Turtle Talk With Crush

Turtle Talk With Crush: attraction at EPCOT, Walt Disney World — live wait times, operating status, and planning data on MouseHub.

Wait time history

Historical wait patterns for Turtle Talk With Crush accrete daily as MouseHub records waits every 15 minutes. Charts appear here once enough history exists.

Visitor sentiment

4.6· 244 Google ratings

The MouseHub take

Turtle Talk With Crush is a fifteen-minute interactive show inside The Seas with Nemo & Friends Pavilion, and it has run at EPCOT since November 2004, back when the building was still called The Living Seas. You sit in a small theater facing what looks like a window into the ocean, and the turtle from Finding Nemo swims up and starts talking to the room. Digital projection and voice-activated animation put him on the screen, the show is improvised, and the questions come from whichever kids are sitting on the carpet that round. Crush may bring Marlin, Nemo, Squirt, Hank, or Bailey along with him.

This is the quiet workhorse of an EPCOT afternoon. It runs cold and dark, it seats the whole party, and it costs you fifteen minutes at the point in the day when World Nature is hot and the kids have stopped walking. Families with an outgoing child get the most out of it, and so do adults who like watching a performer field whatever a four-year-old decides to ask. The people who leave flat are usually the parents of a kid who sat with a hand up the whole show and never heard their name.

At a glance

Best for
Families with a young kid who will put a hand up and ask a stranger a question.
Skip if
You have one EPCOT day, a list of headliners, and nobody under ten in the group.
Ride type
Interactive animated theater show, improvised live
Intensity
Gentle. The theater goes dim, nothing moves, and the show holds no scares for young kids.

The good

  • No two shows run the same way
    Disney bills the show as improvised, and it plays that way. The script is whatever the kids in the front rows decide to ask, so a second visit gets you a different conversation.
  • Adults laugh as hard as the kids
    The performer voicing Crush is quick, and the jokes pitched over the children's heads land with the parents on the benches. The turtle stays in character the whole time.
  • It doubles as an air-conditioned sit-down
    Fifteen minutes, dim, cool, and seated, in the middle of a World Nature afternoon. Families who plan a break around it hold up better for the evening.
  • Crush answers you in real time
    Voice-activated animation keeps his mouth and gestures on the beat with the answer, with no lag to give the trick away. Kids under six take it at face value.
  • Crush brings his friends along
    Disney names Marlin, Nemo, Squirt, Hank, and Bailey as possible drop-ins, so the Finding Dory half of the cast turns up as well as the original one.
  • You wait next to the fish tanks
    The holding area sits among the pavilion's exhibits rather than in a corridor, so a restless toddler has something to look at while the current show finishes.
  • Any height gets in, and nobody sits out
    Disney lists this one as Any Height. Infants come in on a lap, grandparents take a bench, and Rider Switch is not part of the plan here.

The bad

  • Your kid sits away from you
    Children go to a carpeted area at the front of the screen while adults take benches at the back. Parents who want a hand on their child in a dark room find that arrangement uncomfortable.
  • Only a handful of kids get called on
    Crush works through a few questions in fifteen minutes and the carpet is full. A child who walked in planning to talk to him can walk out in tears.
  • You wait out whatever show is running
    The theater runs back-to-back rounds, so arriving after the doors close means standing by until the room empties. Time that wrong with a tired toddler and the wait is the hard part of the visit.
  • Shy kids freeze when the mic arrives
    A cast member hands over the microphone and some children lock up on the spot. The performer covers for them gracefully, but it stings for a nervous kid.
  • The same bits come back on repeat visits
    The crowd work is live, but the performer falls back on a set of reliable gags between questions. Do the show twice in one trip and you will hear a few of them again.

Veteran tips

  • Dress your kid to stand out
    Crush picks people out by what they are wearing, so a neon shirt or an odd hat gives him something to call on. It is the closest thing to a strategy this show has.
  • Have the question ready before the doors open
    Kids who start thinking with a microphone in their face either freeze or repeat what the last kid asked. Settle on the question while you are still waiting outside.
  • Spend your Multi Pass somewhere else
    This sits in the second Multi Pass group at EPCOT, competing with Soarin' Across America and Spaceship Earth for the same two picks. Standby gets you into the next show anyway.
  • Tell your kid that Crush cannot reach everyone
    Frame the visit as going to watch Crush rather than going to talk to him. Kids who walk in expecting to listen have a good time either way.
  • Go in the morning if your kid wants a turn
    The pavilion fills as the day goes on. Early rounds run with fewer children on the carpet, which improves your own child's chances of getting picked.
  • Ride The Seas with Nemo & Friends first
    Both sit in the same pavilion, so do the ride and then walk over to the theater instead of making two trips to this corner of World Nature.
  • Put your own hand up
    Crush works the benches as well as the carpet, and the parents who play along get some of the sharpest exchanges in the show.
  • Stay in your wheelchair or ECV
    Disney lists this one as May Remain in Wheelchair/ECV, so there is no transfer at the door. Assistive listening and audio description are both offered here.

MouseHub editorial, written from visitor reports and official Disney sources. Last reviewed .

Sources