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View Full Version : Un-imaginative Imagination Pavilion



goofyskier
01-16-2010, 03:37 PM
Is it me or is the Imagination Pavilion well overdue for a major re-do? We just finished our vacation and, of all the areas in Epcot, this one seems to have so much more potential that what it is now. To me, this should have a marquee attraction and some really cool secondary shows. It is just a waste now. :(

Strmchsr
01-16-2010, 05:38 PM
Yep. You can find thread upon thread of people lamenting the current state of JII and begging for a return to the days of Figment and Dreamfinder the and upstairs dreamworks.

Ian
01-16-2010, 05:56 PM
No argument from me. I actually am sort of embarrassed for Disney that they still have an attraction based on Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.

That movie is 21 years old and it was corny when it was first released.

DizneyRox
01-16-2010, 06:25 PM
I'd say for the last 4 or 5 years we haven't even looked over at that corner of the park, and won't until something new appears in that spot. It's a shame, as it's one of the best looking buildings in Epcot.

fielin
01-16-2010, 06:30 PM
This pavillion is pure genius, on the contrary !

Disney is the only company that can make imagination look, smell and feel boring ! :D

PopeCharming
01-16-2010, 07:03 PM
Ha! So true, Fielin!

I agree with all the above. Its a sad, derivative echo of what was once a deeply imaginative ride. I'm not an 80s Epcot purist, but the original JII is one thing that Disney got right the first time, and they never captured that magic with the ride's two updates.

DigitalDaredevil
01-16-2010, 10:54 PM
Wow, 21 years old. Never realized it was that old. I don't mind the show, but I do not care for the Figment JIYI ride and most of the "un imaginitive" things in there.
It is the lease interesting part of Epcot to me. I rather have the Wonders of Life Pavilion open.

Imagineer1981
01-16-2010, 11:47 PM
agreed. I kinda wish they would bring back to old Figment ride for nostaliga, but I really think its a diamond in the rough, they could really explode that entire area and make it so much better

beksy
01-17-2010, 10:20 AM
I just wish they would get ride of the Honey I Shrunk the Audience. I'm scared to death of snakes and my sister is scared to death of mice so this is a no-go for us. I actually just rode the Figment ride for the first time (I don't think we ever rode that on any trip but I don't know why :confused:) I fell in love with the song and would ride it again just for that! Anybody know where I can get the song?

Strmchsr
01-17-2010, 12:13 PM
I fell in love with the song and would ride it again just for that! Anybody know where I can get the song?

Oh, sure. The Imagination song is from the original ride so it's on lots of Disney CDs. Check Itunes. They probably have a version of it, too.

thesplashmountaineer
01-17-2010, 01:38 PM
20 years ago it was one of my favorite attractions...now it's just a waste of space and a waste of time....

they should redesign a new attraction and replace HISTA by a new 3d movie starring Phineas and Ferb. It would fit with the "imagination" concept

coneygoil
01-17-2010, 05:06 PM
Back in the '80's and early '90's, JII was the COOLEST place. I can remember my imagination exploding from all the sights and wonders! Then Disney changed it and imagination turned into this boring mess of blah. Yes, I am proud to be one of the people who cries for Dreamfinder to come back! I would love for all the old JII to come back so my kids can grow up with it like I did. :figment:

SillySymphony
01-17-2010, 09:08 PM
Y'know... I feel your pain on this one... but I also consider that today, our Imagination's have been stretched by every known form of entertainment and learning device. 3-D movies, tactile video game controllers, scent-emitting microwave ovens.... Almost anything Disney served up would be historically inaccurate by the following week. Which is why I've felt that it should have been reduced to a dark ride of what we thought was imaginative in previous generations, a la "CoP" or Tomorrowland.

Strmchsr
01-18-2010, 07:57 AM
Y'know... I feel your pain on this one... but I also consider that today, our Imagination's have been stretched by every known form of entertainment and learning device.

I understand what you're saying, but the original JII wasn't about wowing us with new forms of imagination. With Dreamfinder and Figment it was about finding and unleashing your imagination in many different ways. That's what made it timeless.

Rhetoric2000
01-19-2010, 11:04 AM
Back in the '80's and early '90's, JII was the COOLEST place. I can remember my imagination exploding from all the sights and wonders! Then Disney changed it and imagination turned into this boring mess of blah. Yes, I am proud to be one of the people who cries for Dreamfinder to come back! I would love for all the old JII to come back so my kids can grow up with it like I did. :figment:

Yes! And you can replace JII with "Future World" in general and I'd agree equally.

