A Whole New World IV (The Theme Park Rundown, Pt. 2)

Life’s a funny thing - just when you get into the swing of things, you get a bunch of curve balls thrown your way. Such is the case with the recent life of your humble blogger. Following a string of very well received posts in October, reality swallowed up most of my free time for a while (buying and moving into our first house, a difficult holiday season, illnesses, a death in the family, and our long-awaited Disney World vacation.) But for now, dear readers, we are back into a rhythm of sorts here at Started By A Condor - at least until the next batch of shit hits the proverbial fan.

This week, let’s get back to our recurring series of entries (now there are two of them, so I can call them recurring) seeking out references to the films we’ve reviewed in and around Disney’s theme parks. We’ve got a ripe batch this time around, so grab your preferred form of ticketing media and let’s get to it.

Shrek
I really shouldn’t even be talking about this one, since it’s not a Disney production - and the “review” itself was an April Fools gag (boy, I hope everyone realized this, and didn’t think I’d lost my mind - that happened later.) The actual 2001 film is itself chock-full of satirical jabs at Disney and its interpretations of fairy tale lore, as well as its theme parks. When Shrek and Donkey pass through the turnstiles to enter the kingdom of Duloc, it resembles nothing less than first light at the Magic Kingdom, with its well-stocked gift shops, piped-in music and gleamingly clean streets (which are notably vacant - perhaps it more closely resembles EuroDisney in its first year.) One can easily imagine producer (and Disney exile) Jeffrey Katzenberg rubbing his hands with glee at the skewering of his former employers.

However, proving that the corporate world is one without a sense of irony, Dreamworks has leased out Shrek (and the franchise it spawned) to various entertainment companies around the world, leading to a number of varied attractions featuring the namesake Ogre and his friends. Disney’s theme park rival, Universal, operates most of the Shrek-themed attractions worldwide, including an entire themed land based upon the franchise called (appropriately enough) Far, Far Away, located in their Universal Studios Singapore park. Home to a pair of family-friendly coasters (Enchanted Airways and Puss In Boots’ Giant Journey,) the land also contains what was once Shrek’s most prevalent attraction, Shrek 4D. Another in a long line of tiresome 3D shows with silly in-theater effects (such as water being blasted in your face, or your legs getting “mechanically tickled” to simulate bugs and rats crawling underfoot,) the attraction had, at one point, six operating iterations around the globe. As of 2018, however, only three Universal parks still run their “in-your-face” theater show, including the original in Orlando.

Shrek demands jazz hands!

The ongoing presence of Shrek and Donkey walk-around characters ensures that Katzenberg’s big green baby won’t be leaving the theme park world (or pop culture’s shared memory) anytime soon.

Make Mine Music
Back in the early, rose-tinted days of Started By A Condor, I hadn’t fully thought out my idea for a “theme park reference” article yet. And so to pad out my review of Make Mine Music, I unfortunately already brought up the one and only nod given to Walt Disney Productions’ 1946 musical anthology. That would be the Magic Kingdom’s replacement for Disneyland’s original “Coke Corner,” Casey’s Corner, named after the “Casey at the Bat” segment of the film. This quick-service eatery is your first (and likely only) choice when craving corn dog nuggets with plastic cheese dipping-sauce under the Florida sun. Beyond the name (and drawings of Casey and the opposing team's pitcher on the menu board,) the old-timey baseball theming gives no other references to the animated sequence. At least I didn’t notice any when I was there. Then again, I was too busy glaring a hole into the back of the guy in front of me in line who was taking forever to order despite the fact that ALL THAT’S ON THE DAMN MENU ARE HOT DOGS AND SODA!!

Okay, fine - there're desserts, too...

Candleshoe
Ah, Candleshoe - one of those odd little gems sitting nearly forgotten amidst Disney’s catalogue of live-action features. Vaguely beloved by those who recall it from their youth, this 1977 Jodie Foster vehicle has absolutely no representation in Disney’s theme parks - not even a name-check.

No, a Cinderella "shoe candle" from World of Disney doesn't count...

The Many Adventures of Winnie The Pooh
Well this one should be easy to spot, since the “silly old bear” and his Hundred Acre Wood pals have been theme park staples for over forty years. Walk-around characters based on A.A. Milne’s literary creations first began greeting guests at Disneyland in 1965, a year ahead of the release of “Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree” (Disney’s first Pooh short that was later included in the 1977 anthology film reviewed on this blog.) While the costumes for characters like Eeyore and Tigger have changed relatively little over the years, the initial design for Pooh himself was … an interesting one. Amongst the last of Disney’s early “big head” costumes, Pooh was portrayed as having a squat little body and a gigantic head, itself featuring a “Hunny” pot perched atop it (which was then topped with a little spring-mounted bee.) The cast member inside the costume (sorry kids) had their head inside the honey pot, with rods running down to the bears flappy arms that provided a modicum of movement. How the performer was able to make Pooh’s snout wiggle is best left to the imagination. A bizarrely proportioned affair that looked little like his animated counterpart, this design was astoundingly kept around with few alterations until 1989.

Pooh's got the pinkeye!

A quick aside: I find it amusing that until 1999 the character had his name (“POOH”) scrawled across the front of his shirt - as if kids wouldn’t recognize the big yellow bear without the tag.

Given the ongoing popularity of the characters, it’s somewhat surprising that a Winnie the Pooh attraction didn’t appear until 1999, when Imagineering replaced Magic Kingdom’s zany classic Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride with the gentle Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (a substantial downgrade, to be sure.) I remember reading that a Pooh dark ride had been planned for Disneyland’s Fantasyland expansion in 1983, but haven’t been able to find out why it never materialized. Walt’s park did get its own version of Magic Kingdom’s ride in 2003, replacing the Country Bear Jamboree - itself a Florida import from 1972 that had seen audiences decline severely over the years (unlike its perpetually popular forebear.) This version of the ride was later copied to Hong Kong in 2005 (where it was Fantasyland’s sole dark ride until their version of It’s a Small World opened in 2008) and Shanghai upon its 2016 opening. Tokyo Disneyland, on the other hand, pulled out all the stops with their own Pooh ride. Pooh’s Hunny Hunt, which opened in 2000, is an elaborate E-ticket attraction utilizing a state-of-the-art trackless ride system that whisks its riders along a random path through the colorful attraction, the roving honey pots occasionally grouping together to “dance” in synchronization to the soundtrack. I guess all the best stuff really is made in Japan.

