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SIX FLAGS MAGIC MOUNTAIN
& Six Flags Hurricane Harbor
Valencia, California
Six Flags Theme Parks
Read Screamscape’s Official Review of WONDER WOMAN: FLIGHT OF COURAGE (2022)
Read Screamscape’s Official Review of WEST COAST RACERS (2020)
 Park News - (6/5/2023) Good news from Six Flags Magic Mountain today, as it was just reported that for the first time in years, the park has finally reopened the Roaring Rapids attraction.
(5/26/2023) In the announcement that the new Quick 6 grab-and-go store was opening at Six Flags Great Adventure in New Jersey, it was mentioned that a second Quick 6 store will also be coming to Six Flags Magic Mountain. According to a new update at Blooloop the Quick 6 in the California theme park will be located near the main gate and like the east coast version, will be powered by Amazon’s “frictionless payment technology” that lets shoppers literally grab and go after scanning a code upon entering the Coca-Cola sponsored store on your mobile device.
(5/17/2023) Six Flags Magic Mountain has confirmed that their Hurricane Harbor waterpark will officially open for the 2023 season on May 27th. Six Flags Magic Mountain itself will return to daily operations as well by then and kick off the summer season with the Viva Le Fiesta (weekends now through June 11) and Flavors of the World (Fri, Sat and Sundays, June 16 - Aug. 13) celebrations.
(4/29/2023) Six Flags Magic Mountain may not be building a new roller coaster this year, but the California theme park has announced a rather epic new project is going to begin construction. According to the press release Six Flags has confirmed in a partnership with Solar Optimum and DSD Renewables, a plan to install a massive 12.37-megawatt solar energy carport and energy storage system at the Six Flags Magic Mountain theme park. “Six Flags Magic Mountain will be home to the largest single-site commercial solar energy project in California and largest for any for-profit organization in the world.”
If you have ever been to Six Flags Magic Mountain you know just how brutally HOT it can get as the sun beats down on the California park, so building a solar farm on top of a carport structure in the main parking lot does make a lot of sense. The system will feature a battery storage system able to produce “1.958 megawatts of power, with 7,886.3 kilowatt hours of capacity that can be deployed daily”, producing 20.8 million kilowatt hours of energy annually. This is the equivalent to the power consumption of 2,874 homes and 1.79 million smartphones charged. The end result is that “The park will be able to offset 100% of its energy usage with solar power”.
This is not the first attempt at Six Flags to set up a solar farm at their theme parks. The first project saw a group of smaller carport systems installed across various lots at the Six Flags Great Adventure property in New Jersey and then a larger carport system installed over the guest lot at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in central California.
(4/22/2023) Good news from Six Flags Magic Mountain. A source tells us that an assortment of refurbished Roaring Rapids rafts have been spotted in the overflow parking lot. Other postings online claim that the park’s rapids attraction is expected to begin testing in the next week or two’s time, ahead of an expected reopening to guests in time for Memorial Day weekend if all goes well. Stay tuned!
(2/24/2023) Six Flags Magic Mountain has announced a new Spring Break festival that will include an After-Hours Haunt Event and an all new Food Festival. “New and exciting Spring Break events for daily operations from March 9 through April 16. The theme park brings Spring Break to life with thrills and chills for guests all of ages, including the introduction of a unique after-hours haunt event, Scream Break, and an all-new Tacos & Beer Fest.”
The new “Scream Break” after-hours event will require a special ticket purchase and run from 9pm to midnight on select nights between March 18 and April 16 and feature some haunted houses as well as unlimited rides on Wonder Woman, Full Throttle, Goliath, Batman, Twisted Colossus and Scream, along with dancing and DJs in DC Universe and Full Throttle Plaza.
“The all-new Tacos & Beer Fest provides foodie-lovers even more culinary delights, with an assortment of specialty tacos, exclusive desserts, and unique beverages, daily from March 9 through April 16. With the purchase of a Tacos & Beer Fest Tasting Pass, guests can enjoy a taste of thrills with new offerings including some delicious specialties”.