I realise things move on, especially technology which is what a lot of Future World is meant to represent. But there is nothing now, outside of the Land pavilion, that is reminiscent of - even in spirit- the excitement about learning and about real future generations that Future World once had.

Do you rember that despite the great area and themes it covered there once seemed a real narrative from Spaceship Earth, to Wonders of Life, to Living with the Land, to World of Motion, to Horizons. It seemed like a smooth transition taking you on a clear, exciting journey.

It's now just a collective of haphazard attractions which have nothing whatsoever to do with each other.

Maybe Disney could have done with Dreamfinder on the team over the last 20 years because there is one thing that area has lacked over that time....

Goes4FastPass
01-19-2010, 02:39 PM
I don't think the Imagination "Works" area is so bad - although those take a picture of yourself and glue stickers on it and email it to counsin Clem kiosks can be a long time, uh, dare I say, "wasted".

I hope after the hopefully brief return of Capain EO the pavilion will get an ALL new 3D movie the hands on area AND the ride will be refurbed to fit the new movie.

I'd love to see the real return of Dreamfinder and Figment.

BrerGnat
01-19-2010, 06:24 PM
I realise things move on, especially technology which is what a lot of Future World is meant to represent. But there is nothing now, outside of the Land pavilion, that is reminiscent of - even in spirit- the excitement about learning and about real future generations that Future World once had.

Do you rember that despite the great area and themes it covered there once seemed a real narrative from Spaceship Earth, to Wonders of Life, to Living with the Land, to World of Motion, to Horizons. It seemed like a smooth transition taking you on a clear, exciting journey.

It's now just a collective of haphazard attractions which have nothing whatsoever to do with each other.

Maybe Disney could have done with Dreamfinder on the team over the last 20 years because there is one thing that area has lacked over that time....

I know exactly what you are saying. I am an "80's Epcot" purist!

However, I think a BIG part of the problem with Future World is that, as a society, we have become increasingly jaded by "new tech". Every day, there is something "new" for us to take in. Everyone walks around with, essentially, handheld computers (smartphones). Space Exploration is just not what it was in the 80's (the excitement about it), because so much of the exploration is done by drone spacecraft and we receive the info IMMEDIATELY via satellite. We can use Google Earth to see our whole planet in detail, from our homes. You can ALREADY play video games with people across the globe, with a simple internet connection and Xbox or Wii.

There isn't this grand notion of "what will tomorrow bring" because, we as a society are sort of maxed out with the amount of innovation that bombards us every day. It's sort of like "what else is left for them to come up with?" Everything for the past couple years has just been a smaller and/or more portable version of a previous innovation.

It would be fun for "Future World" to turn into "Past World." It would be neat to look back on the "innovations" of the 70's, 80's, 90's, etc. And, they could just keep "updating" it as each dacade passed! Would be more fun to show our children how things USED to be, rather than what they MAY become.

If you recall, much of what was "prophesized" by Epcot as our "future" has turned out to be humorously inaccurate. Sort of like Back to the Future II. That "future" is still 5 years away, and it seems so archaic! I mean, FAX machines in every room of the house??? FAX??? ;)

Kathy Jetson
01-20-2010, 02:04 AM
I don't think the Imagination "Works" area is so bad - although those take a picture of yourself and glue stickers on it and email it to counsin Clem kiosks can be a long time, uh, dare I say, "wasted".

I hope after the hopefully brief return of Capain EO the pavilion will get an ALL new 3D movie the hands on area AND the ride will be refurbed to fit the new movie.

I'd love to see the real return of Dreamfinder and Figment.

Is Captian EO returning to Epcot? I know it was going to be at Disneyland.

dumbo_buddy
01-20-2010, 06:45 AM
if you go to you tube and type in original journey into imagination you'll get a good fix!! i miss it!

Ian
01-20-2010, 08:05 AM
I hope after the hopefully brief return of Capain EO the pavilion will get an ALL new 3D movie the hands on area AND the ride will be refurbed to fit the new movie.I may be mistaken, but I think EO is only coming back at Disneyland, not Epcot.

dumbo_buddy
01-20-2010, 08:33 AM
i think i read that EO will be back to wdw in feb?

of course we will be there on sunday and miss it. oh well...