Cars
Oddly enough, the first Pixar film that wasn’t greeted with universal acclaim ended up spawning what may be Imagineering’s most impressive stateside accomplishment since the turn of the new century. Likely conceptualized to combat Universal’s upcoming Wizarding World of Harry Potter for ultra-detailed adherence to its cinematic source material, when Cars Land opened in 2012 it single-handedly saved California Adventure’s reputation (the uber-charming Buena Vista Street notwithstanding) and began pulling greater numbers of guests from its sibling across the Esplanade.

Containing the usual array of gift shops and eateries, the re-creation of Radiator Springs hosts a trio of attractions: Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree (a spinning whip-ride,) Luigi’s Rollickin’ Roadsters (the US’s first use of the “trackless” ride system mentioned above,) which replaced Luigi’s Flying Tires, an attempted update of Disneyland’s failed Flying Saucers attraction from the early ‘60s, and the big E-ticket Radiator Springs Racers (a thematically rich thrill ride that wisely put the “slot car” technology from EPCOT’s Test Track to good use as a race simulator.) Most impressive, though, is the sheer amount of detail and sense of immersion the designers were able to draw from the animated film and translate into reality. Entering the land from the park’s performance corridor (or whatever they call that wide path that runs from Buena Vista Street, past Pacific Wharf and through Paradise Pier Park,) the confines of the small theme park melt away as the simulated desert town and surrounding mountain range seem to stretch on for miles.

Right, like it's ever this empty...

While California lucked out with the premier Cars-related attraction, the first one to open was actually in Paris, in the Toon Studio section of Paris’ second park, the dreary Walt Disney Studios Park - AKA the one that can be used as a bottom-of-the-barrel comparison point (“Hollywood Studios is half construction walls, but at least it’s better than the Walt Disney Studios Park” or “People are crapping all over the landscaping at Shanghai Disneyland, but at least it’s better than the Walt Disney Studios Park” or “My appendix just burst and I have to have emergency surgery, but at least it’s better than being at the Walt Disney Studios Park”.) Cars Quatre Roues Rallye is a simple carnival ride similar to Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree, featuring minimal theming such as 10-foot tall versions of the film’s Ornament Valley rock formations (which can be seen "life-sized" at DCA.)

Meanwhile, back at Walt Disney World, walk-around (or drive-around, I should say) characters such as Mater and Lightning McQueen could usually be seen at Hollywood Studios, at least until the Star Wars and Toy Story Land construction took out the backlot area. Beyond that, an entire section of Disney’s Art of Animation resort (one of their “value” level hotels) is themed around the film, featuring life-size models of the Cars characters and vistas of Radiator Springs painted on the hotel buildings. Okay, technically the hotels aren’t part of any theme park, but they’re still on-property so I’m gonna use ‘em. So there.

Honey, I Shrunk The Kids
Finally, a live-action film that spawned an attraction! Opened in December of 1990 at what was then called the Disney-MGM Studios, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: Movie Set Adventure was an oversized kiddie playground themed to look like a gigantic backyard like the one from the film (only with fewer killer scorpions.) I remember the Disney World travel videos made this imaginative playground look like a real blast, with a slide made to look like a roll of Kodak film, a giant dog nose that sprayed mist, and ride-on sized ants and bees! Kids must’ve enjoyed it, since this minor attraction outlived its perceived shelf-life and remained open until April of 2016, when it was razed to make way for Star Wars. By the time of its closing, many of the youngsters clamoring around the simulated anthills probably had never seen the original movie.

Radical!

My family and I encountered the Movie Set Adventure a mere three months before its removal, and were struck by just how small the playground actually was. And, like many a public park, the place was packed with rambunctious probably-too-old-for-a-playground kids (and their extended families finding a shady spot to park themselves); therefore our then 1-year old daughter was not able to partake in the microscopic jubilance.

Honey, I Blew Up the Kid
I can just hear you now, dear reader, crying, “Hey! Why don’t you combine the sequels together instead of separating them to pad out the article? You lazy bastard!” First of all, stop yelling at your screen - you sound like a crazy person. Second, I was actually going to discuss the Honey, I Shrunk… attractions together, when I realized that the two were actually tied directly to each individual film. While the Movie Set Adventure was clearly inspired by the “backyard jungle” setting of the first film, the 4D Honey, I Shrunk the Audience film that first opened in Epcot ‘94 (ugh) was, despite its name, based completely upon the sequel. Randal Kleiser returned to direct the full Szalinski family (sans oldest daughter, Amy,) played by the same actors - including Rick Moranis, Marcia Strassman, Robert Oliveri and both Daniel and Joshua Shalikar (as young Adam.) We’ve also got a broadly comic score by Bruce Broughton, utilizing his main theme from the 1992 film. Make no mistake, this attraction follows directly from the second film, even while its premise and title played off the popularity of the original. Hell, this filmed attraction feels more like a genuine sequel than 1997's direct-to-video Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves, which re-cast everyone save for Moranis (and really, really sucked.)

Does that say "Honey, I Shrek the Audience!?"

The film was actually quite clever, with a shrunken Adam begging his dad to fix him before “one of those Disney sweeper people” came by, and characters beseeching little Adam to put the theater back exactly where he found it, “otherwise the exits won’t line up.” The so-called 4D effects ranged from ingenious (the theater seats vibrating in time with the character’s giant footsteps) to silly (a blown-up Quark the dog sneezes on everyone at the film’s conclusion - lovely.) Being one of the earlier 4D attractions (it opened three years after Disney-MGM’s Muppet*Vision 3D,) perhaps theme park guests weren’t as burned-out on the genre as they later became. Sadly, as clever as a 4D attraction can be, in the end it’s still a film presentation - and park-goers become less inclined to continually revisit an experience that has no variation. Heck, by the time the attraction was duplicated on the west coast (as part of Disneyland’s ill-fated Tomorrowland redesign of 1998,) the steam had pretty much run out of the Honey, I Shrunk… franchise. In 2010, all iterations of the attraction - including ones in Paris and Tokyo (where it was known as MicroAdventure!) - closed down for good.

Interestingly, in each of the parks it occupied, Honey, I Shrunk the Audience originally replaced the kooky space musical adventure (and 4D precursor) Captain EO, which had opened in 1986 (in Disneyland and EPCOT Center; Tokyo premiered it the following year, and Paris in 1992.) Starring Michael Jackson, produced by George Lucas and directed by Francis Ford Coppola (now that’s star power!), the moonwalking masterpiece of pure ‘80s awesomeness holds the record for the most expensive film ever made, in terms of its cost-to-screentime ratio ($23.7 Million for 17 minutes.) When Honey, I Shrunk the Audience closed, it was replaced in all four parks with … Captain EO. Brought back as “Captain EO Tribute” in honor of the recent death of Jackson, this welcomed revival has since shut again, presumably for good, replaced by a collection Star Wars clips (in California,) an interactive Stitch show (in Tokyo) and a collection of Pixar shorts (in Florida and Paris.)

