Sunset Boulevard

The two marquee attractions at Hollywood Studios [1] are located within yards of each other at the end of Sunset Boulevard, so expect considerable congestion when making your way through the turkey-leg vendors and gift shops along this route. Your persistence will pay off, though, as The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror and the Aerosmith-themed Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster are not just the two best rides at Hollywood Studios, they may be the two best rides on Disney property.

The Tower of Terror puts riders on a ghostly malfunctioning elevator inside the seen-better-days Hollywood Tower Hotel. The theming of this ride is incredibly impressive and detailed down to the last cobweb on the lobby’s registration desk.

While the Twilight Zone references may be lost on some generations of riders, there is a thrill in making your way through the hotel’s 13 floors and then dropping like a stone when your elevator malfunctions, only to be jerked back up when it recovers…only to fall again and again; the drops are randomized, so riders never know when and how often they’ll plummet.

The Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster is an extremely fast indoor coaster that would be a screaming success even without the presence of aging rockers Aerosmith. The combination of the high-volume soundtrack, the 0-to-60-in-3-seconds launch, and a series of high-speed loops and corkscrews, all in neon-flecked darkness, makes for a chart-topping (groan) coaster experience.

For the less thrill-inclined, Sunset Boulevard is also home to Beauty and the Beast — Live on Stage, an extravagant stage production that distills the highlights of the animated film into a half-hour cavalcade of live action, songs, and dance.