For those visiting during the regular Spring Break days (Monday-Thursdays, May 13 through April 16) select rides will offer “Double Ride Days” for back-to-back thrills on Goliath, Batman, Scream and Riddler’s Revenge. Other features will include Double Foodie Fun (double size burgers, ice-cream and more), Double the Merch deals, the 20th anniversary of Scream and 23rd anniversary of Goliath, and more.
(2/23/2023) Good news for Six Flags Magic Mountain… as a video clip has been posted showing that the park’s Magic Mover is still up and running after all. According to one source, the funicular’s entry on the website may have been removed when they removed the Honda branded version of the name from the website, and was possibly never restored as just the “Magic Mover”.
I’m dating myself, but many MANY years ago the park had numerous forms of transportation that would move guests from the lower levels of the park up to the top of the mountain. This included the old Eagle’s Flight aerial gondola ride (Von Roll) and the Dragon, a slow-moving cable-car attraction that took vehicles from the bottom of the mountain from a station located near Gold Rusher up up the mountain to the upper station which was re-purposed for use for the Ninja roller coaster. Today only the Magic Mover (formerly Orient Express) remains in service.
(2/19/2023) While Six Flags Magic Mountain has just renamed the park’s funicular ride up and down the mountain as “Magic Mover” just last year, the attraction is now no longer listed on the park’s website at all. The park could be planning on removing it entirely, or they’ve just shut it down for a very long-term closure and no longer want it listed on the site or app to confuse guests about the transportation option up and down the mountain. Time will tell.
Formerly the ‘Magic Mover’ has been given a sponsorship based name for the past few years, where it was known as the “Helpful Honda Express” but long-time guests will always remember it as the Orient Express.
(1/28/2023) Would you believe that people actually were spotted back inside the Skytower at Six Flags Magic Mountain this week? Unfortunately the tower is still not open to theme park’s guests, and to be honest, I can’t remember the last time I’ve even heard of it being open to guests in years. Instead, what happened is that first responders with the local Sheriff and Fire Departments gathered at Magic Mountain to participate in the “Sky Tower Challenge” where they held a competition to see who could reach the top of the tower in the fastest time. No elevators… they did this the old fashioned way and climbed the stairs to reach the top of the 385 foot tower.
(1/22/2023) It’s no secret that Six Flags Magic Mountain has been having some issues in terms of getting their coaster fleet running. Reports of coasters being closed entirely and others open with only one-train operations have been the unfortunate norm since late 2022. The good news is that X2 has opened once again, which was confirmed by a reader who visited the park on Saturday, and elsewhere I did hear an unverified report that Viper may have also opened again.
The list of major rides still thought to currently be closed include Goliath, Riddler’s Revenge, and Superman, along with the expected winter closure of the water rides and the Buccaneer swing ship.
(1/7/2023) This is just a rumor, but according to some whispers going around the park, some are saying that Roaring Rapids at Six Flags Magic Mountain may be closed for good. From what I’ve heard, it may have opened for a time in 2021 after the park first reopened following the state-wide shutdown of all theme parks in 2020, but apparently it failed to open entirely during 2022. Now according to those quiet rumors, they say that during the 2021/2022 winter refurbishment time, it was determined that Roaring Rapids was in need of some expensive repairs. Repairs that never happened… so it never opened. So now the voices are worried the rapids are gone for good combined with the spotting of the paint markings along the pathway nearby. (After seeing a few pictures, these appear to be markings showing off the locations of water and electric lines next to and under the pathway and likely just indicative of simple utility repairs or upgrades in the area and nothing more…)
Now I’m not going to say that the rumors are right or wrong completely, but there are a number of other factors that have been causing problems industry-wide over the past year or two that could very much be at play here. For starters, water rides just aren’t as popular as they once were, and chain wide, Six Flags has been cutting back on the operations schedule of rides like these for the past several years, limiting them to a few weeks of summer use only in many cases.