Before Honey, I Shrunk the Audience’s 2010 removal, its character Dr. Nigel Channing (played by Monty Python huckster Eric Idle) spread throughout EPCOT’s Journey Into Imagination pavilion like an English-accented cancer, killing off poor Dreamfinder and sapping the glass pyramids of creativity. Despite attempts to inject some whimsy in 2002, Channing continues to infect the attraction to this day. One only hopes little Figment will eventually make it through okay.

He's not the Messiah - he's a very naughty boy.

Tangled
The film that catapulted Walt Disney Animation back to the top of its game, 2010’s Tangled has been simultaneously omnipresent and surprisingly subdued in its theme park presence. While the breakout success of 2013’s Frozen led Disney to scramble and re-theme EPCOT’s Maelstrom attraction, the earlier success (and continued popularity) of Tangled has seemingly caused them to create everything but a new (or even repurposed) attraction. Rapunzel herself has become a staple of Princess meet and greet locations around the globe, and she and Flynn appear in multiple parades (including the wonderful Festival of Fantasy parade at the Magic Kingdom.) There have been Tangled-themed stage productions as well, ranging from the simple ("Storytelling at the Royal Theatre" in Disneyland’s Fantasy Faire) to the extravagant (the Broadway-styled Tangled: The Musical, performed aboard the Disney Magic of the Disney Cruise Line.) Heck, Rapunzel and her beau are even featured at a character breakfast at the Trattoria al Forno restaurant at Disney’s Boardwalk.

And yet the biggest addition to a Disney park featuring the hit animated film comes not in the form of a ride or a walk-around character, but that of a john. In 2013, as part of the Magic Kingdom’s Fantasyland expansion, the site of the long-shuttered Skyway station (along the pathway from the Haunted Mansion and Columbia Harbor House) was expanded with a detailed recreation of Rapunzel’s tower, fronted by a babbling stream and a small, lantern-adorned square - built around an exquisitely themed restroom. A nice example of newly-built theming blending seamlessly into Fantasyland’s pre-existing architecture, the area around the “Rapunzel crappers” is a nice addition to the park, featuring a large seating area and a gentle, folksy music loop. It’s just kind of a shame that such a fine movie is represented by a toilet.

I keep wonderin', and wonderin', and wonderin' when will my BM begin...

In Search of the Castaways
Unsurprisingly, Disney’s rip-roaring 1962 adaptation of Jules Verne’s adventure novel gets no direct mention in any of its theme parks. Verne himself appeared in Animatronic form at the beginning of EPCOT Center’s beloved Horizons - but that doesn’t really count, does it?

Sacre bleu!

Bambi
Our last movie in this "Theme Park Rundown" is a true classic of animated cinema, beloved by generations of film-goers. Surprisingly, however, an attraction based upon Disney’s 1942 coming-of-age fable has never been made. Beyond a Bambi topiary in EPCOT’s annual Flower & Garden Festival, there are rarely seen Thumper and Flower walk-around characters (as well as Thumper’s girlfriend, referred to as Ms. Bunny, whom my family actually encountered at Animal Kingdom on a particularly busy day this past January.) Clips from Bambi appear in the lobby of California Adventure’s “Disney Animation” building, and images of the films characters appear in the tile-work and shower curtains at the Grand Californian and Disney World’s Wilderness Lodge resorts (again with the bathrooms?).

Man is in the forest ... and he's setting up concession booths...

Perhaps the films strong conservationist message (and vilification of mankind) doesn’t lend itself to a theme park ride. In the end, maybe it’s for the best; somehow not having Bambi and his woodland friends shoved in ones face makes the original film feel a bit more special.

Well, we certainly hit some pay-dirt for movie references this time around. There are some more gems to come in future "Theme Park Rundowns," so let’s hope this blogger can continue writing long enough to get to them all!

A Whole New World III (Reflections of Earth: EPCOT Pt. 3)

Things fall apart; the Center cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world…
      -W.B. Yeats, The Second Coming

Purple reign

In a way, Walt Disney may have died at just the right time. Over his years as a public figure, the man went through a number of changes, both personally and professionally (as everyone does, of course.) With his early successes with Mickey Mouse and Snow White he came to be seen as an artistic wunderkind, warmly embraced by Hollywood's elite and the intellectual set. As time went on and Walt Disney Productions came to face failure just as often as prosperity, Walt's worldview slowly soured into something more cynical. He was quick to blame labor issues at the studio on "communist infiltration," a sentiment no doubt nurtured by his growing number of friendships with influential conservatives like Richard Nixon and his cronies. When the studio's films weren't consistently performing well with audiences, Walt turned his attention to Disneyland - something that, unlike film, could be controlled in a much more continuous and "hands-on" manner. From cartoons, to movies, to theme parks, Walt seemed like he was always trying new and more direct ways to assert some kind of control over an uncontrollable world - and a real-life city was the next logical step.

Please hold all questions until the end

And yet during this time, the uncontrollable and unpredictable landscape outside of Disney's interior world was changing rapidly - and Walt's one-time revolutionary mind was not keeping up. While those who thought as Walt did considered his company an American institution, producing traditional, quality family amusements, the rest of the world was increasingly viewing Disney's entertainment machine as a rusted dinosaur, part of the "old guard." The counterculture movement had already come onto the scene by 1966, and hippy "flower power" was about to explode during the "summer of love" the following year (and then just as quickly implode by the end of the decade.) Conversely, with American homes being privy to the daily horrors of war thanks to nightly television broadcasts from Vietnam, Disney's kinder, gentler means of escapism didn't seem to be cutting it any longer. While Walt may have thought a model city of tomorrow could go a long way to solving society's ills, it's hard to judge what elements of America's rapidly-changing society he felt were the ones that needed curing.

Soarin' over Saigon

Many grouse that we could’ve been witness to a better society had Walt’s “city of the future” been there to show us all the way; personally, I believe the truth would’ve been much worse. When Walt died, his E.P.C.O.T. city remained a great "what might have been," a last undelivered gift from a beloved old legend. How different it would’ve been if he'd lived to see the project to it's completion, and to witness it's real impact upon the world. As alluded to in the first of my EPCOT articles, while Walt may have believed he’d hit upon a solution to the “problems of America’s cities,” it’s more likely that the people within those cities would’ve viewed Walt’s great gleaming tower as a joke; a quaint, unwanted, backwards-thinking idea of what the future should look like, ran with unwelcomed assistance by huge, faceless corporations lead by out-of-touch millionaires. It’s a sad thought, but had Walt lived beyond his brief 65 years upon this rapidly-changing Earth, he likely would’ve lived to see his legacy reduced to a laughing stock.

