Disney World’s Monstropolis Food First Look & Inside New Show Replacing MuppetVision

The ‘Dark Avenue’ half of Monstropolis will debut ahead-of-schedule starting in 2027, and Walt Disney World has served up a first look at the in-universe Monsters, Inc. inspired foods at Harryhausen’s Restaurant and Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza ahead of opening. Here’s a look at the monstrous dishes, along with new concept art and details about the attraction being reimagined from MuppetVision.

As basic background, there are two halves to Monstropolis. The back half is the Monsters, Inc. Doors Coaster being built backstage in what used to be Cast Member parking and an access road. This is the blockbuster E-Ticket element of Monstropolis, and Walt Disney World has not yet provided any opening timeline. Our expectation is that it’s a Summer 2028 opening.

The front half is the ‘Dark Avenue’ area that’s reimagined to replace Muppets Courtyard, with existing venues in that now defunct land being repurposed. Dark Avenue is the main street-esque area that’ll feature Harryhausen’s Restaurant, Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza, Monsters University Alumni Club, the Scareporium, and more. The restaurants are our main focus here, followed by new looks inside and outside the “Welcome to Monstropolis” stage show…

With Harryhausen’s Restaurant and Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza, Walt Disney World culinary and beverage teams face the unusual challenge of creating food that feels authentic to monsters while remaining delicious for humans. Bonus points if it’s photogenic and plays well on social media. This team is taking characters, locations and details from the films and turning them into experiences guests can eat.

Disney recently shared a behind-the-scenes look at this process with Chef Brian Piasecki, Director of Culinary and Concept Development, and Evan Rosenthal, Beverage Director, who are two of the creatives developing the Harryhausen’s Restaurant and Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza menus.

“There were so many moments where we asked, ‘Is this too much?’” said Evan. “And sometimes we’d hear back, ‘No. Can we take it further? Can we make it brighter, bolder, and more interesting?’”

Brian added that “Monstropolis is full of fun, adventure, zaniness, and craziness. We’re taking familiar dishes and adding unexpected twists that feel authentic to this world.” The result is something the culinary team affectionately calls “grossly fun” food. These are familiar flavors reimagined with playful monster-inspired twists.

As someone who lived through the first Monstrous Summer over a decade ago, this approach strikes me as familiar, and it’s unsurprising that Disney would push the envelope. Even if there’s a gross-out factor for some guests, the audience is as much social media as it is actual guests consuming food in the parks. Some of the dishes in Monstropolis will produce viral moments that offer monstrously free marketing for Walt Disney World, and that’s likely one of the goals going into creating the menus.

With that said, I also fully expect the culinary team to come out swinging with an ambitious and envelope-pushing menu and not just superficial shock-value dishes. The vast majority of the time, Walt Disney World restaurants are at their absolute best in their newest and purest form, and then gradually get diluted over time once they run into the harsh realities of guest preferences and operational realities of throughput.

Harryhausen’s Restaurant

Harryhausen’s Restaurant recreates the location of one of Mike and Celia’s most unforgettable dates in the movie. Sulley and Boo show up, as does the CDA, ruining dinner. It was a whole thing. Harryhausen’s takes over the space previously occupied by Mama Melrose, and will likewise be a table service restaurant.

The centerpiece of Harryhausen’s is its head sushi chef, a new Audio-Animatronics figure you’ll see using eight tentacles to prep food in the center of the dining space. The table service restaurant will offer a vibrant dining experience that feels like it’s straight out of the movie and features more than just sushi. (Which implies that, unsurprisingly, sushi will be featured on the menu.)

Here’s a look at the Audio Animatronics sushi chef in action:

Walt Disney Imagineering shared a short clip of a mock-up for Harryhausen’s coming to Disney’s Hollywood Studios!

Imagineers are using classic techniques, including audio and visual media, to bring the sushi chef Audio-Animatronics figure to life. pic.twitter.com/zdmBLomiDa

— Drew Smith (@DrewDisneyDude) August 28, 2026

“It’s the swanky place that you go for a night out, but we want it to be fun for guests of all ages,” said Evan of Harryhausen’s Restaurant. “Making sure that the menu appeals to younger guests, to older guests, and then challenging ourselves and taking things that we love and saying, is there something we can add that gets people talking about it and gets them to come back because it’s delicious and entertaining.”

During D23, Disney teased menu items via the Monstropolis Horn newspaper, including the Caterpillar Roll and the Terrible Teriyucki. The paper also mentioned the Not-So-Slimi Sashimi, though it also cautions that these dishes may not be appropriate for human diners.

