Universal Great Britain - Speculation & Rumors

[tommyhawkins]

Even though DLP is a short trip away, we always choose Florida due to the vast array of what’s on offer. We’d rather pay a bit more and have a well rounded experience. I have been to DLP but not since 2007 and that’s because it hasn’t added anything significant for quite some time. However I may visit again in the next few years as I believe they have some big expansions coming.

I’m quite confident there won’t be any clones at the Universal UK park from Florida. From other Universal parks elsewhere such as Beijing or Japan? Possibly yes as very few people from the UK visit those parks.

I haven't been to DLP since 2015, i think it has less today than it did then, I have however been to Europa 3 times in a year despite DLP being so much easier to get to - I wonder if two different groups are bein conflated in this discussion

I agree, this is a much more important issue as far as duplicate rides are concerned. My first theme park experience was DLP. Rather than stopping me going to Orlando because I'd already seen a version of the Magic Kingdom, it encouraged me to go to Orlando because there was so much more of that theme park excellence on offer. If Orlando had been my first experience, would I have gone to DLP? Maybe not, especially as I might have concluded that I'd already experienced everything that Paris had to offer while I visited Orlando.

I think too much concern is being attached to the cannibalisation issue. Yes, lots of Brits visit Orlando, just over 900,000 last year, but the UK's population is 69 million so Universal is creating a massive new market of potential visitors by building in Bedford. The possibility of Orlando losing a few British visitors is pretty small beer compared to the domestic audience that Universal is hoping to attract in Bedford, and that's before you start thinking about visitors from the rest of Europe.

If Universal want to minimise the possibility of Brits deciding not to visit Orlando because they've "done it all" in Bedford, there is pretty easy solution to that potential problem. Build world class and unique attractions, which reside within beloved IPs. It's what they've done extremely well over the last 20 years, as even the most cursory glance at their track record will show. So it should be business as usual for Universal Creative, the only thing which will hold them back is a lack of ambition (and investment) by UDX and Comcast.

A million visitors is nearly 12% of their expected Y1 visitor numbers, if you are to rank people into groups of who is most likely to visit, the Florida contingent are the highest.

Again, I don't know why so much emphasis is being put on Potter like it will singlehandedly carry this park, it won't. The discussion seems to be as if there will be a huge backlash if they don't have this.

Europa Park is the second most visited park in Europe with 6m visitors- has only one singular mini land with Arthur. It's just a park filled with great theming and rides and people go there. Many of the other popular parks aren't based on mainstream IPs.

I assume the reason everyone is on this forum and not a Harry Potter/Nintendo/HTTYD/Popeye/Transformers/etc forum is cos they like the work Universal do on the whole and believe they are good at this park building malarkey right?

 

[rob@rar]

Again, I don't know why so much emphasis is being put on Potter like it will singlehandedly carry this park, it won't. The discussion seems to be as if there will be a huge backlash if they don't have this.

Europa Park is the second most visited park in Europe with 6m visitors- has only one singular mini land with Arthur. It's just a park filled with great theming and rides and people go there. Many of the other popular parks aren't based on mainstream IPs.

I assume the reason everyone is on this forum and not a Harry Potter/Nintendo/HTTYD/Popeye/Transformers/etc forum is cos they like the work Universal do on the whole and believe they are good at this park building malarkey right?

I’m not wedded to IP-based environments, certainly not as much as Universal itself seems to be. When IoA opened my favourite land was The Lost Continent, which was mostly free of any IP that was still within actual IP rights. But everything that Universal has done since then has been IP-based, either stuff they owned or stuff they paid a fortune to use. Assuming that will be the case for the park in Bedford is not a leap of faith, but a racing certainty.

So if we assume that Universal UK is going to be mostly IP-based, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to discuss the pros and cons of what might be coming. Universal aficionados had until recently mostly dismissed the possibility of Harry Potter forming the basis of one of the lands, for the perfectly rational reason that Warner Bros would not want a major HP presence next door to their very successful Studio Tour. A story in The Sun (a British tabloid newspaper, not always with a reputation for adhering strictly to the facts of the matter) cast doubt on our received wisdom that HP was not a possibility, by suggesting that Universal had recently reached an agreement with Warner Bros. From a commercial point of view I think this makes a compelling story, even if it means there’s less chance of seeing the IP that I’d really want to experience, Lord of The Rings. But does anyone really doubt that HP is anything less than a juggernaut of the IP world, especially in the UK? I’ve not been to Orlando since 2023, but that summer the two HP lands in The Studios and IOA were absolutely rammed, shifting monumental volumes of merchandise, food and beverages, with consistently long queues for all the rides and attractions. I’m sure that’s the case in 2025, and the amount of time visitors are prepared to queue for the new Ministry ride is indicative of the enduring popularity of the IP and Universal’s awesome ability to craft wonderful story-based attractions within that world. Does that mean that HP’s presence will make or break the park in Bedford? No, I don’t think it’s anything like that. But if Universal is able to obtain those rights I think they’d be foolish to ignore the park-visiting public’s desire to immerse themselves in that world. Sitting alongside other massive IPs like the Jurassic franchise, will appeal to the widest possible demographic.