Water rides also have very intense maintenance requirements, and as one of the two oldest operating rapids rides in the world (Roaring Rapids and Congo Rapids at Six Flags Great Adventure both opened in 1981) these rides feature parts that are no longer common or easy to obtain due to their older design. Supply chain issues are still ongoing, especially in the amusement industry, as many parks around the world have been forced to keep select rides closed for long periods of time as they encounter parts they need to make repairs being put on back-order. So mix the limited operations schedule with a ride very likely to have parts on backorder, and you end up with a park unable to even get the parts they need from Intamin until after the warm summer season has long since past. If you need another example of another ride in SoCal that has been waiting on parts from Intamin for a very long time, look no further than Xcelerator at Knott’s Berry Farm.
Staffing has also been an issue at all theme parks over the past couple years, and rapids rides in general require a fairly large staff to operate. It isn’t hard to imagine that by keeping Roaring Rapids closed, the park could easily staff two other major attractions instead. Now add in the general industry trend that has seen Six Flags and many other theme park chains start to close and remove all their 1980’s era water rides, especially those that really soak riders to the bone.
So do I think Roaring Rapids is gone for good? Not necessarily… keep in mind that the park closed the Log Jammer about 10 years ago to open Full Throttle, and then remember that they just removed Tidal Wave to open 2022’s Wonder Woman coaster. Even if they intend to close the Rapids, it may be a bit much to do so so close to the park’s removal of Tidal Wave, which would leave only the aging Jet Stream flume ride as their last remaining water ride. Roaring Rapids is also in an interesting location, high on the hillside, completely out of sight unless you’re riding Tatsu, so we aren’t likely to see any demolition take place until they are ready to build something new on this site. Currently the rapids are still visible on the app and park map, so until they decide to remove it from there, I think it may be too soon to say that the plug has been pulled just yet.
(12/22/2022) Based on a few new reports, the coaster status condition is improving slightly at Six Flags Magic Mountain. Superman is said to have re-opened, as well as Scream, but unfortunately this means Riddler’s Revenge, Goliath and Full Throttle are closed, through we did get reports that Full Throttle was spotted testing.
I’m not entirely sure of what is going on withh Full Throttle, as I had previously heard it was closing for some annual maintenance for the rest of the year. Why they didn’t wait until after New Year’s is beyond me, but that’s what we were told. Beyond that, a few other coasters that have been more temperamental as of late are also said to currently be open again, so hopefully the situation will continue to improve as we move into the holiday season.
(11/26/2022) I have to say that I wouldn’t want to be at Six Flags Magic Mountain today. Taking a quick look at the Six Flags app, right now the park has the following major rides listed as being closed: Full Throttle, Goliath, Jet Stream, Justice League, Ninja, Scream, Superman: Escape from Krypton, Riddler’s Revenge, Twisted Colossus, on top of Roaring Rapids which is “closed for the season”.
That is seven (7) major roller coasters closed currently today along with the park’s popular dark ride. Not counting the four kiddie coasters in the park, that only leaves 9 of the major coasters open at the moment, which is no going to go over well for those who opted to visit on this holiday weekend. Checking in the later part of the day, it looks like Justice League, Ninja and Superman did eventually reopen, but then Wonder Woman closed, so clearly there are some issues going on right now.
Speaking of closures however, Screamscape sources also tell us that internally, both Scream and Riddler’s Revenge are being listed as being closed “indefinitely”. The problem? Both are rumored to have blown their lift motors. Making the problem worse… replacement motors are on backorder, and we’re being told that the park’s budget is only allowing for one to be purchased at the present time.
Oh boy… not good news indeed if this proved to be true. I’d start making calls to see if any of the other Six Flags parks happen to have a spare sitting around that they can borrow… but I’d guessing they may have already gone that route and can up empty handed by now. So the sad news is that only one of these coasters is likely to get up and running by the first part of 2023, and the other will have to sit closed until they can get approved for the necessary budget for a second motor, and then wait for the backorder issue again. In a perfect world, you would like to think that a park like SFMM, that promotes itself as having 20 roller coasters, the most of any park on the planet, would have a maintenance budget able to handle needs like these.
