The Future That Never Was: Get a Look at Doug Chiang's Sketches for Disneyland's Scrapped Star Wars Tomorrowland Retheme

While Disneyland’s home for a galaxy far, far away now lies in the over $1 billion land Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, it was not the first idea to bring a Star Wars land to the park. In the new art book Doug Chiang: The Cinematic Legacy, we got a look at what a Star Wars retheme of Tomorrowland could have looked like.

What’s Happening:

• Starting in 1987 with Disneyland's Star Tours, Star Wars has become an integral part of the Disney Parks experience around the world. 
• The Lucasfilm sci-fi series has become synonymous with the incredible experiences found at the Happiest Place on Earth. 
• While many of those experiences originally found themselves available from the eventual retheme to Star Tours: The Adventures Continue and limited-time celebrations and offerings, a permanent home for the Star Wars franchise had long been rumored to be in the works at Disney. 
• At D23 2015, the hope became reality when Disney unveiled their plans for a new Star Wars themed land that would be headed to Disneyland and Walt Disney World’s Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
• Officially opening in 2019, Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge is one of Disney’s most ambitious theme park projects to date, welcoming fans to Batuu for adventures alongside their favorite characters. 
• However, this was far from the first idea for Star Wars at Disneyland. 
• Thanks to the new book Doug Chiang: The Cinematic Legacy, fans can check out a look at one of the initial ideas for Star Wars: a Tomorrowland retheme. 
• Doug Chiang, who serves as the Senior Vice President & Executive Design Director at Lucasfilm was integral to the design of Galaxy’s Edge as well as its earlier iterations.
• In the new book, Chiang talks about the challenges of transforming the buildings and pre-existing footprint of Tomorrowland. 
• He shared “I started by designing classic Star Wars shapes and integrated them into the existing buildings of Tomorrowland. Since we could not change the footprint or alter the structural components of the buildings, I focused on resurfacing the buildings by placing iconic spaceships on rooftops and redesigning the facades. The aim was primarily on reworking the surfaces to evoke the visual design of Star Wars as much as possible.”

• What’s so interesting about the designs is the lack of PeopleMover track, which, as much as there is only a sliver of hope Disney will bring that attraction back, would have been a sad loss. 
• The project also incorporated Space Mountain and its nearby Pizza Planet (formerly Pizza Port) restaurant. 

• The shared sketches show a potential retheme for the quick service restaurant that was inspired by the fun of droids. 
• While, in an ideal world, the droid would float, Chiang designed a walk around waiter droid that would’ve been able to traverse through the restaurant. 

• Chiang worked hard to find inspiration to make Star Wars Tomorrowland a possibility, sharing “Most of my initial sketches were primarily about finding inspiration, trying to see if it could work. It was very challenging, because the buildings and restaurants were very specific, and it was tough to reconfigure them into Star Wars.”
• As Disney and Lucasfilm began working towards the sequel trilogy, the idea would eventually be scrapped for the 14-acre Galaxy’s Edge lands, but it’s so cool to see “what could’ve been.”
• Now, hopefully, a more faithful refresh of Tomorrowland is on the horizon, as Disneyland’s version of the land is in desperate need of an update. 
• Doug Chiang: The Cinematic Legacy is available now!

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