And so the Disney company created what I think was a more sensible alternative to it’s founder’s last big idea - and yet nearly bankrupted itself in doing so. Over the course of more than a decade, from planning to designing to construction (the largest construction project on Earth at the time,) EPCOT Center cost the company as much as $1.4 billion to create - that’s over $3.5 billion today, adjusted for inflation. For a still relatively small corporation that had invested over $330 million just a decade earlier for “Phase 1” of Walt Disney World (and whose underwhelming performances at the box office throughout the 1970s had lost them a considerable amount,) this basically meant that the entire future of their working capital was tied up in this single project.

Oh, those work crews - what a bunch of clowns...

And yes, you read that right: EPCOT Center alone cost nearly three times as much to build as it cost to purchase 47 square miles of central Florida land, design and build canals and flood-control systems to redistribute it’s swamps, create an internal road and freeway system, build miles of monorail beams and trains, the Seven Seas Lagoon, the Fort Wilderness Campground, The Contemporary Resort, the Polynesian Village and The Magic Kingdom. Wow.

The finished EPCOT Center was truly a sight to behold: a vast wonderland of serene gardens, glittering fountains and massive, modernist buildings containing the most advanced theme park attractions in the world. Each pavilion addressed a real-world topic and brought them to vivid life by either bringing them down to a human scale (such as the World of Motion's discussion of transportation history which featured an Animatronic couple driving to a picnic,) or blowing them up to spectacular proportions (as in the Universe of Energy, where a lesson in fossil fuels took riders through a jungle full of dinosaurs, and then into a massive theater for a laser-light show finale.) The central Communicore pavilion introduced many to the world of digital technology for the first time, and gave glimpses into the future of instantaneous telecommunication that we now take for granted.

It’s hard to put it into words, really - there were (and still are) those who simply “got it”; who understood that what was represented at EPCOT Center was more than just simple amusements and fun (not that there wasn’t plenty of fun to go around,) but something greater. At it’s best, EPCOT left these high-minded individuals - both children and adults - excited to know more about the world; it managed to inspire them to actually work toward a better future. Granted, there were many - let’s call them “mouth breathers” - who whined that the park was boring, and that they didn’t come to Disney World to learn stuff. For them, the Magic Kingdom was just a monorail ride away, where they could ride Space Mountain until they got whiplash.

This, kids, is called a "print ad"

Yet it was the massive over-spending on this mammoth monument to mankind that would lead to it’s downfall. From the outside, the investment seemed to be worth it: attendance to both the new park and the rest of the resort increased steadily, with guests extending their vacations now that there were a pair of massive theme parks to explore. Their feedback was mostly positive, especially once the initial setbacks and technical glitches typical of a theme park’s “shakedown” period were worked out. But in the wake of the park’s opening, the company was left indebted, financially unstable and ripe for takeover by corporate raiders. As has been discussed on this blog before, thanks to the intervention of Roy E. Disney the company made it through the ‘80s still intact, with ex-Paramount president Michael Eisner at the helm.

Eisner quickly did a number of very good things for Disney. He almost single-handedly rescued it’s filmmaking divisions from becoming complete write-offs in Hollywood, and turned the company's overall fortunes around. In regards to EPCOT, however, it was clear that Eisner could be counted among those who didn’t “get it.” That his first instructions regarding the park was for the Imagineers to come up with concepts for a “Movie Pavilion” (an idea he was so fond of that he quickly had it expanded into it’s own theme park) is telling, as it’s hard to reconcile a topic like the entertainment industry with EPCOT Center’s “big concepts” like energy and imagination. Under Eisner, EPCOT began to be referred to as Disney’s “Discovery Park” in company literature and brochures, a motto more befitting a local children’s science center than a spectacular park meant to “entertain, inform and inspire” (as is noted on it’s dedication plaque.)

Just begun to dream 

There was something else happening around the same time that forecast dark clouds over EPCOT Center’s sunny skies. While the rise of counterculture in the ‘60s would’ve made Walt’s E.P.C.O.T. an outmoded endeavor, the change from city to a forward-looking theme park couldn’t have come at a more appropriate time. Following the nightmare of Vietnam and the sucker-punch that was Watergate, the US was allowed to breathe a sigh of relief with the national celebrations focused around the bicentennial. As the 1980s dawned, the country seemed like it was ready to put a more positive spin on it’s future once again. With such unifying events as the pop-culture phenomenon of Star Wars and (as much as I hate to say it) the rise to power of “hooray for our side” president Ronald Reagan, the idea of futurism seemed to be on it’s way back into the collective consciousness. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t last.

It’s not something that anyone would’ve recognized at the time, but in 1982 America was presented with two different and distinct pop-culture visions of it’s own future: one was EPCOT Center, the other was Blade Runner. At the time, the “winner” of this ideological tug-of-war seemed clear, as EPCOT Center drew plaudits and crowds while Blade Runner tanked at the box office. However, as the decade passed more and more praise and attention began to be paid to Ridley Scott’s film, and it’s bleak vision of a dark, unappealing near-future came to influence a number of other works of popular art. This was concurrent with an alarmingly rapid turn toward cynicism as the ‘90s sighed into existence. It almost felt as if the upbeat energy of the ‘80s had shown itself to be more facade than fact, and America faced the turn of the new century with a shrug and a “well, now what?” Postmodernism, snark and mistrust of authority became the rules of the day, which stood in stark contrast to EPCOT Center’s corporate-fueled positivity; dreams of “Mars high school” gave way to cyberpunk. After being open for only a decade, EPCOT Center was already in danger of becoming a relic.

Deckard attempts to decipher his guide map at The Electric Umbrella

Looking back now with knowledge of the decades which followed, Disney’s best bet to deal with their “EPCOT problem” probably would’ve been to let the park quietly keep it’s head down, lightly updating a few attractions and adding new ones along the way. I say this as it seems the park as originally built would’ve been “rediscovered” and reevaluated by a more open-minded post-Gen X crowd (would this be millennials?) who just may have recognized it as a modern classic. Unfortunately, Disney did just the opposite.

Bowing to the vaguely-defined pessimism of the era (and the "mouth breathing" minority whining for less intellectual distractions,) between 1994 and 2000 Disney altered, renovated, gutted or destroyed most of EPCOT Center’s classic attractions - some of which were barely a decade old. Imagine if, within the span of a few years, Disneyland had The Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean, the Haunted Mansion, Splash Mountain and Space Mountain all removed and replaced with new or heavily-altered attractions. Seems improbable, right? And yet this is precisely what was done to EPCOT Center, the difference being that it was still a young enough park that it’s signature attractions were unfortunately not yet recognized as “untouchable” classics.

