Just making sure everyone saw that they are adding After Hours to Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios:
I’m excited by this change! I had EMM booked at HS, but I will cancel now in favor of this. I’ve been dying to try it at MK, but the dates never line up for me. Now, instead of scrambling on our last day to check our baggage at the resort and rush to EMM, we can now relax! I hope they open the bookings soon!
Hmmmm… $100 for AP/DVC…
Welp…I WAS worried about not getting enough MK time. 
Still was hoping they’d do one of those VIP nights, but understandable if they don’t.
EDIT: so they say ice cream and beverages are included…does this, per chance, also include…dole whips?
Oh well. If it was Animal Kingdom on 2/16 I’d have been all over that. But nope. It’s at the park I pretend doesn’t exist.
More money for something else. 
That would be so cool especially for AK I think. But alas $800 for my group of 6 for 3 hours of rides is too much for my budget, even with free ice cream.
I think it is important to pay attention to the hours too. For some of the MK nights you can get in three hours before the party (at 7p with party at 10-1), while other nights you get in only one hour ahead (7p with party at 8-11). More bang for the buck with the 10pm party start
I see this as a great way to cover an afternoon arrival day.
Instead of include the arrival day in your multi-day pass you can purchase a party ticket instead. And considering the early entry time you get six hours of park time (3 hours with lower wait times) and get in even more than if you had used one day of your multi-day pass.
But it’s going to cost more than adding a day
I may be in the minority, but I am getting annoyed with all these parties and “after hours”. They are taking the experience away from a regular ticket. I don’t want to be rushed out of the park at closing and I don’t like the park closing early. I also don’t like planning around these things.
End rant.
I agree with you. For our two-week December trip we are planning around the following:
MK After Hours: Dec 3 &10
AK After Hours: Dec 4 & 12
HS After Hours: Dec 8
HS EMM: Dec 3, 5, 7, 9, 12
MK EMM: Dec 2, 4, 11
MVMCP: Dec 2, 4, 6, 7, 9, 11
The only positive that I can come up with is that I can count on my Dec 3 MK hours not changing in the evening and I could safely plan a PPO BOG on Dec 11 without worrying they’ll switch to an 8:00 open. There is some “extra” event going on every single day, sometimes in multiple parks, of our trip. It is annoying for those of us who don’t want to use them. I can totally see why people would be interested…the price tag is just too steep for my family of five.
Personally I don’t think the After Hours events will affect your daytime parks. They are limited in number to very few. The ones in the morning are the same. I would not worry at all about them. The only thing I would work around is MVMCP (go to MK on those days until the afternoon for lowest crowds, return for one evening on a non-MVMCP to see HEA). You will have a great trip, these extras are not worth trying to avoid.
One of our favorite parts of our last trip was being one of the last ones to ride BTMRR (a family favorite) and taking our time leaving the park after close. DAH would affect our ability to do this. I don’t think Disney is going to allow those without tickets to stop and take pictures and enjoy the park as it closes.
We have a family of 5 as well and I agree, the price is way too steep.
It does not include dole whips 
It includes bottled soda, water, Mickey bars and ice cream sandwiches, the minute maid frozen lemonade, the frozen fruit bars (anything they sell at the carts during the day). And popcorn.
The MK event is great. We did it once and really enjoyed the emptiness of the park.
They might not affect our daytime touring, but they definitely affect things like rope drop and hanging out in the park, shopping or whatever, at the end of the night. Miraculously only two of these (other than the MVMCP) are on our planned park day at that park (Dec 3 for MK and Dec 12 for AK) and I’m certainly not changing my plans based on them, but it is frustrating.
I also see that for a shorter trip the price difference is not THAT much between adding a park day or adding one of these. But when it would only cost me $50 to add a whole park day to my family’s tickets these would add at least $500-600. Ouch. Like I said, I totally understand the appeal. They just don’t make sense for us and frustrate my planning.
Booooo so close to overdosing on dole whips.
My kids are too young for the after hours events. When are they going to do an EMM AK? I am doing EMM TSL and EMM MK in January, and I would so add EMM AK. We don’t love lines and I think the money is worth it.
Just more of Disney making us pay for what used to be included. Neither HS or AK have PM EMH, but now for $100+ a person, you can have what you used to get for free, just by staying on site (eyeroll). Oh but now you get some ice cream and a soda, I can buy a lot of Mickey Bars for the price difference on an add on day ticket, compared to this “party” ticket
Seems to me that the appeal of these events depends greatly on how many days you are spending at WDW. For a number of reasons, my family typically can’t go for more than 3-5 nights. If I were going to WDW for a full week or more, I can’t see paying extra for these nights/mornings, but for my short visits, they would make a lot of sense for me when my kids are a bit older. I haven’t done the math, but I suspect the cost of a 4 day vacation with a couple of these events prices out similarly to 7 day vacation without these events (of course, it depends on the cost of the hotel and food for those extra days which varies depending on where one stays and eats).
For us, the appeal is in the reduced number of people in the park. As a crowd-averse person, this is a way for me to actually enjoy myself in the park fully without having to worry about a touring plan or whether or not I am able to obtain a same day fastpass. I now find myself glued to my phone for a good portion of the day to modify fastpasses to ensure my family has a good time without the god-awful waits. These events allow me to be in the present, move from ride to ride without any hassle. And since we have a small family of 3, it’s slightly more affordable and the AP discount helps too.
This definitely is my reason behind splurging for this. That and I’m alone.
Spending $400+ for a family for only 3 hours (or even 5 since you can enter in at 7PM) of extra park time doesn’t seem worth it to me. But as I’m only there for 4 nights and solo, throwing down an extra $100 isn’t so bad.
I do wish they would do something else for these aside from only ‘free snacks’.
The article I read said that unlike the holiday parties, cast members do not usher people out of the park who don’t have tickets. You can linger, take pictures, etc.
Our plan on one AK day was to arrive late and check out Pandora at night, this will give us even more time without a ticket.