 

[MangoDance]

But does anyone really doubt that HP is anything less than a juggernaut of the IP world, especially in the UK?

Good points, my counter-argument would be that a lot has happened with the franchise since the Ministry of Magic portal and attraction plans were greenlit. After the successful first Fantastic Beasts movie, the second film underperformed, then the third film tanked hard ($100m+ loss) which not only killed the film franchise, but seemingly sunk their HP-adjacent plans for the "Wizarding World" altogether, they've spent a lot of time and money rebranding everything back to simply "Harry Potter".

If the bean-counters have concluded the only safe bet is the nostalgia factor, but at the same time they don't want to clone another hogwarts, diagon or hogsmeade incase it impacts other park revenue, it really doesn't leave many options on the table.

So I'm still going to stick my neck out and say we won't get a full land even with this rumoured deal, but just a single large attraction in the form of a Quidditch Stadium housing shops and a "flight of passage" style simulator ride, the brits love their football culture, which is heavily coded into Quidditch, so it could be a way to inject some of that into the park and sell HP merch at the same time. The concept art even has a pretty obvious spot for a large stadium structure to sit, just saying.

 

[rob@rar]

So I'm still going to stick my neck out and say we won't get a full land even with this rumoured deal, but just a single large attraction in the form of a Quidditch Stadium housing shops and a "flight of passage" style simulator ride, the brits love their football culture, which is heavily coded into Quidditch, so it could be a way to inject some of that into the park and sell HP merch at the same time. The concept art even has a pretty obvious spot for a large stadium structure to sit, just saying.

What do you think JK Rowling would make of that plan? A half-assed Potter presence in her own country, because Universal’s bean counters wanted to sell lots more Butterbeer but were fearful of putting off some people from visiting Orlando? I don’t think she’d be very happy with that kind of commoditisation of her work, so her response would be a flat “no, no, no”. We’ll see in time, but I think Bedford will either get a fully featured HP land or nothing at all.

I think you’re right to point out that the likelihood of the theme park “Wizarding World” franchise to include more and more Fantastic Beasts references has come to an end. Which is a shame, as I enjoyed those movies and hoped they would conclude the storyline. But I don’t think that weakens the strength of the Harry Potter part of the Wizarding World, which has always been the tent pole that holds up the entire structure. That remains as large and as popular an identity as it has done for the last decade. The books continue to be bought and read, increasingly by new parents who loved the stories when they were children and are looking to introduce a new generation to the boy who lived. The HP movies continue to be streamed. Stephen Fry and Jim Dale audiobooks continue to be heard. And now we have a new full audio dramatisation about to be released by Audible featuring a stellar cast, and the prospect of a multiyear mega TV series which is going to delve in to the world of Harry Potter in a much deeper way than seen before. It seems to me that the Harry Potter juggernaut will continue to roll on, perhaps with even more momentum over the next decade. There’ll be a strong nostalgic theme for some people, but a journey of discovery for plenty more.

 

[rob@rar]

Did anyone listen to the latest episode of the Jim Hill podcast? He talked about Universal’s plans for the Lost Continent after part of that area had been devoted to the original Wizarding World of Harry Potter, back in the 2000s. The discussion was prompted by the current news that permits had been filed to demolish five acres worth of building, most probably Poseidon’s (sob) and Sinbad’s, in anticipation of new attractions (yay). Jim Hill said that Universal’s plans had originally been to expand the Potter part of that land to include a spinning Dumbo-style ride themed for the Whomping Willow (presumably with a Forbidden Forest setting), and to convert the Sinbad stunt show into a Potter themed show of some kind, set within the Shrieking Shack. Universal got as far as artwork for this expansion which Jim Hill had seen, but the massive popularity of the original HP land persuaded Universal to expand that franchise to their other theme parks, and the plans to takeover the rest of the Lost Continent were shelved.

 

[tommyhawkins]

I’m not wedded to IP-based environments, certainly not as much as Universal itself seems to be. When IoA opened my favourite land was The Lost Continent, which was mostly free of any IP that was still within actual IP rights. But everything that Universal has done since then has been IP-based, either stuff they owned or stuff they paid a fortune to use. Assuming that will be the case for the park in Bedford is not a leap of faith, but a racing certainty.

