Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster Starring The Muppets opens with a new Audio-Animatronic cast
Disney’s Hollywood Studios reopened its reimagined launch coaster on May 26, swapping the long-running Aerosmith theme for the Muppets and adding several new Audio-Animatronic figures. The centerpiece is a Scooter figure that hosts a recording-studio pre-show, programmed to change with the ride’s dispatch cycle so guests boarding on different cycles see slightly different beats.
The pre-show also adds penguin figures cast as the studio’s audio engineers. At the unload area, Disney relocated the Statler and Waldorf figures that used to heckle audiences from the balcony box at Muppet*Vision 3D, which closed in June 2025. The two hecklers were unbolted from their old theater seats and reinstalled inside an RV camper at the ride exit, where they deliver a closing insult to departing riders.
The reuse of the Statler and Waldorf hardware is a concrete example of Imagineering recycling existing figures rather than fabricating new ones, and it ties the new attraction to the shuttered 3D theater a short walk away.