The Disney Destiny is HERE, and the new Disney Cruise Line ship comes with some incredible details, theming, and storytelling.

The hydra!

One of the standout offerings onboard a Disney Destiny sailing is the entertainment, namely the new Broadway-style show, Hercules. This incredible production features live singers and dancers, as well as some larger-than-life effects. And during our media sailing on board the ship, we got to go behind the scenes of the show.

During a special panel, we learned that it took a full two years to develop Hercules, including lots of research and development. One of the major things that had to be researched was the exoskeletons that the performers wear for the Titan costumes onstage. These things are incredible! And the development of those exoskeletons is helping to pave the way for other elaborate show elements that Disney could use in the future.

The behind-the-scenes panel.

Overall, there are 115 interactive elements in the show, which is the most of any of the productions in the Disney Cruise Line fleet. Between cannons, smoke, fog, and light-up electronics, the managers of the show have quite a bit to keep track of to make sure that effects happen on time (that’s 13 projectors, 10 snow machines, 12 confetti canons, and 100 automation axes). Add to that the challenges of being on a moving vessel, and rehearsals can get incredibly technical as performers navigate the struggles of working on a stage that’s moving across the ocean. Just imagine what it’s like for them to jump up and down!

They’re very detailed!

These tasks can be even more challenging for the performers who have to wear the exoskeleton suits. The rock Titan — whose name is Zion — also performs as the hydra that swallows Hercules during the show. He and the ice Titan performer Cam have to wear about 70 extra pounds of weight in their costumes. On top of that, there’s an additional 40 pounds of maneuverability, so at any given time, they could be moving over 100 pounds of added weight. When they’re not in the suits during the show, they perform as regular dancers. But once the suits go on? They’re weightlifting puppeteers with a story to tell to the audience. It’s a lot of pressure!

These things are incredible!

Thankfully, Disney has built safety precautions into these massive suits to make sure the performers can take a break if they feel off-balance or the weight is too much to bear at that moment. If you’ve been on a cruise before, you know that balance can be tricky if the boat is having a rough time, so it’s important to have these precautions in place.

Safety is the utmost priority

Toward the end of the panel, the showrunners admitted that they’d learned quite a bit about how to make these exoskeletons work from the run with the Hulk character suit out in Disney California Adventure. Through trial and error, they’ve been able to improve on that technology and make it more manageable for the wearers. Now, they can take these learnings and apply them to future projects for Disney Experiences.

The hydra heads!

Ultimately, we learned some really fascinating tidbits about this new technology from the panel with the creators of Hercules, and we can’t wait to see how Disney applies it in the future. After watching the show ourselves, we were incredibly impressed with Disney’s production — it’s a must-see onboard the ship!

Stay tuned to DFB for more updates from the Disney Destiny.

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Disclosure: In nearly all circumstances, Disney Food Blog writers and photographers pay full price for their own travel, hotel, food, beverage, and event tickets. We do this because it’s important to us as journalists to ensure not only that we give you unbiased opinions, but also that you can trust us to do so since we’re paying our own way. On rare occasions, when we are invited by a company to attend a preview as media, and when we choose to accept that invitation, we will always make you, our readers, aware of that situation. Today, we were invited by Disney Cruise Line to attend their media preview of the Disney Destiny. Note that when we attend events as media we are 1) Not required to review that event/food on any of our channels, and 2) Not required to review that event/food favorably. You can always count on DFB to give you a 100% unbiased and honest review of any event that we attend, food that we eat, or beverage that we drink. You can see more in our Disclosure Policy. Thank you for reading. — AJ