Like its competitor Disney-MGM, Universal is a working studio, filling more than four hundred acres with the latest in TV and movie production technology. Unlike MGM, there's more emphasis on movie-related rides than backstage shows. Universal's top rides are Back to the Future , a bone-shaking flight-simulator trip from 2015 to the Ice Age (not for claustrophobes); the breathtaking Terminator 2: 3D , a dark, dizzying combination of high-speed live action, superb robotics and 3D morphing effects (for maximum enjoyment, sit in the middle of the auditorium, five or six rows from the front), and the flabbergasting Twister , where you're pitted against a tornado. Men in Black: The Ride will allow you, with others, to control the fate of each ride.
Of the other rides, Jaws , a boat trip through shark-infested waters, plays wickedly with audience suspense; Kongfrontation has you scooped up and shaken by the angry six-ton brute; and Earthquake takes you on a subway ride through chaos, flooding and collisions. ET is gentler, a superb, undulating bike ride to save ET's home planet be sure to listen when the little tyke says goodbye. Elsewhere, there are attempts to demystify production techniques, the most successful being Alfred Hitchcock: The Art of Making Movies , with surprising insights into Hitch's famed visual trickery. The two-man Gory, Gruesome and Grotesque Horror Makeup Show , played for laughs, is as notable for its tour-de-force performances as for its educational content.