According to the paper, the Department of Human Relations has appointed special Culinary Ambassadors tasked with adapting monster flavors for the human palate. This is being done to bridge the gap between the worlds, giving humans the opportunity to “taste our most famous fare without fear.”

Some of the menu items being explored at Harryhausen’s include iconic ramen bowls inspired by traditional Japanese flavors. The dishes will feature familiar, classic ingredients like rich tonkotsu broth and alkaline ramen noodles, plus a few others with playful, monster-y twists like fish cake sliced to look like eyeballs and green eggs.

As a ramenhead, they had me at “rich tonkotsu broth.” We’ve been begging for a good ramen restaurant at Walt Disney World since Takumi-Tei was first rumored (that ended up being pretty much the polar opposite of a ramen shop).

If this can deliver delicious ramen that isn’t exorbitantly priced, it’ll be a winner for us. We’ve had Michelin-starred ramen for ~$15/person, but fully understand it’s going to exceed $25 at Walt Disney World. Let’s just not exceed $30; this is ramen, after all.

As far as cuisine comparisons go, we’re expecting Harryhausen’s to be comparable to Shiki-Sai: Sushi Izakaya over at EPCOT, but with the addition of ramen and obviously monstrously-themed dishes. That should also mean a wide range in pricing, with meals as inexpensive as $35 and as pricey as over $300.

It also wouldn’t be surprising to see Walt Disney World do some sort of prix fixe menu to avoid the problem that Be Our Guest Restaurant originally had with guests ordering the cheapest dishes possible just to get in the door since Harryhausen’s is going to be an attraction unto itself. Maybe that rolls out eventually, though, with Harryhausen’s starting as an a la carte mix of sushi and izakaya.

Our expectation is that Imagineers will recreate Harryhausen’s from the movie, with an end result that amounts to Oga’s Cantina meets Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant meets Space 220, but better than all three. It should join the already-formidable themed restaurant roster at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and offer both highly themed and fine dining.

Harryhausen’s has tremendous potential for a ‘show’ component beyond just the Audio Animatronics sushi chef. Based on what the culinary team just revealed, it looks like the menu will be varied and fun, with something for everyone.

Harryhausen’s will be the hottest Advance Dining Reservation at Walt Disney World. Here’s hoping it’s actually good…and stays that way. We can already hear the complaints about adventurous and/or “alien” cuisine. We plan on getting our fill of Harryhausen’s ASAP, as the menu in 2027 might be very different from the menu in 2028 or 2029!

Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza

Just down the street, Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza showcases a completely different side of Monstropolis. Inspired by Monsters University, this quick-service restaurant will feel like the beloved pizza spot where generations of monster college students gathered with friends after class.

Humans may recognize Archie, Fear Tech’s beloved six-legged mascot, but after years of being “borrowed” by mischievous MU students, he’s become a fan favorite on both campuses. Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza was previously PizzeRizzo, and will retain the same footprint and layout of its predecessor. Expect it to look similar to PizzeRizzo, except with Monsters window-dressing as opposed to Muppets.

“When ideating the menu, we kept those thoughts of nostalgia in the front of our minds, remembering what we loved from our neighborhood pizza shops as kids, and finding a way to add those elements of fun unexpectedness,” said Evan. “At its core, it still feels like the pizza shop that you want to go back to time after time.”

As someone who lived close to a college town and frequented one such pizza shop as a kid (RIP Bruno’s), this resonated with me. It also squares with what new Walt Disney World President Joe Schott shared with us at a recent event, which is that Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza is getting all-new kitchen equipment and an upgraded recipe to produce higher quality pizzas. Pizzafari actually tested making good pizzas a while back, and the results were shockingly impressive.

Blort, a staple from Pixar’s Monsters University, will make its real-world debut at Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza. Blort is one of the most popular soft drinks in all of Monstropolis, but no human has ever seen it or tasted it. This gives the Walt Disney World beverage teams the ability to offer their own interpretation. The result is a purple frozen spin on Monstropolis’ favorite soda topped with a Scream Apple Foam.

It amuses me endlessly that all these years after the Wizarding World of Harry Potter debuted Butterbeer, Walt Disney World is still chasing its own lightning in a bottle, license-to-print-money novelty drink. They didn’t achieve that via the special drinks that debuted alongside Cars Land, New Fantasyland, Pandora, or Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. Perhaps Blort will finally do the trick.