So if we assume that Universal UK is going to be mostly IP-based, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to discuss the pros and cons of what might be coming. Universal aficionados had until recently mostly dismissed the possibility of Harry Potter forming the basis of one of the lands, for the perfectly rational reason that Warner Bros would not want a major HP presence next door to their very successful Studio Tour. A story in The Sun (a British tabloid newspaper, not always with a reputation for adhering strictly to the facts of the matter) cast doubt on our received wisdom that HP was not a possibility, by suggesting that Universal had recently reached an agreement with Warner Bros. From a commercial point of view I think this makes a compelling story, even if it means there’s less chance of seeing the IP that I’d really want to experience, Lord of The Rings. But does anyone really doubt that HP is anything less than a juggernaut of the IP world, especially in the UK? I’ve not been to Orlando since 2023, but that summer the two HP lands in The Studios and IOA were absolutely rammed, shifting monumental volumes of merchandise, food and beverages, with consistently long queues for all the rides and attractions. I’m sure that’s the case in 2025, and the amount of time visitors are prepared to queue for the new Ministry ride is indicative of the enduring popularity of the IP and Universal’s awesome ability to craft wonderful story-based attractions within that world. Does that mean that HP’s presence will make or break the park in Bedford? No, I don’t think it’s anything like that. But if Universal is able to obtain those rights I think they’d be foolish to ignore the park-visiting public’s desire to immerse themselves in that world. Sitting alongside other massive IPs like the Jurassic franchise, will appeal to the widest possible demographic.

I have a huge mistrust of The Sun, they are known to print lies, repeatedly. However I am more inclined to trust the journalistic integrity of the BBC, and point out that the article below although on the face of it seems quite flimsy "a source" BBC is not in the business of taking someone's word, so I'd expect them to have been at least shown evidence of what they're saying even if they can't physically print it- this is a fairly common practice and a lot of rumours are an iceberg of information where only a tiny portion is revealed to protect a source. So from if the "contracts have been signed" with all those IPs already there, from a commercial point of view what does HP add that the other IPs dont? Especially if they have secured LOTR and if they're having to heavily compensate WB Studios Tour, restrict how much merch they can sell and there's still a risk potential visitors won't come to park and just go to the studio tour/Orlando instead.
I'm just cynical that expectation of a certain thing actually equates to making a huge difference. what I can't wrap my head around is a scenario where LOTR is in the park, and they choose to spend money on Potter too, especially if they then have to spend money devising brand new rides to protect their core audience going to both places. Will it have two similar castles, how would that work?

James Bond and Paddington could star at Universal UK

Lord of the Rings and 007 – but not Harry Potter – are expected at the Bedfordshire theme park.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[xtpower]

I have a huge mistrust of The Sun, they are known to print lies, repeatedly. However I am more inclined to trust the journalistic integrity of the BBC, and point out that the article below although on the face of it seems quite flimsy "a source" BBC is not in the business of taking someone's word, so I'd expect them to have been at least shown evidence of what they're saying even if they can't physically print it- this is a fairly common practice and a lot of rumours are an iceberg of information where only a tiny portion is revealed to protect a source. So from if the "contracts have been signed" with all those IPs already there, from a commercial point of view what does HP add that the other IPs dont? Especially if they have secured LOTR and if they're having to heavily compensate WB Studios Tour, restrict how much merch they can sell and there's still a risk potential visitors won't come to park and just go to the studio tour/Orlando instead.
I'm just cynical that expectation of a certain thing actually equates to making a huge difference. what I can't wrap my head around is a scenario where LOTR is in the park, and they choose to spend money on Potter too, especially if they then have to spend money devising brand new rides to protect their core audience going to both places. Will it have two similar castles, how would that work?

James Bond and Paddington could star at Universal UK

Lord of the Rings and 007 – but not Harry Potter – are expected at the Bedfordshire theme park.

www.bbc.co.uk

I completely agree. Which is why I was quite surprised when so many people accused the BBC of taking rumour and former Theme Park stop videos as sources for their info. That's not and never has been how the BBC acts, they have journalistic integrity and likely corroborated whatever their 'source' told them.

With the Sun I've been trying to keep my eye out for corroboration but I've seen nothing thus far. I've been wanting to ask the more 'in the know' posters here if they've heard wind of The Sun article having weight but couldn't bring myself to doing so.

But then people who actually have an idea of The Sun's reporting accuracy have stated this might be true because it comes from their Showbiz editor or something. So in all mentions of Potter I've specifically stated 'rumoured' just to avoid spending months saying it's happening for The Sun's article to turn out false.