(11/18/22) Six Flags Magic Mountain has revealed details about the park’s Holiday in the Park event to take place on select days from Nov. 24th through to Jan. 1st, 2023. “Beginning at 5:00pm, the magic of the season takes over as the park transforms into a dazzling winter wonderland with more than two million twinkling lights amidst a thrilling collection of world-class coasters and family attractions. The new Holiday Market offers additional merriment including holiday shopping, a nook for kids to write letters to Santa and more. From coasters to cocoa, it’s a holiday spectacular for all to enjoy!”
New this year will be the North Pole area in Whistlestop Park, featuring Santa, Mrs, Claus and the elves. Elsewhere in the park look for the light show of Arctic Alley near Viper, the Jingle Bell Way walk-through ornaments in DC Universe, the lights and open fire-puts of Glacier Point in Metropolis, plus Polar Bear Pass in the Golden Bear Plaza. Other features this year will include the “HollyRock!” time-traveling musical show, the Peppermint Path, Gleampunk District, Holiday Square, Snowy Nights themed areas, plus don’t forget an assortment of special holiday treats and meals to enjoy.
(11/6/22) For anyone visiting Six Flags Magic Mountain, I’m told that Goliath is now closed and while the app makes it look like your typical brief closure, the word going around internally is that Goliath may stay closed through to at least Spring 2023. I know earlier this year there was talk about shutting it down for a very overdue repaint and refurb, so perhaps it is finally time as outsourcing any parts for the Giovanola made coaster isn’t easy to do. Keep your eyes open to see if they bring the crew who repainted Tatsu last year back to tackle Goliath.
In other news, we did hear that a number of major rides were closed on Friday, including Jet Stream, Scream, Superman, Ninja, Riddler’s Revenge and of course Roaring Rapids that is already listed as being closed until next year. Meanwhile Revolution, X2, Tatsu, Full Throttle and Batman were all listed as having single train operations as well which is never fun.
(10/16/22) Consider this an interesting item of note for coaster fans who travel from across the world to visit Six Flags Magic Mountain. When tourists from far away come to California to visit theme parks and ride the states big roller coasters, typically another checklist item on the agenda is also to seek out and try “In-N-Out” to see if their reported legendary status burgers live up to the online reputation. While I’m not going to get into that argument, other than to say that they are good, for guests visiting Magic Mountain you can now check off both items from your must-do list on the same visit as a brand new In-N-Out Burger just opened between the theme park and the freeway on Friday at 27510 The Old Road, Valencia, CA 91355.
(9/22/22) Don’t say I didn’t warn you, but if you look ahead at the operational schedule for Six Flags Magic Mountain, but starting in November the park will officially drop it’s highly promoted 365-day schedule. Yes, starting right off on November 1st, Six Flags Magic Mountain will be closed entirely on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thurdays for the rest of the month, with the exception of the week of Thanksgiving. The 4-day a week schedule will continue into December as well, and only return to being open 7-days a week during the last two weeks of December for the Christmas / New Years holiday time period. Beyond Jan. 1st, 2023 the park has not posted any kind of schedule yet.
While Schedule changes are always subject to change, the switch from being open 7-days a week to just 4-days a week is a bit harder to swallow in this case, as the park has been heavily promoting their new daily schedule for the past few years as a major selling point for their Season Pass and Membership programs. So you might be wondering if any kind of refund may be offered for the loss of days, but so far I haven’t heard anything. Then again, the change appears to be a new one, so I don’t think the word has quite gotten out just yet.
