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A new documentary that delves into filmmakers and their associated theme park projects is streaming now on Disney+.
Disney Worldbuilders uses interviews and file footage to go behind the scenes and into the childhoods of a set of storytellers.
The 60-minute film, directed by Leslie Iwerks, starts with former Walt Disney CEO Bob Iger strolling up Main Street at the original Disneyland in California, and wraps up with Iger on the beach in Abu Dhabi, the site of the company’s next major park.

There is a global emphasis in “Worldbuilders”, so it is a little light on Walt Disney World, though certain attractions such as Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and Pirates of the Caribbean translate well across properties.
Like many of the filmmakers, Pete Docter made childhood sojourns to Disneyland, and they were big influences.
“To this day, I think Pirates [of the Caribbean] is the best ride,” he says. “I just remember feeling as though I had gone into a dream. It’s just such great storytelling. You go in, you fall asleep, you’ve experienced this whole thing and you come up and you wake up out of it and you’re just ‘What just happened?’ It’s magic.”
Docter is now chief creative officer of Pixar Animation Studios and one of the forces behind Toy Story (1995), Monsters, Inc (2001) and Inside Out (2015). Monsters, Inc is getting the park treatment at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida.
In the documentary, Docter recalls conceptualising the door factory concept for the film.
“It literally was like 30 seconds until we were like ‘That would make a great theme park attraction,’” he says. “And for one reason or another – whether the technology wasn’t there or the budget wasn’t quite right – it kept getting postponed. So it’s very exciting now that they’re finally building it.”


Nostalgia and sentimentality are peppered through Worldbuilders, but it gets especially emotional as cameras follow Jennifer Lee, co-director of Frozen and Frozen 2, into the World of Frozen at Disneyland Paris for the first time. It opened in March, almost three years after the first edition landed in Hong Kong Disneyland in late 2023.
Jared Bush, chief creative officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios, recalls his first reaction to the Zootopia land at Shanghai Disneyland.
“I literally bawled my eyes out,” Bush tells Iger in the documentary.
Bush was a writer on Moana (2016), which now has a presence in Epcot in Florida, and directed Encanto (2021), which is getting an attraction in the under-construction Tropical Americas section of Disney’s Animal Kingdom in Florida.
“For me, seeing all those come to life is incredible and staggering and surreal,” Bush says.
I love what the Imagineers do and what they build and how they build it
Dave Filoni
Lucasfilm president Dave Filoni says Disney’s acquisition of it immediately led to speculation about Star Wars in theme parks.
“I think the difficult thing was narrowing it down to what you could actually do,” he says.
Filoni and movie director Jon Favreau were asked to help update the Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run attraction.
“I love what the Imagineers do and what they build and how they build it,” Filoni says. “It’s just this awesome process of creating this adventure. It’s such an impressive machine, the way that ride functions.”
Filoni says when he is in the park, it is usually with Favreau.
“We ride stuff together. We always come out of it excited, especially if we’re shooting,” Filoni says. “Because we see the love the people have. We’re like, ‘Alright, we need to get back to work now. We need to give them something great.’”

A segment features Kevin Feige, president of Marvel Studios. Viewers will see run-throughs of an attraction for Avengers Campus.
“This attraction will take people on a tour throughout the universe,” Feige says. “We are going to move from environment to environment, from screen to screen.
“The Imagineers who mock this up in Glendale [California] sit you in a rolling chair and will push you around a version of the track, and you’ve got your 3D glasses, and you look at the screen, and what’s astounding is the point of view of the screen moves with you depending on where you’re looking. Even on my rolling chair in Glendale, it looked amazing,” he says.
“I do believe we have only scratched the surface of what can be done with our characters and with our worlds in the parks,” Feige adds as the film images show Epcot’s Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, Iron Man Experience at Hong Kong Disneyland and Marvel attractions at Disneyland Paris. (A new feature in Toy Story Land and a Marvel-themed expansion at Hong Kong Disneyland were announced at D23, a large Disney fan convention that took place in Anaheim, California, from August 14 to 16, 2026.)
“There are so many details within a land,” Feige says. “My favourite detail in a land is a construction wall because a construction wall means more is coming … the adventure continues.”


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Disney Worldbuilders documentary captures ‘magic’ of turning films into theme park lands

Guests walk past Cinderella Castle at the Magic Kingdom in Walt Disney World in Florida on April 2, 2025. Photo: TNS

Former Walt Disney CEO Bob Iger features in the new Disney+ documentary Worldbuilders. Photo: Disney/dpa

Pixar chief creative officer Pete Docter recalls how childhood visits to Disneyland inspired him in Worldbuilders. Photo: Disney/dpa

Jennifer Lee, chief creative officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios, in Hong Kong Disneyland for the world’s first Frozen-themed area, World of Frozen, in November 2023. Photo: Edmond So

Filmmaker Jon Favreau was asked to help update Disney’s Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run attraction. Photo: Disney/dpa

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Chandler and his wife, Kathryn, attend the Los Angeles premiere of Lanterns at Paramount Theatre on August 13, 2026. Photo: Getty Images via AFP

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New Disney+ film interviews masterminds behind Frozen and more to show how on-screen tales are adapted at Disneylands from Hong Kong to Paris


New Disney+ film interviews masterminds behind Frozen and more to show how on-screen tales are adapted at Disneylands from Hong Kong to Paris.


Disney+

Hong Kong Disneyland Resort

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Marvel

Disney Worldbuilders documentary captures ‘magic’ of turning films into theme park lands

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}New Disney+ film interviews masterminds behind Frozen and more to show how on-screen tales are adapted at Disneylands from Hong Kong to Paris

New Disney+ film interviews masterminds behind Frozen and more to show how on-screen tales are adapted at Disneylands from Hong Kong to Paris