I know there’s not going to be a “Eulogies” thread for Rockit like there is for Jaws, but seeing as I’m not going to get back out there to ride it again before the closing date, I want to pay my respects (because no one else will
).
Around the time Rockit began construction was around the time I became old enough to start hanging out places without parents, so hanging out with friends was a big deal. Growing up in Orlando, going to the parks was just a given—everyone did it. So when looking for places to hang out, the parks were an obvious choice, and given that we were now hardened teenagers by this point, Disney was out of the question.
I remember my first time getting dropped off to hang out at Universal with friends. We had a good time, but being the closeted theme park nerd I am I remember being disappointed…sure, it was a fun time, but the park itself wasn’t what I had remembered from the few visits I’d made every so often when I could convince my parents to deviate from Disney.
While the simulators generally shook you around a little more than Disney’s rides would, it wasn’t really the grown-up hangout spot I had built up in my brain. I remember spending a majority of our time in the Curious George ballpit, because the “thrill rides” were just not super “thrilling.” While Hulk and Dueling Dragons were obviously fun, they weren’t that much more unique (at least layout-wise) than the kinds of roller coasters at the regional parks by grandma’s house.
Nonplussed as I may have been, one thing stood out—the towering red and tan steel looming over the USF park entrance. The lift was vertical, the drop was steep, and it looked huge next to the low-level soundstages surrounding it. The promise of this new ride is what got me excited to come back.
A week or so before school started, a bunch of us were hanging out at CityWalk (probably trying to sneak into an R-rated movie or something, because we were
edgy) and noticed trains climbing the vertical lift from across the lagoon. And they had people in them!
So we went over to scope it out and, sure enough, the ride was in a soft opening. Couldn’t tell you how long we waited, because it didn’t matter; I could not have been more excited. Just looking at it, I could tell this was going to offer a radically different on-ride experience than Hulk or Mummy.
And sure enough, it delivered. The one thing that stood out to me was that this ride offered a first-of-its-kind experience in all of Florida: airtime. It was full of it, the kind you could ONLY get in those rides by grandma’s house. On top of that, it offered a couple of genuinely unique features, specifically the vertical lift and, of course, the customizable music.
All I wanted to do was ride Rockit over and over again, and I did. Not just that night, but in every subsequent visit to come. When we went to HHN (yeah I was one of the annoying teenagers you guys hate), I spent more time on Rockit than in houses. It was not possible for me to slam into the final brake run without a massive smile on my face and an itch to get back on asap.
But it wasn’t just the ride experience that set Rockit apart for me. The whole aesthetic was perfectly in line with who I was at the time, loitering at Universal without my parents. The queue didn’t waste space with lame theming from cartoons or old movies…it just let you watch music video clips (from artists like Kanye and Crystal Method no less!) while playing an irreverent version of the tried and true safety spiel you heard everywhere else at the time. While hokey now, the paint splash aesthetic was so different from what Disney and Universal were doing at the time that it just clicked. It aligned perfectly with the version of Universal that I wanted when I first got that Annual Pass.
I also think that the loudness of the queue and visual intrusion of the track is what people focus on when they call the ride an eyesore; however, I’d argue that, visually, the ride actually did a lot right. I think people forget that Rockit’s opening was synonymous with the Music Plaza Stage, with its imposing structure and astroturf patches being a huge upgrade from the Boneyard that had come before it. Further, the ride’s last stretch into Citywalk gave UO an excuse to beautify the path leading up to BMG, replacing slabs of concrete with lush green grass. And to top it all off, regardless of your opinion on visible coaster track, you can’t deny that the vertical lift towering over CityWalk’s lagoon, the Hard Rock, the globe, etc., is iconic.
Over the years I lost interest in going to the parks. You get a car, you talk to girls, you taste booze for the first time, you lose interest in this stuff. Sure, Harry Potter was added to IOA but in its earnestness in portraying a series of children’s fantasy novels, it just came off sort of cheesy to me at the time. Things like Springfield, Minions, etc. just didn’t align with my tastes anymore, and the parks became goofy to me…
…with the exception of Rockit. The few times I’d find myself back playing in the park, Rockit still felt “cool,” precisely because it wasn’t trying too hard. The secret song list also gave it so much longevity; over those years I went through a Modest Mouse phase, a Queens of the Stone Age phase, a Kanye phase…and Rockit fit right into those memories seamlessly.
Now I’m a lame old man and see Rockit for what it is. I still like the layout more than most, but can admit it is bumpy and has lost a lot of its luster. The millennial aesthetic hasn’t aged well and the new song list is even worse. I’m excited to see what a post-Velocicoaster Universal can do with the space.
But that doesn’t mean I won’t miss it. Maybe my affinity for Rockit is unique to me because it opened at just the right time for me. Maybe I just value different things in my theme park experiences. But either way, I will very much miss not only the Rockit, but the time of my life with which I’ll always associate it.