The Most Exciting Upcoming Theme Park Rides Under Construction

Despite months and even years of delays and closures forced by the pandemic, the world's theme parks are bouncing back to their old selves. Most of the industry's major companies opened at least one new ride in 2021, and many announced new attractions coming as soon as early 2022.

The theme park industry's biggest players — Disney and Comcast's Universal parks — opened several new rides at their parks around the world, while at the same time hyping up a bunch of new attractions currently under construction. The most anticipated Disney park attractions coming soon include the TRON Lightcycle Run at Magic Kingdom and the Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind coaster at Epcot — both in Florida. While Universal boasted the debuts of Super Nintendo World and the Jurassic World VelociCoaster in 2021, one of the most exciting upcoming attractions is its expansion of the Mario-themed land to include a Donkey Kong area.

Six Flags also has several new rides opening soon at its parks in Texas and California, and all of SeaWorld Entertainment's major parks are looking forward to at least one new ride — from Busch Gardens Tampa Bay's Iron Gwazi to SeaWorld San Diego's Emperor coaster. Legoland Florida will also welcome a sister park when the Peppa Pig Theme Park debuts right next door in February 2022 in Winter Haven, Florida.

From roller coasters themed after penguins and "John Wick" to a recreation of "Frozen's" Arendelle, here are the most exciting upcoming theme park rides under construction, all over the world.

Super Nintendo World just opened at Universal Studios Japan in 2021, but the park is already expanding the immersive area to include another beloved video game franchise — "Donkey Kong." 

Expected to open in 2024, the Donkey Kong area of Super Nintendo World is set to include a roller coaster, interactive attractions and more themed merchandise and food. When the expansion was announced, Nintendo said the land will also recreate "the lush jungles where Donkey Kong and his friends live." Images released by Nintendo tease that guests will access the Donkey Kong area of the park via a large round door that currently sits inside the Mario-themed area of Super Nintendo World. By adding Donkey Kong to the park's video game mix, Super Nintendo World's size will increase by about 70%. 

While the ride's official name and other details have yet to be announced, concept art released by Universal Studios Japan and Nintendo (pictured above) shows the coaster's possible track closely resembling the legendary video game's mine cart levels. 

The "Donkey Kong" franchise launched in 1981 with an arcade game and has since sold more than 65 million units. The land expansion adds even more immersive, interactive entertainment to Super Nintendo World, which is currently almost entirely themed after Mario's Mushroom Kingdom and includes a Mario Kart simulator and the leisurely Yoshi's Adventure ride.

One of prettiest coasters at the Disney parks is the TRON Lightcycle/Run, a semi-enclosed steel roller coaster that lets riders hop on their own futuristic motorbike to zoom around The Grid. The ride first debuted at Shanghai Disneyland in 2016, and a second iteration of the coaster is expected to open at Magic Kingdom in Florida in 2022.

The Magic Kingdom "TRON" coaster was announced back in 2017 at Disney's D23 Expo, and theme park fans have been closely following updates and construction photos ever since. It was originally set to open in 2021 but was postponed to 2022 due to delays caused by the pandemic. But when it does open in the Tomorrowland area of Magic Kingdom, the TRON Lightcycle/Run will bring Disney's fastest roller coaster to the U.S. with speeds hitting over 60 mph.

The coaster is inspired by the "Tron: Legacy" series and features a color-changing canopy and two-wheeled ride vehicles that get "powered up" by character Sam Flynn's identity disk in order to launch riders into The Grid. The launch platform and areas underneath the glowing canopy are highly immersive, simulating the pixelated experience of being digitized into a "TRON" character. 

Back before the pandemic took hold, 2020 and 2021 were expected to be banner years for SeaWorld Entertainment, as most of its major parks were building new roller coasters. At SeaWorld Orlando, that new coaster is Ice Breaker, now set to open in February 2022.

The ride, with its bright orange track atop teal support beams, has top speeds of up to 52 mph with four launches both backward and forward. The last is a reverse launch surging riders upward 93 feet before plunging them into a beyond-vertical drop at a 100-degree angle. The drop will be the steepest in Florida. But, SeaWorld doesn't want the thrills to scare off younger riders, as the coaster's height requirement is just 48 inches. 

