Monster Trees and Grasping Branches: First Villains Land Models Have Magic Kingdom Fans Buzzing

By entgrove · August 15, 2026

Two sculpted tree maquettes displayed in the Walt Disney Imagineering pavilion at D23 offer the first physical look at the villains themed land coming to Magic Kingdom. The models show trees with monstrous faces and finger-like branches looming over a human scale figure, while sitework is already underway for the land, which will include two major attractions plus dining and shopping.

Two sculpted tree models with faces, claws, and grasping branches are the first physical glimpse of the villains themed land coming to Magic Kingdom, and Disney fans have been picking apart every detail since they went on display at D23. The maquettes, shown in the Walt Disney Imagineering pavilion under a sign reading "Villains | Magic Kingdom", suggest a land that leans fully into menace rather than softening it for the park.

Trees with faces, built to loom over guests

The first maquette shows a tree whose branches arch overhead to form an archway, as if the tree is reaching an arm out over anyone who walks beneath it. A monstrous face is worked into the trunk. Sculpting tools sat in front of the model on the display table, a small reminder that these are working artifacts from Imagineering's design process, not polished marketing props.

The second tree is even less subtle. Its branches end in long fingers, and its carved face points downward toward a small human figure placed at its base for scale. That scale model is the telling piece: the tree towers over it, with only sparse leaves at the top. Nearby, a screen under the "Villains | Magic Kingdom" sign played footage showing how the tree figures were created.

Maquettes like these are how Imagineering has worked since the earliest days of Disneyland. Small scale sculptures let designers test a silhouette, a face, or a pose before anything is built at full size. When trees themselves are characters, the land's atmosphere is being designed down to the landscaping, which says a lot about how immersive Disney intends this place to feel after dark.

What Disney has confirmed about the villains land

Disney announced the land at D23 in 2024 and has said relatively little since. The confirmed pieces: two major attractions, plus dining and shopping. The land's backstory holds that a spell has summoned the villains to this corner of Magic Kingdom, giving Imagineering a story reason to mix characters from very different films in one place.

Disney also released a list of villains inspiring the land, a roster that includes Yzma from The Emperor's New Groove, a deeper cut that surprised fans expecting only the usual heavy hitters. The concept art shared so far leans hardest on Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty, with her dragon form on the left of the image and her thorn wrapped castle at the center.

On the ground in Florida, the project has moved past the announcement stage. Earth is being moved and graded at Magic Kingdom to prepare the site for construction, the same early sitework phase that preceded projects like Tron Lightcycle / Run in Tomorrowland.

Why fans are buzzing

A villains land has been near the top of fan wish lists since long before Disney made it official, and every scrap of design work gets studied accordingly. The trees answer one open question: this will not be villains lite. Faces in the bark and branches shaped like grasping hands point to a land built around atmosphere and unease, something Magic Kingdom has never really offered outside the Haunted Mansion. The next questions are the ones Disney has not touched yet, namely which villains anchor the two attractions and when the land opens. With dirt already moving behind the berm, those answers are getting closer.