Welcome to Universal Studios Hollywood, the entertainment capital of Los Angeles.  Halloween is over and Christmas is just beginning to trickle into the park.  You have to look carefully to find it but it’s there.  The stores have been stocked with cheery merchandise while the twinkling lights very subtly adorn the trim of many structures in the park now.  The next big thing to be hitting the park is, of course, The Wizarding World of Harry Potter. We have plenty of pictures including a virtual tour of the land, for you to enjoy. We also have pics of plenty of off-season construction happening throughout the park including the front gates, The Special Effects stage show, and the Universal Experience in the lower lot.  Let’s get straight to the pics shall we?

Christmas Creep

Despite the fact that Halloween Horror Nights was stretched out longer than it had ever been (through Nov. 7th) Christmas is finally hitting the park.  The merchandise locations are the first to see the change in the park with decorations following right behind it.

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Around the park, decorations are beginning to pop up.

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They have wrapped the trees in the Shrek 4D queue with lights.

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The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

Here we see that The Wizarding World of Harry Potter is pretty much finished and the attractions are already cycling.  It’s all about the details people, what we can see is simply amazing.

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The Flight of the Hippogriff is already cycling.

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Universal also launched a virtual tour of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter.  Here guests can see the full listing of things to come to this new land.  Visitors to the site can also sign up for updates as they are released.

Construction Walls

Right after the last chainsaw was shut off for Halloween the construction walls went up on a number of projects.

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At the front gate, we see that work has begun on refurbishing the turnstiles starting with the right side.
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From the inside of the park.

Looking down the main entry plaza we can see that as the new retail and food locations are being constructed to the left, they have also closed the Hollywood Grill location on the right, creating a temporary bottleneck.

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On this visit we found that they have the also put the Special Effects Stage behind walls.

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On the lower lot they are overhauling the Universal Experience building.

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Along the Studio Tour route there is quite a bit of upkeep happening. That coupled with a total of 10 T.V. and Film projects being shot out there this week makes the Studio Tour pretty interesting.

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In one “celebrity” sighting, Kris Jenner was seen in the backlot shooting a commercial.

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Do any of you know who that is in the gold jacket?
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Never gets old.
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Earthquake was down for refurbishment.

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At the Whoville set, crews were frantically prepping the area for Grinchmas.  They always do a cute little live stage show here along the route.  They don’t have to, but it’s a fun little touch that really brings magic to the season.

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Opposite the Whoville set, a wall is being constructed.

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Directly opposite the Bates Motel set the construction on the warehouses is finally complete.

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Even with multiple things closed and behind construction walls, now is a very good time to visit Universal Studios. Crowds are low and the weather is great here in sunny Southern California.

That finishes up our coverage of Universal Studios Hollywood and all of the new and exciting things coming to this world class theme park and movie studio. You can look forward to more Potter, more Grinchmas and more of everything from us soon. 2016 is setting up to be a phenomenal time for theme park fans.

See you In The Parks

Norman Gidney
Norman Gidney, also known as Fishbulb, has produced and edited many of the articles on MiceChat over the years.