Unfortunately, something named “Blort” has an uphill battle in capturing the natural appeal of something called with “Butterbeer.” It’s like the culinary linguistic equivalent of “fartbox” versus “cellar door.” But if Blort tastes delicious despite a bit of gross out factor, perhaps this will finally be Disney’s smash sensation drink that becomes so popular it gets a mention on earnings calls.

‘Welcome to Monstropolis’ Stage Show

A couple of weeks ago, Walt Disney World quietly put concept art for The Glob Theater lobby on display at Walt Disney Presents at DHS. It depicts guests walking through a lobby with glass chandeliers adorned with monster eyes, horns, and teeth details. We assume this space is similar to the old MuppetVision 3D pre-show, both in location, layout, and footprint. That was version one of the art.

A second version was shared online, which subdues the monstrous style of the chandeliers and makes changes to the poster art on the walls. Within a few hours, a third and perhaps final version was released, which changes the marquee of the concessions stand. Version three is what’s above, and it actually isn’t the first time Monstropolis has had competing pieces of concept art, with one version online and another in the parks.

For those who are surprised that Walt Disney World would have a concession stand inside a pre-show, fear not, it’s unlikely that they’re hawking refreshments because they’ve pulled a Cosmic Rewind and made this lead-up interminably long. More likely is that this is part of the themed design, similar to the concession stand inside the queue of Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway at Disneyland (above).

As demonstrated there, concession stands are great for gags, Easter Eggs, and obscure references. Monsters, Inc. attractions have previously used this approach with vending machines, so a concession stand feels like the logical iteration of this.

Walt Disney World also released a new piece of concept art depicting the exterior of the Glob Theater (below). This one also depicts changes to this venue; in this case, the top of the clock tower is more subdued as compared to what we’ve previously seen. That tracks with what’s already visible in the park, and is also consistent with the history of changes to this clock tower over the years.

As noted above, the new show at the Glob Theater is titled “Welcome to Monstropolis,” featuring an original Randy Newman song by the same name. The monsters in the show will introduce humans to Monstropolis, and highlight how similar monsters and humans really are.

Mike and Sulley will be hosts, Imagineers shared at D23. The premise is that Sulley has been working on a small, homespun show, whereas Mike puts an emphasis on showmanship, and has a few surprises up his sleeve that he thinks will bring down the house.

Imagineers have boasted that the production will be packed with technology, which is backed up by what we know of investments into the space based on recent public filings.

Over the summer, I had the chance to see some of the technology and Audio Animatronics that’ll be featured in “Welcome to Monstropolis” during a visit to Walt Disney Imagineering in Central Florida. The monsters in the lower left and right of the concept art above (on drums and camera) will be Animatronics, with screens and more being used center stage and on the upper sides.

While I can’t speak to the quality of the show from a storytelling perspective, the array of mixed media in “Welcome to Monstropolis” is going to be impressive. It should have good depth as a result, as opposed to being another one-dimensional (or 3D/4D) screen-centric production.

Ironically enough, what I saw reminded me of a modernization of MuppetVision 3D, but with Monsters. I’m skeptical that the story and comedy will be that good, but “Welcome to Monstropolis” should far surpass Monsters Laugh Floor.

Ultimately, we’re looking forward to experiencing the Dark Avenue area of Monstropolis and these new restaurants in 2027. These two new restaurants and show will be hugely popular, and Harryhausen’s in particular is going to have a tough time keeping up with demand.

Given that, perhaps there’s something to be said for front-loading some of the demand to reduce the influx of crowds once the main event opens. This is doubly true for Monstropolis, which is expected to be treated as an attraction unto itself where guests linger, shop, and eat. Exhausting demand, along with capturing high-margin merchandise and food & beverage sales, before the Monsters, Inc. Doors Coaster opens might actually be the savvy play.

The final question is a matter of when we shall see. The facades are starting to take shape and scaffolding is coming down, but there’s still a decent amount of work on the courtyard itself. That’s to say nothing of the Harryhausen’s and Glob Theater interiors, which are likely the bigger undertakings. With little visibility into any of that, our gut is that the first half of Monstropolis debuts in Summer 2027, right alongside the first third of Tropical Americas. We’ll keep you posted as we learn more.

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YOUR THOUGHTS

Thoughts on the food being served at Harryhausen’s Restaurant and Archie’s Scare Pig Pizza? What about the interior and exterior of “Welcome to Monstropolis” or the multimedia nature of the show? Cautiously optimistic about Dark Avenue, or still disappointed that the Monsters evicted the Muppets? Surprised to see it’ll start debuting in 2027, or did you expect a phased opening? Do you agree or disagree with our assessments? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!