Simple, elegant.
(Photo courtesy Yesterland.com)

Throughout the park, the originally unified design philosophy was soon thrown out the window. The Imagineers who’d designed the place had been very conscious of building a harmonious environment, with complimentary color schemes, unified fonts across all attractions and buildings, and leaving enough open "spaces to breathe" between the park’s bold pavilions. With the coming of the ‘90s, however, each new attraction was handled by a different team of young Imagineers eager to prove themselves, and little attention was paid to the why of what had come before. Colors became garish, new signs and random "shade structures" were bolted onto the once deceptively simple pavilion buildings, and dozens of new merchandise and snack carts came to be scattered along the once uncluttered walkways. The iconic Spaceship Earth was even bedazzled for nearly a decade by a massive, cartoonish Mickey Mouse arm/magic-wand combination (following it's initial installation as a millennium celebration decoration.)

What. The. Fuck.

To add further insult to injury, it was also at this time that Eisner’s Disney decided that the park’s name was too old-hat, and so after losing it’s heart, EPCOT was stripped of it’s Center. The most mind-boggling (and embarrassing) part of this was that the initial new name chosen for the park was (wait for it …) Epcot ‘94. Yep, in 1994 all of the park’s signage, guide maps, merchandise, and all of the road signs and bus stops on Walt Disney World property were updated to reflect EPCOT’s new “NOW!” name. The marketing geniuses that came up with this must’ve been in for quite the shock when January rolled around, and suddenly it was 1995! So once again everything needed to be updated, and the park was re-re-christened - yeah, that’s right - Epcot ‘95. Someone must’ve finally realized the futility of this plan, for by the end of the year the park was finally re-re-re-christened Epcot. The name of the place was now just that - a name, a made-up word with no pretense of standing for “Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow,” signifying nothing. Epcot had finally become just another theme park - a collection of amusements without a center.

To see how high the wave crested before it came crashing down, there’s no better case-study than the sad ballad of Horizons. Planned as an opening day attraction but, like Journey Into Imagination, it’s massive and complex ride systems were nowhere near ready in time, and so it opened in October of 1983 (exactly one year after the park had.) Horizons sat on the park’s east side, between the Universe of Energy and General Motor’s World of Motion, looking like some giant jewel or angular spacecraft that had just landed. A spiritual successor to Walt’s Carousel of Progress, the General Electric-sponsored pavilion contained only one massive attraction, which suspended riders over a number of detailed sets populated by Animatronic figures, as well as through giant “Omnimax” film-screen tunnels that gave the impression of flight. Horizons pulled together all of the various themes of EPCOT Center into one grand exploration of a promising future. Guests followed several generations of a family as they traveled (or telecommuted) from their homes in a futuristic city, a technologically advanced farm, and an underwater lab to their youngest relative’s birthday party on an orbiting space station. At the ride’s conclusion, each ride vehicle was given a choice of which terrain they would like to traverse on their way “back to the 20th century” (space, underwater, or a desert colony,) in a minor precursor to Disney’s “Soarin’” attractions. A big hit with guests and within the amusement industry, many considered Horizons to be the greatest (non-thrill ride) theme park attraction ever created, surpassing even Disneylands’s original Pirates of the Caribbean for artistic endeavor and thematic unity. As a matter of fact, it was from Horizons that the world was blessed with the oft-quoted “motivational phrase” - often erroneously attributed to Walt Disney himself - “If we can dream it, we can do it.” The crowning achievement of the park's mission statement to “entertain, inform, and inspire,” Horizons was truly the shining light at EPCOT’s center.

Horizons - all shining and new ...

By the early 1990s, however, Disney seemingly had Horizons closed more often than it was open. When GE chose not to renew their sponsorship of the ride in 1993, it quickly began to show signs of disrepair - as if Disney couldn’t be bothered to replace broken-down Animatronics or missing ceiling tiles if another company wasn’t helping foot the bill. In December of 1994, the attraction was suddenly shuttered - barely a decade after it’s grand opening. Then just as suddenly, to compensate for the extended closures of both Universe of Energy and World of Motion, Disney re-opened Horizons at the end of 1995. The attraction, by now in a sorry state, chugged along, uncared for, for a further four years before it was unceremoniously closed for good at the end of 1999. As the new millennium dawned, the pavilion all about the future was completely demolished. To this day, no one seems completely certain what led to the decision to suddenly axe the beloved attraction - cost-cutting after GE pulled it’s sponsorship is likely a big reason, as is the rumor that a sinkhole developed under part of it’s foundation. Disney, at one point, claimed they needed to build an even larger structure to house the ride’s replacement, space-training simulator Mission: SPACE. However, when the new attraction opened in 2003, it was housed within a significantly smaller (and visually less interesting) building than Horizons had been. Mission: SPACE’s centrifuge-based experience has since gone on to send more people to local hospitals complaining of nausea and chest-pains than any other attraction in Orlando, and is probably best known for seeing two of it’s riders die from pre-existing conditions after riding in 2005 and 2006.

The end of the future

Since the turn of the century EPCOT has more or less coasted along with a hodgepodge of attractions and experiences that sometimes make attempts at the old “edutainment” mantra. But the focused futurist unity of EPCOT Center is long gone. More often than not it seems as though Disney has to hide or sneak in any educational material it tries to introduce to it’s increasingly dumbed-down audience, like a wary parent blending vegetables into a picky child’s marinara. More and more, attractions are being changed-out for ones based on Disney’s successful film franchises - the Living Seas pavilion is now The Seas with Nemo and Friends, Norway’s eccentric Maelstrom attraction was replaced by Frozen Ever After, and just recently the venerable Universe of Energy (which had itself already been extensively refurbished into “Ellen’s Energy Adventure” in 1996, featuring Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Nye "The Science Guy" - it didn’t age well) was shuttered for good to make way for a Guardians of the Galaxy-themed roller coaster. Thought provoking inspiration begot snarky self-referentiality begot vacuous synergy.

Disney states that massive changes are on the way for Future World in the coming decade, ones they promise will remain “true to the spirit of EPCOT’s roots.” The increasingly disillusioned part of me is quick to think “bullshit” - Disney nowadays is quick to offer such empty platitudes while they shill overpriced merchandise with “retro” EPCOT Center logos slapped on. I half expect the entirety of Future World to be re-branded as “Marvel’s Iron Man: Stark Expo” or some crap like that.

Things to come?

