Ride Overview: Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind
Are you ready to save the galaxy?
What is Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind?
Epcot’s newest attraction, Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, allows you to accompany the Guardians of the Galaxy on an intergalactic chase through space and time. This new thrill ride is the first reverse-launch coaster on Disney property and is one of the largest fully-enclosed coasters in the world. The ride vehicle also rotates 360º as you go through the ride, so if you are prone to motion sickness, this might be one you want to skip.
Where is Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind?
This attraction is located in Walt Disney World’s Epcot theme park. Once you are in Epcot, you’ll need to go to the World Discovery section of the park to find this ride. If you walk in the front entrance of the park, World Discovery is on the left side of Spaceship Earth.
How Can I Ride Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind?
It is important to note that there is no standby queue for Cosmic Rewind. If you want to experience this ride during your next Epcot trip, you need to plan ahead to get access. You cannot just walk up to the ride and wait in line to ride it without having secured a boarding pass in the My Disney Experience app.
There are four ways that you can secure a boarding group for Cosmic Rewind:
Virtual queue at 7 a.m.
You are not required to physically be at Epcot to enter the 7 a.m. virtual queue, but you must have a park reservation and ticket for the day.
Individual Lightning Lane Purchase
Virtual queue at 1 p.m.
Extended evening hours
In order to join the virtual queue, you need to have active theme park tickets and a park reservation for Epcot on that day. You can only join the virtual queue once per day, so if you got in at 7 a.m., you cannot join again at 1 p.m. or 6 p.m.
Note: It is recommended that you log on to the My Disney Experience app a few minutes earlier than the time the queue opens so that you can make sure your party is connected on the app and you can join the queue right when it becomes available.
I Got a Boarding Group, Now What Can I Expect?
Congratulations! If you got a boarding group, you should be able to ride the newest WDW attraction! When it is time for your group to go to the attraction, you will get a notification from the My Disney Experience app. Once you get there, you’ll either go into the Lightning Lane entrance or the regular entrance, depending on how you secured your boarding group.
The queue for Cosmic Rewind is set up as a tour through the Galaxarium, a planetarium-like exhibit that highlights the similarities and differences between Earth and Xandar’s galaxies. The queue also features highlights of Xandar’s technology, videos of the Guardians, and more! Make sure to get a boarding group through the virtual queue if you want to see the full Galaxarium, because the individual Lightning Lane queue skips over a lot of it.
Ride experience *includes spoilers*
Once you get to the end of the queue, you’ll enter a room for the pre-show. In the pre-show, Centurion Tal Marik (played by Terry Crews) will invite you to teleport to a Xandarian ship. Once you get there, the power source for the Xandarians’ jump points are stolen by a Celestial. After the Celestial steals the power source, they pull Earth through a jump point to the past so that it will be erased. Luckily, Rocket is able to keep the jump point from closing completely and as you are evacuating the ship, you get to join the Guardians on their mission to save the galaxy.
The coaster itself has a reverse launch (although it does not happen immediately) and the ride vehicles will spin around to point you in the direction of the action as you go along. You’ll get to listen to one of six songs during your ride: “September” by Earth, Wind & Fire, “Disco Inferno” by The Trammps, “Conga” by Gloria Estefan, “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears, “I Ran” by A Flock of Seagulls, or “One Way or Another” by Blondie.
Conclusion
Overall, Cosmic Rewind was a really great attraction. I would definitely recommend it if you like thrill rides. The queue and pre-show were very fun and the ride itself was exciting. It was pretty easy to get a boarding pass — I went in June 2022 and was able to secure a boarding group at 7 a.m. by spamming the refresh button in the Virtual Queues section of the My Disney Experience app starting at 6:59 a.m. I got boarding group 14, which was originally estimated to be called around 9:50 a.m. But while on the bus to the park, I got the notification that it was time for our group to ride (around 8:10 a.m.). Once you get that notification, you have a one hour window to tap into the attraction, so we went straight there after arriving in Epcot. I did not experience any motion sickness on the ride, but I rode it on an empty stomach immediately after arriving. I can see how it might be different if you had had more food (or drinks) before riding.