As for the coaster's icy theming, SeaWorld partnered with Alaska SeaLife Center to bring awareness and education about the wildlife and environment of the Arctic. Ice Breaker is also located right next SeaWorld's iconic Wild Arctic simulator ride, as well as the area of the park housing Arctic animals like beluga whales and walruses.

More than two years after it was announced, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay's newest roller coaster Iron Gwazi will finally open in March 2022. With a bright purple steel track on wooden support scaffolding and beams, Iron Gwazi is set to be a beast of a hybrid coaster — the world's fastest and steepest. 

Making it more unique is the fact that the ride is built from some of the remnants of the park's last Gwazi — a wooden dual coaster that was infamous for its height, speeds and bumpy, headache-inducing thrills. The original Gwazi closed in 2015, leaving behind a wooden skeleton and a large swath of the Tampa park to use for annual festivals and events.

Iron Gwazi boasts top speeds of 76 mph, a 206-foot-tall peak and a 91-degree drop. Busch Gardens said the coaster gives riders a dozen airtime moments and three inversions along its more than 4,000 feet of track. As for the theming, Iron Gwazi takes inspiration from the African safari-themed park's crocodiles, with bright green ride vehicles with a croc's head as the front car.

Six Flags' park in Valencia, Calif. is set to open the world's tallest and longest single-rail roller coaster when Wonder Woman Flight of Courage makes its debut in summer 2022.

The coaster has a top height of 13 stories and flies up to 58 mph along more than 3,300 feet of track. The Raptor-track single-file steel coaster from Rocky Mountain Construction is similar in style to the Wonder Woman Golden Lasso coaster at Six Flags Fiesta Texas, the Jersey Devil coaster at Six Flags Great Adventure and the Stunt Pilot coaster at Idaho's Silverwood park. With the opening of Wonder Woman Flight of Courage, Six Flags Magic Mountain will break the record for the highest number of coasters at one theme park with 20.

Themed after the strength and speed of Wonder Woman, the DC- and Amazonian-themed coaster is said to immerse riders "in the story of her life and how she obtained her super powers" with an immersive queue of Greek architecture and tropical landscaping. Then, on the track, riders will soar through banks, rolls, quick turns and dives. 

Wonder Woman Flight of Courage is part of the park's revamped DC Universe area, which includes new restaurants, shops and the popular Batman The Ride attraction. 

Like SeaWorld San Diego, Six Flags Fiesta Texas is also getting a new record-breaking dive coaster from manufacturer Bolliger & Mabillard. Dr. Diabolical's Cliffhanger — expected to be the world's steepest dive coaster — is set to open in 2022.

The coaster is themed after fictional Dr. Diabolical, an immortal character who lures visitors to use her new thrill machine in order to harvest their adrenaline and fear. The ride has three 21-passenger vehicles that surge riders 150 feet up, "lock them in a face-first Cliffhanger hold" and then plunge them down a 95-degree drop at 60 mph. The coaster also includes an epic Immelmann inversion, a 270-degree zero-g roll, a 75-foot near-vertical drop, an intense bank turn and airtime hill and a speedy spiral finale.

Similar to SeaWorld's new Emperor coaster and Busch Gardens Tampa Bay's famous SheiKra coaster, Dr. Diabolical's Cliffhanger is floorless — making for more intense, thrilling freefall-like drops.

The Sony Pictures-owned "Jumanji" franchise is finally getting its own theme park ride — and it's coming to Italy's Gardaland park.

Gardaland described Jumanji: The Adventure as an indoor dark ride where riders hop in a 4x4 open-top off-road safari vehicle to journey through a jungle full of "dangerous animals, falling obstacles and a mighty stone giant." The goal is to return a scared jewel back to its proper shrine home in order to break the curse and save the land of Jumanji.

In their announcement in September 2021, Sony said the ride expands on the adventurous world created by all the films — the original from 1995 starring Robin Williams, as well as the Rock/Kevin Hart-fueled spinoffs from 2017 and 2019. In late October 2021, the first stone was laid at the ride's construction site with help from cosplayers dressed up as some of the character from the films. In November 2021, the tracks arrived to create the ride's railroad, linking the attraction's dozen different scenes.