Paramount’s Parks

In the early 1990s, something unexpected happened to the theme park industry. After the Disney-MGM Studios (1989) and Universal Studios Florida (1990) paved the way, suddenly operating a theme park required neither the detail of Magic Kingdom nor the brains of EPCOT Center. Instead, studios could build rides in boxy, beige soundstages, “label slap” movie titles on roller coasters, and mash films together on a “backlot,” where inconsistency, exposing lighting rigs, and fourth-wall breaking celebrity appearances were half the fun. Just as Warner Bros. and MGM were building or buying their own parks, Paramount Pictures did, too.

In 1992, Paramount officially purchased the Kings Entertainment Company. By 1993, they’d rolled out their roster of newly-rechristened theme parks… including Paramount’s Kings Dominion.

It’s fair to say the stories of Paramount’s Kings Island, Kings Dominion, Carowinds, Canada’s Wonderland, and Great America during their 20-years under the Paramount name (which, legally, included years nesting the division under Paramount Pictures, Viacom, CBS Corporation, and – no, seriously – Blockbuster Entertainment) are a mix of drama, comedy, action, romance, and horror, all depending on whom you ask.

After all, for a generation of Millennials who grew up around one of the Paramount Parks, there was something sincerely magical about having such a cinematic presence so close to home; a “Universal Lite,” embodied in regional park form. Under Paramount’s brand, these otherwise “lowly,” seasonal parks saw incredible, blockbuster heights.

Who could’ve imagined a little summer park outside of Cincinnati being home to a ride like The Outer Limits: Flight of Fear (above)? Far more than a coaster plopped down on an expansion pad, Flight of Fear cast guests as members of the press, invited into a U.S. Bureau of Paranormal Affairs hangar see a captured alien craft up close, only to be strapped in and launched to The Outer Limits on the world's first LIM-launched coaster.

It's even true of the zippy Italian Job Stunt Track family coaster that launched guests in ¾ scale MINI Coopers, weaving between police cars, racing through helicopter fire, and blasting out of a billboard, to say nothing of the mysterious, immersive, and one-of-a-kind Lost Legend: TOMB RAIDER: The Ride that would still be a headliner if it opened at Universal Orlando today.

It’s really no surprise that the five Paramount Parks entered (and exited) the “Coaster Wars” of the ‘90s and 2000s in very different shape that the beefed-up and overexpanded thrills of Six Flags or Cedar Fair parks. These were – after all – not parks of coaster-packed midways like Cedar Point or the Lost Legend: Six Flags Worlds of Adventure… They were theme parks – imbued with that “After Disney” DNA. To this day, some of the most iconic rides ever were born of Paramount’s leadership… which isn’t to say they always got it right. You can probably see a bit of both in what happened to Paramount’s Kings Dominion’s Safari Village…

The Congo Rises

As you can imagine, one of Paramount’s first edicts upon taking over operation of the newly-rebranded Paramount Parks was to cease operation of the Safari rides at each. It made sense. While Paramount might genuinely envision their new theme parks as revenue generators and brand ambassadors worth investing in, running 100-acre exotic zoos from the ‘70s wouldn’t have been on their shortlist. 

At Kings Island, for example, the remaining “Adventure Village” lasted only a few more years. In 1999, its thatch-roofed huts, wooden outposts, and rainforest foliage were reclad, rebuilt, and uprooted, respectively, becoming the Paramount Action Zone – a sun-drenched concrete studio backlot centered around a Paramount Pictures watertower and a plaza of action movie posters. (The "Stunt Crew Grill" – with the blue roofs on the left – is easily recognizable as the former, thatch-roofed Kafe Kilimanjaro.)

In this distinctly-Paramount “land,” guests became a stunt crew, braving supersaturated all-caps thrill rides (like TOP GUN: The Jet Coaster, a face-to-face inverted Boomerang called FACE/OFF, a record-breaking DROP ZONE Stunt Tower, and the sequel to end all sequels – the Lost Legend: SON OF BEAST.) 

Kings Dominion’s “Safari Village” made a more subtle change. In 1996, it was renamed Congo (an allusion to Paramount’s 1995 film of the same name, which was itself an adaptation of a Michael Crichton novel in the post-Jurassic-Park gold rush to adapt his books). The Congo area still counted Avalanche, Anaconda, and The Lost World among its ride collection (plus a 1996 copy of the U.S. military-base set Flight of Fear… one of many sigh-inducing ride placements made by Paramount.) But that was soon to change…

In 1995, the rides inside of the Lost World (including the fan-favorite Smurf Mountain – a reimagining of the original Land of Dooz) were shuttered. A poster child for Paramount’s occasional game-changing (and largely doomed) bets on big, innovative, custom, blockbuster rides, the Lost World became a construction zone. The iconic mountain was hollowed out and its peak lopped clean off as magenta supports pierced its craggily sides. In 1998 – after much delay – the Lost Legend: VOLCANO – The Blast Coaster opened, launching guests vertically out of the fire-belching mouth of the 150-foot tall mountain and directly into an inversion.

Just like that, the park’s CONGO became its anchor once more. In 2005, the land received a wave of changes in the wake of the studio’s Angelina Jolie action adventure film Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, including strengthening the land’s explorer aesthetic with scattered film props and using the film’s score as ambient music (an unlikely move in an era when most parks played Top 40 hits). But of course, the biggest addition was a new ride.

TOMB RAIDER: FireFall was a HUSS Suspended Top Spin – a standard-sized, thrill-focused. outdoor version of Kings Island’s much larger, indoor, E-Ticket dark ride. But what FireFall lacked in budget, it made up for in theatrics. Cast as an ancient stone altar in the shadow of the Volcano, the flipping thrill ride was embedded in volcanic rockwork and waterfalls, film props, flame effects, fountains, water cannons, and more, all synchronized to its own audio track. In other words, Firefall was an attraction even for those who merely gathered in the outdoor amphitheater to watch its cycle. 

Sure, the very next year, a copy of the Italian Job Turbo Coaster was plopped in an expansion pad technically belonging to the Congo, and if you dared examine Kings Dominion (or any Paramount Park’s) theming with a fine-toothed comb, such one-step-forward, one-step-back additions as the government alien-abduction-themed Flight of Fear or the Los Angeles stunt heist Italian Job pretty quickly make it all fall apart… 

But that may be about to change. Because even though Kings Dominion has lost two of its most iconic thrill rides, the land around them is undergoing its most impressive change yet…