Video: Back to the Future Ride Holds Final Countdown

August 3, 2007 at 12:02 PM | by juliana | Comments (0)

Yesterday, Jaunted was invited to attend the final countdown for the Back to the Future Ride at Universal Studios in California. The final countdown? What's that? Well, it turns out the Back to the Future ride is closing on Sept. 3 so if you are headed to Universal Studios before then, you must ride the BTTF ride as you may never again get the chance. Word is they are putting a The Simpsons ride in its place in 2008.

So to commemorate the 14 years of the BTTF ride's existence, Universal held a countdown extravaganza complete with a masse of DeLoreans in the parking lot, a meeting of the real Doc Brown (actor Christopher Lloyd) and a fake Doc Brown, a short speech by the movie's co-creator Bob Gale and of course, the start of the countdown in front of the Hill Valley town clock.

This was by far one of the most awesomest press junkets we have ever been to and that's not because we are crazed BTF fans. No, it's because if you were to use the unintentional comedy rating scale, this junket would be off the chart.

The second more exciting video is after the jump.

First off, there were about 60 DeLoreans in the Universal parking lot. Several of them had personalized license plates like GotFlux, FlxCptor, UFO4Doc, and the best one ever, McFly. These DMC (DeLorean Motor Club) owners are not only fans of the car but of the BTTF trilogy and in a passionate way--kind of like Star Wars nerds. As we walked around admiring the DeLoreans, we heard one DMC geek quizzing another DMC geek if he knew the name of the beer brand they used to fill up the flux capacitor in the second BTF (Answer: It's Miller.) Also, in this crowd "Great Scott!" never gets old.

Second, the Doc Brown impersonator was painfully over-exaggerated. He came around the parking lot wearing those crazy silver glasses and a lab coat saying "Great Scott!" and other lines from the movie. As a Doc Brown impersonator he probably wasn't that bad, but still impersonators, especially in Hollywood, always make us cringe. However, people got a kick out of him, including a local newscaster, and he was asked to be in a lot of pictures. Always a good thing in the life of an impersonator, we guess.

Third, the actual event where they kicked off the countdown began with a few speeches from Bob Gale, who urged parents to buy the Back to the Future DVDs to show their children, if they haven't already. He'll be promoting this trilogy until the day he dies. Then they kicked it up a notch by having the real Doc Brown and the fake Doc Brown arrive in a DeLorean together. When Lloyd got out of the car, the crowd went nuts and when he yelled "Great Scott!" at the mike the BTTF fans and DMC geeks alike cheered loudly.

Finally, fake Doc Brown joined Gale and Llloyd together to light up the countdown because if "you don't connect the past with the present, you may not have a future!" A bunch of pyrotechnics went off, followed by some green tinfoil streamers and the event was over. The daily rides began shortly afterwards and guests were allowed to enter their name into a sweepstakes to win an authentic 1981 DeLorean for themselves. You can also enter online.

All in all, seeing how many BTTF fans showed up for the event and the love for the real Doc Brown they gave, we're surprised (and we admit, saddened) Universal is closing the ride. But this is Hollywood. Simply put--if you're old, you're out.

Head on over to our Back to the Future Special Pages for pictures from the event.

Related Stories:
· Universal Studios Hollywood [Official Site]

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