3d 22h 26m!!

BMan62
01-20-2010, 08:53 AM
i think i read that EO will be back to wdw in feb?

of course we will be there on sunday and miss it. oh well...

3d 22h 26m!!

Disneyland, not Walt Disney World.

TikiGoddess
01-24-2010, 08:33 AM
I would like to see JII turned into an interactive dark ride. Look at the technologies being used in TSMM and Spaceship Earth... why not have a ride where you get to USE your imagination to create a different ride experience every time?

Kathy

Tekneek
07-06-2010, 05:00 PM
This is one pavilion that is slowly being starved. It has so much potential, given the theme/subject it is tackling. However, it has been on a downhill slide for more than a decade.

The only reason a pavilion fails at Epcot is through neglect. Whatever the reasons are for that neglect (sponsor withdrawal, sponsor disinterest, Disney budgetary problems, etc), it is very sad to see it in action.

Tigerinvestigator
07-07-2010, 02:57 AM
Wow I get to be the first to disagree with everyone else. I loved the original and rode it too many times to count. But I remember how bad the second installment was and compared to that the current version is fantastic. Here is how I feel about it. My three kids have started growing up with the current version. They love it and my DD5 wants to ride it first on every trip (she loves the skunk). I find it very pleasant and relaxing. My fear is that with this much complaining it probably will be replaced with a futuristic attraction like Mission Space, Test Track etc and once again we will lose one of those easy to get on, relaxing to ride dark rides. Seems like they are slowly being picked off one by one. Replace HISTA, I'm all for it! Replace the current Image Works I'm all for it. But don't change the ride. My kids will feel the same way many of you do because they took the original. Lets start building tradition again folks......and be careful what we wish for because the Imagineers would have no problem taking figment and never letting us see him again. We thought that happened last time and next time we may not be as lucky. Just one fathers perspective that doesn't add up to a hill of beans in this crazy world!:thumbsup:

magicalmom
07-07-2010, 08:21 AM
I just went on youtube, and got my JII "fix" - I really miss it, and my kids weren't old enough when they saw it to remember it, so many thanks for the suggestion!

That being said, as a piece of theater, the original ride admittedly had some problems, but it seems as if Disney threw the baby out with the bathwater -

Instead, I believe they should have re-worked and re-recorded the dialogue (which was dated enough to be quaint, and a lot of people don't care for quaint.) In the ride surround, I would have updated only those areas which seemed originally to be done sort of on the cheap - for instance, the light beams could have been replaced with a computerized animation, as with Nemo at the Seas. That could have created a visual effect that was more in tune with the physical sets.

But those are just tweaks - the sorts of thing that you do during the out-of-town tryout of a very good show in the theater. Instead, Disney managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory with JII; I like Eric Idle, but he doesn't make up for replacing all that sensory richness with dark and industrial.

All of which leads me to wonder - does anybody know WHY Disney felt they had to do this??

Tekneek
07-07-2010, 08:34 AM
My complaints are not necessarily about the current incarnation of the ride, but about the trend with this pavilion. As time has gone by, there have been issues with broken items in the post-show, and now it would appear that Figment-related merchandise is coming to an end. I enjoy this ride, but there is no denying that this pavilion is less than it was when it opened. Also seems hard to deny that it has been on the decline for quite some time.

Considering Figment does not exist outside of Imagination at Epcot, he is surprisingly popular and beloved. They should do more with that, rather than less.

PopPhan
07-07-2010, 08:58 AM
I just went on youtube, and got my JII "fix" - I really miss it, and my kids weren't old enough when they saw it to remember it, so many thanks for the suggestion!

As a relative WDW newbie (first trip in 2003,) I was never able to see the original version of JII, nor was I able to visit the ImageWorks portion of the pavilion. After watching the 3-part Youtube video of this, I think it would really be neat for Disney to reopen the ImageWorks exhibits and revamp the JIYI ride to bring back some, if not all, of the original ride for the WDW 40th!!!

Stu29573
07-07-2010, 09:54 AM
All of which leads me to wonder - does anybody know WHY Disney felt they had to do this??