And yet, overall, I remain hopeful - perhaps naively so. No real fan of EPCOT can call themselves such without having a healthy stable of optimism stored somewhere deep inside. And, in spite of my bitter ramblings, the EPCOT of today remains a unique and fulfilling place to visit. The World Showcase, while typically infested with stumbling drunk “vacation-liberated” soccer Moms after nightfall, remains much as it did in the ‘80s, as the Imagineers' ability to create scaled-down versions of real-world destinations turned out to be their greatest and most timeless skill. Just as it was at the beginning, dining and shopping continue to be important aspects of the World Showcase experience; besides having the highest concentration of varied and interesting restaurants on property, it also features the most unique collection of “anti-gift shops” to be found in central Florida.

In Future World, meanwhile, some of the worst offenses from the ‘90s have been altered or softened somewhat. Journey Into Imagination’s short lived replacement (the “cleverly” titled Journey Into YOUR Imagination,) which did away with all whimsy and suggested that riders had no imagination whatsoever, was revamped to reintroduce Figment after massive fan backlash (though Dreamfinder is still long gone.) Though an improvement, the ride is currently in dire need of a better, more permanent replacement. Over in The Land pavilion, the peppy Kitchen Kabaret was replaced in the ‘90s by the obnoxious song parody-heavy Food Rocks; this show was thankfully removed, and in it’s place now sits the queue for Soarin’ (a California Adventure import that was added in 2005,) which was itself updated just last year into Soarin’ Around the World. While it’s addition to the agricultural-themed pavilion makes little sense, there’s no denying that it’s a magnificent attraction. And even Test Track, GM’s thrill-ride replacement for the World of Motion (which opened in 1999, after a much-delayed refurbishment of over 3 years,) which originally featured the glamorous and magical experience of careening around in a test-dummy car, was re-done in 2012 to deliver a “computerized” TRON-like experience; a better fit for Future Word, at least aesthetically.

Above all, what persists in being most striking about EPCOT - and a source of much thought and inspiration - is it’s composition and architecture. While Disney may have tried to distract guests from WED Enterprises’ sleek and monumental design choices with extraneous add-on details, ugly signage and an over-abundance of merchandising carts, the impressive scale of the pavilions and the way each one speaks to the theme within remains brilliant. EPCOT’s layout is still the most thoughtfully-considered of all Disney’s theme parks, extrapolating Disneyland’s “hub and spoke” design into a complex double-hub. And the rolling lawns and lovely gardens that still exist in the park continue to offer a thoughtful serenity rarely found in theme parks today. Summed up best in a quote from blogger FoxxFur (in a 2007 post from her blog, Passport To Dreams Old & New): “EPCOT’s design is too strong to be overshadowed by a gaudy bandstand ringed in pink neon ... no matter how hard you try, you can take EPCOT out of 1982, but you can’t take 1982 out of EPCOT.”

Reflections of (Spaceship) earth

Over the past decade, pop-culture’s cynical edge has dulled into a weary mess of flash-in-the-pan social media fads. Science, like far too many realities in recent years, has astoundingly been politicized; if you dare bring up climate change you’re automatically accused of pushing a specific liberal agenda. Attempts to modernize American industry or create new, more socially and environmentally responsible technologies leads to accusations of “killing jobs.” Middle America has grown an exasperating tendency to move backward as quickly as possible in this regard, as if a nation full of blacksmiths is suddenly demanding to halt the proliferation of the automobile in order to keep their industry growing, rather than learning a new trade. After a brief reprise of social positivism during the early years of the Obama administration, our cultural spirit of hope has come crashing down; the continuing national nightmare of Trumpism having nurtured a growing revolt against decency and fact, as well as emboldening a startling number of reprehensible hate groups. Much like in 1982, as the Cold War was heating back up, a divided world lives with the specter of escalating nuclear tensions. Our dreams of progress have been revealed as mere delusion, and the chaos society finds itself in has, far too late, made it sickeningly obvious just how truly fucked we are as a culture.

Perhaps, if things get much worse, the human race will realize that it collectively needs something to strive for. As lame as it sounds, the world may never have needed the wondrous future promised by EPCOT Center as much as it does now.

A Whole New World II (One Little Spark: EPCOT Pt. 1)

What started as a typical “TV Detour” entry has rapidly grown out of control. So rather than write out the world's-longest review of an old television special (which probably doesn’t deserve all that many words,) I’ve instead decided to break my article out into 3 separate entries, going through some general background and random thoughts on EPCOT, it’s opening and it’s legacy (which deserves many more and far better words than I could ever muster.) So, as always, my advance apologies. Now let’s take our cue from the EPCOT attractions of old, and take a look back at where we’ve been, where we are, and a look into the future world.

You may not realize this, but the 21st century began not with a countdown to midnight at the tail-end of 1999, amidst a minor panic over the impending Y2K doomsday. No, it actually began in October of 1982 - or at least that’s what The Walt Disney Company once purported to be the case. 35 Years ago, Disney unveiled their biggest and riskiest venture to date (it feels like I say that a lot, however it may be more true here than one realizes,) with the opening of EPCOT Center, their first theme park without a castle. To further differentiate it from it’s Fantasyland brethren, at the time of opening it also sported no thrill rides, no costumed Disney characters, and readily-available alcohol and fine dining. Massive beyond even the scale of the outsized Magic Kingdom just a monorail ride away, here was something completely unique, for Disney and indeed the entire world - mature, educational, thematically dense, entertaining, inspirational - a spectacle beyond all else that celebrated the achievements of humanity by looking back at where we’ve been and forward to where we could be headed in the future. Those lucky enough to visit this city on a hill in it’s original iteration left inspired and in awe of what they’d experienced - at least when all the rides were working. And yet there was (and still is, to a lesser extent) a vocal minority who felt that what they were given was a blasphemy to the name of Disney; for them, what had been created was not what had been promised.

The man with a plan (sort of)

For those who don’t know the whole tangled history of EPCOT Center (later to be shortened to simply ‘Epcot’ - more about that in Pt. 3,) let’s go back to the early 1960s. Walt Disney was known not to be one for repeating past successes, and therefore had little interest in creating a “Disneyland 2.” This was despite the wishes of others within the company, as well as parades of representatives from across the United States (and abroad) who wanted a repeat of the financial windfall that had befallen Anaheim for their own cities. However, since the opening of his “little park surrounded by a railroad,” one thing had gnawed away at Walt’s mind: the glut of cheap, tacky gift shops and motels that had quickly set up shop just steps away from his Southern California wonderland. Added to his perception of the physical and societal deterioration occurring in America’s cities (at least from his increasingly conservative point-of-view,) Walt had a spark of inspiration: why not turn the Disney company’s resources toward a loftier goal than simple entertainment - that of creating a fully-functioning city? He immersed himself in writings about city planning (such as Ebenezer Howard’s 1898 work Garden Cities of To-morrow,) and set his Imagineers to work creating concepts for a self-contained city, utilizing the lessons learned about urban design and land management from building and operating Disneyland. Walt was over the moon for the idea of creating a fully-functional “city of tomorrow,” a company-owned community employing the newest ideas for construction, mass-transit and experimental technologies. Planned as a “living model” more than an autonomous municipality (the roughly worked-out idea being that the residents would rotate in and out on a tenant basis,) he soon hit upon the perfect acronym for his vision: E.P.C.O.T. - the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow.