(9/4/22) We’ve talked about budget cutting causing various rides and even whole sections of some Six Flags parks to be shut down, but have the budget cuts now come to Six Flags Magic Mountain? Looking at the park’s current slate of attractions open as of today, Sunday, Sept. 4th, in the middle of the 3-day Labor Day Weekend holiday, I currently see the following major attractions closed in the park:
Apocalypse, CraZanity, Full Throttle, Lex Lthuor: Drop of Doom, Ninja, Roaring Rapids (Closed for the Season), Superman: Escape from Krypton, and an assortment of smaller rides. For those not entirely familiar with the park, that is four of the park’s major coasters now sitting closed, plus two of the park’s biggest non-coaster rides… in the middle of what should be a busy holiday weekend. Of course, based on the previous financial reports, Six Flags parks just have not been as busy as they used to be, with the chain reporting a 22% decline in attendance in Q2 2022 compared to the same time period the year before. So is this just a bad day for the maintenance team or something more?
According to one Screamscape source, much like how Six Flags America closed off an entire land, it was starting to sound like Six Flags Magic Mountain had opted to simply close off the attractions at the top of the mountain on weekdays. According to some reports this began a couple of weeks ago with Ninja and Superman only being open on Friday, Saturday and Sundays. Unfortunately I’ve been hearing some speculation that Apocalypse may also be given the same Fri-Sun treatment as well.
The way things are going, it is leaving some to wonder just what kind of operational schedule Six Flags Magic Mountain will have in 2023. Are the days of being open 365 days a year coming to an end in favor of the former weekend-only schedule for the winter season? Obviously, if attendance is poor enough and they are facing a situation where they could be losing money by staying open, there may be no choice but to return to a weekend-only schedule.
(8/31/22) On the heels of launching the new season pass and membership options for the 2023 season, Six Flags Magic Mountain announced a list of special events coming to the park from now through to the end of year.
NEW - Coca-Cola Dreamworld Experience (Weekends through Sept. 5) - See the Dreamworld Arcade as part of Coke’s limited-edition launch of the new Dreamworld flavor.
NEW - Tailgate Weekends (Weekends through Feb 12, 2023) - You can catch your favorite college and professional football games at the Full Throttle Sports Bar and METRO PARK Pub.
Fright Fest presented by SNICKERS - (Select Nights Sept. 10 to Oct 31) Haunted Houses, Monsters, Frights, Roller Coasters… sounds like a lot of fun to me.
NEW - Kid’s Boo Fest (Select days Sept. 10 to Oct 31) A fun daytime Trick-or-Treat experience in Bugs Bunny World that offers a not-so-scary experience for the younger guests.
NEW - Oktoberfest (Select days Sept. 10 to Oct 31) Join the festivities with this Fall’s selection of craft and season beers, delicious German fare, themed music and more!
NEW - Veterans Day Celebration (Nov. 11 - 13) Join in as the park honors and celebrated veterans who have served and made sacrifices for our country through ceremonies and military presentations.
Holiday in the Park (Select evenings Nov 24 to Jan 1, 2023) - The park will transform into a magical winter wonderland featuring over two million twinkling lights, holiday-themed displays, Santa and all your favorite festive food and treats.
2023 - Nothing is known at this point in time...
???? - DC Universe Phase 2 - Rumor - (2/4/2023) While this may be some time off, current rumors suggest that a Phase 2 expansion of the DC Universe area could be in planning for Six Flags Magic Mountain. We know the oldest section was just revamped as part of the addition of Wonder Woman, which also saw the removal of the Flash Speed Force ride, and theming of the former Wonder Woman ride into Teen Titans.
While there is still a little bit of open space to deal with in the old DC Universal area, the placement of Wonder Woman also left a very interesting pocket of space between the new coaster and Riddler’s Revenge that could be used for a possible second phase of the park’s DC Universe plans.
Our reader also noticed that the old midways games area across from Crazanity that was just repainted a few years ago, is now fenced off and the game booths gutted, so revamping this area to be more DC Universe themed may be the idea course of action going forth. We’ve seen several others Six Flags parks slowly begin to expand their own DC Universe themed areas in the past few years, adding small groupings of new DC themed flat rides, as well as rethemeing some nearby existing rides to have DC theming, such as SFOG, SFGAm, or even SFDK. Keep your eyes on this section of the park for future developments.
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