller coasters, and have wowed guests with achievements like the Enchanted Tiki Room’s singing birds in 1963 and a Spider-Man robot doing aerial acrobatics today.

Despite this, the parks are full of rides, attractions, and experiences “that opened late, went over budget, or needed costly overhauls after debuting with a thud.” In 2005, when Bob Iger took over as CEO, many Imagineers felt that their creativity was limited, with a forced focus on franchises from Pixar, Marvel, and Lucasfilm. With that came Cars Land at Disney California Adventure and plans for new lands based on Star Wars and Avatar.

Pandora: The World of AVATAR at Disney’s Animal Kingdom opened in May 2017 while Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opened two years later in Disneyland on May 31st, 2019. The version at Disney’s Hollywood Studios opened a few months later on August 29th, 2019.

Two rides were planned for the lands on both coasts: Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run and Star Wars: Ride of the Resistance. The former, according to Imagineers was originally set to have five separate story lines. However, it only debuted with one due to budget and time constraints.  That one mission is led by Hondo Ohnaka (or Chewbacca in the secret “Chewie Mode”) and allows passengers to search for and retrieve coaxium. It is currently still the only mission running.

Rise of the Resistance did not open with the land due to its complex nature:

“That was the hardest attraction technically that the company’s ever built,” Imagineer Craig Russell said of the massive, multilevel Rise of the Resistance. “It’s a ride system inside a ride system inside a ride system.”

Now, years later, a second storyline is being introduced for Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run. First announced at D23: The Ultimate Disney Fan Event in 2024, the new experience featuring Din Djarin and Grogu is coming to the attraction on both coasts on May 22, 2026, alongside the release of the film, The Mandalorian and Grogu.

Are you excited to finally get a new sequence for Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge? Let us know in the comments and on social media.

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