Harbor Boulevard in Anaheim, soon after Disneyland's opening

The entire conception of what would become Walt Disney World was based almost solely upon Walt’s burgeoning plans for E.P.C.O.T. Disney sought to purchase as much land as possible within their chosen site outside Orlando, both to accommodate all future plans for the city and it’s neighboring "industrial section," and to leave intrusions from the outside world as far away as possible. While the desired land was being procured, Walt worked feverishly with his Imagineers at WED Enterprises, creating further plans and concepts for E.P.C.O.T., as well as for the massive undertaking necessary in turning the miles of Floridian swamp into usable land. That the Disney World property would include a new theme park, the Magic Kingdom, as part of the deal was a foregone conclusion - but Walt left the design and planning of the park to a team of (more than) capable Imagineers, focusing his energy on E.P.C.O.T.

Soon, the cat was out of the bag that it was Disney that had discreetly bought up so much land. A few hastily-arranged press conferences followed, in which Walt revealed that they were planning a vast entertainment complex with a “city of the future” within. He even went to the trouble of having a 25-minute presentation film made, showcasing the concept art for “The Disney World project,” as well as his plans for E.P.C.O.T. (two versions were actually made - one for showing to the public and one made for possible corporate partners - which you can watch here - since Walt felt the project would require assistance from other US industries.) Wowed by artist Herb Ryman’s evocative paintings of a futuristic, radially-designed city with a multi-story resort hotel at it's center, many in the press and the public naturally couldn’t wait to see what the beloved company and it’s head wizard would come up with. Unfortunately for them, Walt went and died before any serious work began on his “city of tomorrow.” The E.P.C.O.T. film turned out to be the very last filmed appearance of the world-renowned storyteller.

The paining that haunted a company for decades

Walt Disney Productions, a ship sailing through uncharted waters, was now suddenly without it’s captain. With no completed map left to follow, it was left to brother Roy and the Imagineers to decide what course should be taken. While work ploughed ahead to finish “Phase 1,” work on Walt’s E.P.C.O.T. concept was pushed aside. Following the opening of “The Vacation Kingdom,” work slowly picked back up on the Community of Tomorrow. Before long, the realization came that without Walt’s guidance (and ability to sweet-talk other corporations into sharing their ideas and technologies) there was no realistic way to make his not-fully-thought-out dream come to life as originally planned. Quietly, the “city of tomorrow” concept was allowed to die.

Not wanting to let the idea of Walt’s final project fizzle out completely, his disciples were left to ponder what other possibilities could be used to bring some kind of workable concept to life. Many ideas were bandied about, the most sensible being splitting the “city” into a pair of separate world’s fair-style districts within the Florida property: one an international shopping and cultural center, the other a futuristic campus for scientific discussion and technological education. Faced with few corporate sponsors and even fewer foreign governments willing to participate in the separate ventures (especially now that a “city of the future” was nowhere to be seen,) one day Imagineer John Hench (with assistance from Marty Sklar, at least according to him) pushed the models for the “World Showcase” and the “Future World Center” together. From this point on, work began in earnest on what was soon dubbed EPCOT Center - the thought being that this new “theme center” would be the focal point to learn about various humanistic topics, celebrate world cultures, and to discuss projects related to “the spirit of EPCOT” already in place around property.

Early concept for World Showcase - adjacent to the Seven Seas Lagoon

In doing this, Disney, which had been alluding to Walt’s city as a project "in the works" for years, slyly made the somewhat incredible declaration that Walt Disney World - the entire 43 square-mile property - was itself EPCOT. That’s right folks - that painting you remember seeing, with the gleaming tower sticking up from an enclosed city-center, has already existed as a mostly undeveloped-looking woodland you whiz by on your way to the Magic Kingdom’s parking lot! While it’s certainly true that many of the advancements and practices put into use at Disney World are ones that would be utilized in a “city of tomorrow” - beyond the use of the monorail system as viable mass-transit, there was a pneumatic-tube trash collection system that evacuates all waste to a central clean-burning energy plant, and underground “utilidors” that run beneath the Magic Kingdom (allowing for speedy cast member transport, as well as easy access to utility services.) These, however, are mostly out-of-view infrastructural elements that serve the opposite purpose of a "model city."

For better or for worse, the reality was that by the late 1970s attempting to create a real working “city of the future” made far less sense (and undoubtedly fewer cents) than creating a second theme park under the Florida sun. But my goodness, what a park they made. We’ll get to EPCOT Center as built in the next article.

EPCOT Center entrance plaza concept art

Before we close, however, let’s attempt to address the $64,000 question: could Walt Disney’s E.P.C.O.T. have worked? It’s a complicated question, really. Do I personally think he could’ve gotten it built? Yes. If any one man could’ve made it happen - and I think only one man could’ve - it was Walt Disney. I imagine the finished cityscape would’ve differed significantly from the well-known concept painting and subsequent model made for display in the Carousel of Progress post-show (which can now be seen on the Magic Kingdom’s PeopleMover attraction, by the way.) On the other hand, that Walt was counting on the participation of several different major companies, not just for sponsorship but actual participation in a sort of “American industry think-tank,” seems naïve. It’s extremely unlikely (to put it mildly) that, in a capitalist society, a bunch of corporations would freely and gladly share their plans and most high-profile R&D projects with the rest of the world (including a steady stream of curious tourists,) when their very life-blood depends on keeping their “latest thing” under wraps as long as possible.

The bigger question, though, is would it have worked? Not even thinking about whether or not the “model city” could’ve been expanded or copied to any real-world townships, I feel that the answer is a resounding No. The thing that always seems to be left out whenever fans bemoan that the Disney company “never realized Walt’s dream” of a utopian city is the all-important human factor. In theory, a clean and technologically advanced city, in which everyone works toward a singular goal of maintaining and improving the community would be a great thing. Co-operative neighborhoods and towns have proven to work well in many areas, so why couldn’t it in this case? The whole problem is the fact that E.P.C.O.T. would’ve been a city owned by a corporation, in which residents are merely “passing through” for a year or so. Packing up one’s entire life and family, just to have the opportunity to spend a blink-and-it’s-gone year within Walt’s futuristic city is really asking a lot. Hell, the whole idea of short-time residency arose solely for the reason that it would prevent anyone from having the power to vote, therefore removing the possibility of residents challenging the company’s  - and by extension, Walt’s - ideas on how things should be run.

