Intellectual property is a big deal for theme parks as guests come to immerse themselves in themed worlds of their favorite characters. The largest license at Six Flags is DC comics and with that comes characters like Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. On July 11th the new Superman movie debuted and box office results of $122 million domestically had it #1 this week with the 3rd biggest opening of 2025! Having the IP of a #1 movie in your park is never a bad thing!

My home park, Six Flags Over Georgia, features Superman on three rides and two are named for him. The most prominent is Superman: Ultimate Flight, the flying B&M coaster. This theme is spot on as you take a flying position just like Superman as you navigate the course. The second is Superman: Tower of Power, a kids drop tower. The final one is Justice League: Battle for Metropolis, a dark ride where Superman and his arch nemesis Lex Luther play prominent roles. There are 8 more DC related rides at the park including the iconic Batman: The Ride and The Riddler Mindbender coasters along with two themed sections of the park, a kids DC Super Friends themed area and a Gotham themed section.

Of these rides Justice League: Battle for Metropolis is my favorite by far. This is really a phenomenal dark ride that uses animatronics, screens and special effects all in a motion-based vehicle. The ride used to use 3D glasses (I think because of Covid and probably expenses too), but has switched to 2D and honestly it isn’t much of a loss. The animatronics on the ride are quite good and there’s a great fire effect and fog everywhere. The practical effects are really well done with lots of moving set pieces. There are a couple of instances where your vehicle parks right in front of a screen and the vehicle motion in combination with the screen gives an incredible sensation of speed when you’re essentially sitting still. There’s also an underlying game where you use blasters to shoot elements on the screen portions and you are given a score and ranking at the end. This really adds to the immersion too. This isn’t Rise of the Resistance at Disney Studios or Harry Potter: Battle at the Ministry at Epic Universe, but it is an incredibly respectable dark ride collaboration by Six Flags and Sally Dark Rides. Six Flags has installed clones of Justice League at 7 different parks, so spreading out the development investment probably helped a bunch too.

Having ride themes (intellectual property) either developed in house or licensed can be very important to a park’s economics. A story can make a ride more enjoyable by immersing guests in a world they already know or welcoming them to a new world. It gives the ride context and a reason for being. A ride can of course still be enjoyable without a story, for example I don’t think many guests are aware of William “Willy” Gibson on Georgia Gold Rusher, but a story can often help with immersion (for dark rides more so than coasters) and make a ride a more complete experience. It can also be an opportunity to sell merchandise such as stuffed animals, t-shirts or capes in the case of superheroes. Ryan the Ride mechanic will tell stories about the mechanical problems those capes can cause to ride mechanics, but merchandise is big money for parks. Also, a fun little historical note is that Universal actually tried to get the DC license for Islands of Adventure before settling on Marvel!

I Superheroes are a great fit for theme parks with their supernatural powers fitting well with special effects and crazy movements. DC is almost synonymous with Six Flags at this point, but It’ll be interesting to see if the DC license ever finds its way into any of the legacy Cedar Fair parks. It’s great to see Superman back on the big screen and it’s a big deal for Six Flags as they’re betting you’ll want to ride more DC rides and buy more merch because of it. On your next trip to Six Flags you too can pretend to be Superman, even if it is just for a minute or two.