For fans of classic Disney, it doesn't get much more classic than Snow White. The studio's first feature length animated film led to an opening day attraction at Disneyland that is still there over 60 years later. However, Snow White's Scary Adventure will be closing down in just over a month to undergo a major refurbishment, that will result in major changes to the ride, the first major redesign the rides has seen in almost 40 years.
Snow White and Her Adventures opened along with Disneyland itself in July of 1955 and the Disneyland version of the attraction has remained in operation despite versions of the ride opening in other parks, like Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom, having opened and closed in that time. The last major refurbishment the ride got game with a major revamp to all of Fantasyland in 1983, where the ride's name was also changed. Snow White's Scary Adventures has been mostly untouched since then, but when it reopens after closing on January 6, 2020, it sounds like it's going to be a very different place.
According to the Disney Parks Blog, the update will not only polish up existing scenes guests are familiar with, but will also create new moments we've never seen before, including a sequence where we see Snow White wake up from her slumber and one where the newly awakened Snow is reunited with her animal friends, similar to this concept art that has been released.
Considering that Snow White has only seen one other major update the attraction since 1955, it's probably just about time for such a thing. The 1983 update was a pretty major overhaul that included, among other things, actually adding Snow White herself to the attraction. The original concept for the Fantasyland dark rides in 1955 was that the guest was supposed to feel like they were the main character, in this case Snow White, which meant you never actually saw Snow on the ride.
A lot of guests had trouble understanding this, and were disappointed to not see Snow White in the ride with her name on it, so that became the first major change in the original refurbishment.
With all the new technology that Walt Disney Imagineering has devised, there's a lot of new concepts that can be implemented to bring Snow White's Scary Adventure into the 21st century. The attraction will be closing down January 6, basically right after Disneyland's current holiday festivities come to a close, which is a common time for major projects, as attendance tends to take a bit of a dip, making it the best possible time for attractions to be down..
No reopening date has yet been announced. Worst case scenario is probably a reopen in time for the busy summer season, though it seems just as likely that Snow White's Scary Adventure won't take quite that long to update. It may only need a couple of months of downtime. When it is back up and running, Peter Pan may have some competition in Fantasyland when it comes to popular dark rides at Disneyland.