In part, yes. The ride system was always an issue. The beginning turntable was supposed to sink the cars up to the rest of the ride by grabbing and locking them at a pre-set spot. This often did not occur correctly, so the vehicles would be slightly out of position. Therefore, there were many many break downs to reline everything. When it was due for a rehab, they decided that they simply couldn't fix it, so they redid the whole thing. The new ride actually goes around the turntable part (which is now closed off)

I can only imagine that the retheming was an instance of "well, we've gone this far..." All in all it was obviously a mistake. The new ride, while much better than the second version, lacks the charm and whimsy of the original.

renecat
07-07-2010, 11:55 AM
They say Captain EO is back July 2 2010 for a limited run at Epcot. I loved this and hope it is still there when we go in Oct.

Figment104
07-07-2010, 12:04 PM
All of which leads me to wonder - does anybody know WHY Disney felt they had to do this??

I've often wondered this myself and when we went on the Keys to the Kingdom tour in the Magic Kingdom I did ask why they wouldn't bring Dreamfinder back. I remember the answer had something to do with copyright and split ownership (or something along those lines) with Kodak. So after reading this post I decided to google it and if you check out the wickipedia page for the pavilion it does give some backstory on why the ride was originally changed. Kind of interesting to read about!

I'm with everyone else though that the current ride isn't as good as the old one and the pavilion isn't anywhere near as good. It seems like the current ride has more to do with your sense rather than exploring with your imagination.

Long live Figment and Dreamfinder! :mickey:

DisneyLuver91
07-07-2010, 03:48 PM
Martin's Videos has an incredible video of the original and updates. It is all about the history and shows the whole pavilion! It makes me a little sad to think about what they did to the ride, but at least they didn't get rid of it completely.

darthmacho
07-08-2010, 02:20 PM
No argument from me. I actually am sort of embarrassed for Disney that they still have an attraction based on Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.

That movie is 21 years old and it was corny when it was first released.

Agreed. Also, do you think they could "imagine" something new that isn't tied in to one of their movies? Please?

If they do a refurb, I beg they don't tear down that wonderful structure. It's probably the only decent thing bout the pavilion! :mickey:

gollybass
07-08-2010, 02:20 PM
I have a couple of questions about this, having not been to Epcot since '92 and now being 26! I remember there being jumping fountains outside, are they still there? And also, in JII I remember a tunnel of various coloured lights you walk through, is that there still?

PopPhan
07-08-2010, 03:04 PM
I have a couple of questions about this, having not been to Epcot since '92 and now being 26! I remember there being jumping fountains outside, are they still there? And also, in JII I remember a tunnel of various coloured lights you walk through, is that there still?

The dancing fountains are still there, outside the entrance to HISTA. I have heard that the tunnel still exists, but it is on the second floor which is no longer accessible to regular guests.

gollybass
07-08-2010, 05:51 PM
thats a bummer, its one of my favorite memories!

garthbarth1
07-08-2010, 11:08 PM
They say Captain EO is back July 2 2010 for a limited run at Epcot. I loved this and hope it is still there when we go in Oct.

This would be amazing! I have never seen this and would love too! Im a huge MJ fan..I have a memorial shrine in my living room...can anyone share more info on this :)Thanks!

Tekneek
07-10-2010, 09:41 AM
So the original attraction was drawing more guests than Spaceship Earth? That's the claim being made in the Wikipedia article. I want to believe it, but I cannot be certain of the accuracy. If it is true, it is a major indictment of the changes made. To have gone from being a highlight of the park to a walk-on ride and mostly empty pavilion has to be considered a massive failure.

It is a demonstration of what pure awfulness can be produced when your first priority is saving money. In hindsight, it is almost like the New Coke/Classic Coke (w/ HFCS) story. People were more accepting of a changed "Classic Coke" after first having New Coke pushed at them. Likewise, we are far more accepting of the current ride incarnation because we know how awful the abomination known as Journey into YOUR Imagination really was.

Altair
07-10-2010, 10:32 AM
Martin's Videos has an incredible video of the original and updates. It is all about the history and shows the whole pavilion! It makes me a little sad to think about what they did to the ride, but at least they didn't get rid of it completely.

This video is amazing and includes the entire and very creepy "magic Journeys". We need to post a link to this video. It's the one that's 47 minutes long.:thumbsup:

Altair
07-10-2010, 10:34 AM
This video is amazing and includes the entire and very creepy "magic Journeys". We need to post a link to this video. It's the one that's 47 minutes long.:thumbsup:

If you have experienced this ride from it's begining the video will bring back wonderful memories.