 

[nikem3]

However I am more inclined to trust the journalistic integrity of the BBC, and point out that the article below although on the face of it seems quite flimsy "a source" BBC is not in the business of taking someone's word, so I'd expect them to have been at least shown evidence of what they're saying even if they can't physically print it- this is a fairly common practice and a lot of rumours are an iceberg of information where only a tiny portion is revealed to protect a source.

My only problem with this article is this line: "If you look at Epic Universe, the newest park they're opening in Florida, a lot of those rides are indoors, too," the source said. Not sure how much I trust a source that thinks a lot of the Epic Universe rides are indoors...

 

[rob@rar]

... from a commercial point of view what does HP add that the other IPs dont?

I couldn't give an informed answer to that question, so perhaps the best approach is to look at what Universal have actually done over the last 15 years. They've opened Potter lands in all their parks, at what is likely to have been huge expense if rumours about the commercial terms of their agreements with Warner Bros/JK Rowling are accurate. I doubt there was a sentimental decision to include Potter, they would have been straightforward commercial terms looking at the return on their investment. The development of those lands was done sequentially, so later openings would have been on the basis of proven results. It seems clear to me that Universal believe HP does add something that other IPs don't. I don't think the commercial context for the number of visitors wanting to experience HP attractions has changed significantly since Potter opened in the other parks, so my guess is that Universal will view the commercial desirability of including a HP land in Bedford no differently to how they view the desirability of HP lands in their other theme parks, perhaps more so given that HP is clearly associated with the UK.

As for media coverage, it's perfectly possible that the BBC article and the recent Sun article could both be correct, given that they were published five or six months apart and plans could have changed within that time frame.

 

[marsguo]

I couldn't give an informed answer to that question, so perhaps the best approach is to look at what Universal have actually done over the last 15 years. They've opened Potter lands in all their parks, at what is likely to have been huge expense if rumours about the commercial terms of their agreements with Warner Bros/JK Rowling are accurate. I doubt there was a sentimental decision to include Potter, they would have been straightforward commercial terms looking at the return on their investment. The development of those lands was done sequentially, so later openings would have been on the basis of proven results. It seems clear to me that Universal believe HP does add something that other IPs don't. I don't think the commercial context for the number of visitors wanting to experience HP attractions has changed significantly since Potter opened in the other parks, so my guess is that Universal will view the commercial desirability of including a HP land in Bedford no differently to how they view the desirability of HP lands in their other theme parks, perhaps more so given that HP is clearly associated with the UK.

As for media coverage, it's perfectly possible that the BBC article and the recent Sun article could both be correct, given that they were published five or six months apart and plans could have changed within that time frame.

Is it not just a simple case of - Hogsmede and Forbidden Journey require next to no additional creative development. It's a cheap win. WWHP is in every Universal park because it's a popular IP (obviously brings in guests at scale) AND because they can just work off economies of scale at this point. Is spending 100% more on a LOTR land (which they should do instead) going to get them a Universal Studios that's 100% more popular? Definitely not. So I'd say half the commercial reason HP is in the other parks because they can churn them out, and the licensing costs are minimal compared to the R&D required for new stuff.

And so we come back to the question of - is Universal going to barf out another version of their 20 year old land, or are they going to actually update it for HP's "home" park? If so, if you're spending the money as well as licensing a non-Universal property... Middle Earth's right there. It avoids all of this cannibalization discussion, it avoids the WB Tour politics, and it gives international people a reason to visit this park specifically.

 

[rob@rar]

And so we come back to the question of - is Universal going to barf out another version of their 20 year old land, or are they going to actually update it for HP's "home" park? If so, if you're spending the money as well as licensing a non-Universal property... Middle Earth's right there. It avoids all of this cannibalization discussion, it avoids the WB Tour politics, and it gives international people a reason to visit this park specifically.

Yes, a big and important question. Nobody would be happier than me if the answer was Middle Earth, but if Middle Earth is such a compelling case that it beats out Harry Potter in Harry Potter’s home country, why hasn’t Universal already opened a Middle Earth land? There are rumours that they were considering it as a possible IP a few years ago, and we’ve seen old artwork from Universal Creative that clearly shows LOTR theme park designs have been developed. But Middle Earth doesn’t feature yet in any Universal park, whereas we know how popular HP is. If it were up to me I’d ditch any ideas about BTTF, and build Middle Earth and a unique version of Potter…

We can all happily speculate to our hearts content about what we think Universal is going to do, but I think it’s probably better to consider what they’ve actually done in the last 20 years if we are looking for clues about the future.