Building the future

It seems one would’ve had to have sacrificed some easily taken-for-granted freedoms just for this privilege. One of the points alluded to in Walt’s “E.P.C.O.T. film” was that all of your “modern conveniences” would be regularly upgraded and replaced, to better showcase the continuing advancements and ingenuity of American industry. That sounds okay, but just imagine coming home from work one day to find that all of your appliances, or your furniture, or your wallpaper (none of which you own, by the way) has been switched out with all new, all unfamiliar items. What if you really liked your old toaster, and didn’t want a different one? Beyond material goods, what about spiritual matters? The film also makes mention that the city would contain a number of “churches” in addition to housing and commerce. What sort of churches? How many? Should Uncle Walt and his Wasp cohorts be trusted to populate the small city with enough locations to cover all denominations? Will there be more than a token synagogue? A single mosque? I’m not a person of faith myself, but if I was I couldn’t imagine being without proper access to a place of worship for a year.

Additionally, the running assumption was that the residents of E.P.C.O.T. would mostly be working somewhere within the Disney World property - either for Disney (at the theme park, the resort hotels, within E.P.C.O.T. itself or elsewhere) or for one of the partnering corporations in the adjacent “industrial section.” The thought behind this was that everyone living in the city would all have a stake in keeping it vibrant and well maintained. So right off the bat, anyone who wanted to live within E.P.C.O.T. would almost have to be an employee of Disney, or at least one of the other participating companies on-site (though, as noted earlier, it’s unlikely that there would’ve been many willing companies taking part anyway.) The entire set-up of the proposed city, in which PeopleMovers would transport workers from the “residential sections” to their places of work or to a central monorail station for transport elsewhere on property, is based on a worker-centric “company town” concept. Sure, the single-family households proposed for the edges of the city all featured garages (all roads were in a “perimeter configuration,” leaving pedestrian paths centralized - no need to worry about little Jimmy getting run over while playing outside,) but it seems unlikely that anyone would want to pack up and move away from their current homes, presumably already close to their places of work, if they’d have to commute further to get to an off-site job for a year. It also seems unlikely that Disney, the ultimate decider of who would be suitable to live within their city, would select non-employees over those who work for them (and ultimately would have the company’s best interest in mind, since it would affect their own well-being.)

Walt Disney World Preview Center Hostesses, c. 1970

Here we get to another, somewhat more disturbing notion. You see, in the real world, people are messy. They can be unreliable, do stupid things, make decisions based on greed and endanger themselves and others. While I do feel (believe it or not) that humanity, as a whole, is good and honest, and wants to move toward a better future, it doesn’t always act like it; humanity stumbles just as often as it soars. Since the opening of Disneyland, Disney was known for hiring not only the best and brightest young workforce for it’s public face, but also the most beautiful. If we’re being honest, Disney’s hiring practices by the late ‘60s and early ‘70s would likely be illegal today. The company byline was hiring for roles, rather than simply filling positions, hiring freckled redheads for Frontierland and tall blondes for Tomorrowland, for example. Why then would we expect their methods for selecting “suitable residents” for their “city of tomorrow” to be any different? How would the selection process have gone, exactly?

Assuming that more than a lot of people would’ve been willing to drop their lives and send in an application (or whatever) for residency within E.P.C.O.T., how far would the qualifications have gone? Would Walt or his colleagues have looked at income? At criminal histories? At library records? Would they have considered how physically attractive you or your family appeared to them? Would residence selections (and, while we’re thinking about it, specific housing placement) be determined at random, or by some secret social or economic factor? Or by race? At best it would be like an HOA gone mad, and (not to sound too sensational) at worst like a dictatorship. Any residency or home ownership contract obviously has to go through one or more systems of approval, but at what point does weeding out someone's idea of an “undesirable element” go too far? And who would give a business, and more specifically the head of a corporation, that kind of power, no matter how well-meaning or benevolent he may appear? What the hell would give him the right?

We could discuss the pro’s and con’s of a Disney-controlled metropolis indefinitely (well, at least I could,) but it’s all a moot point anyhow. For now let’s leave the past behind us, and tune in next time for a look at the "present" of October 1982, and the opening celebration of the wondrous achievement a Walt-less Disney made instead of a "city of the future." Hooray for the 21st century!

A Whole New World I (The Theme Park Rundown, Pt. 1)

And so Started By A Condor has reached 60 posts - hooray for arbitrary numbers! Since post #1 was an introduction, however, I suppose this one would actually be “review #60” - except we won’t be reviewing anything today. Going back to an idea I had while starting the blog (pushed aside in my initial feverish dash to write too many reviews,) today we’ll begin a recurring series of entries looking back at the films we’ve reviewed so far and run down what presence (if any) each one has at Disney’s theme parks. Since tackling every one of these in one post would be tedious (to write and to read,) we’ll take them 10 at a time, with a new entry in the series every once in a while.

Sound like fun? Well, too bad, I’m doing it anyway.

So now come along with me as we journey into imagination (!?) and depart for the exotic cities of Anaheim, Orlando, Urayasu, Marne-Le-Valle, Penny’s Bay and Pudong for a journey through the turnstiles (or MagicBand readers,) as we go a-hunting for references!

Condorman
Looking first for a reference to our beloved blog namesake, we find … precisely diddly-squat. Seriously - there’s nothing in any of Disney’s 12 theme parks (or their resort hotels and shopping districts, as far as I  know) referencing our winged wonder. And why should there be? One of the requirements of a cult film, by definition, has to be it’s non-presence in the mainstream - and Disney doesn’t get much more obscure than Condorman (well, almost - let’s not bring up Midnight Madness just yet.) Unfortunately my emails to Walt Disney World management, urging them to re-paint the cars at the Tomorrowland Speedway to resemble the Condormobile, have thus far fallen on deaf ears.

We tried to start a meet and greet, but kids kept poking their eyes out on my wings!

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Okay, this one’s much easier to spot. Disney’s original animated film features prominently in the theme park world, and has from day one. Beyond Snow White and the Dwarfs themselves making innumerable appearances in shows and parades, Snow White’s Adventures (later renamed Snow White’s Scary Adventures) was an opening day attraction at Disneyland, and still operates there today - albeit in a heavily-modified version partially based on Florida’s 1971 re-make. That version, which was first toned down in 1994 and then removed completely in 2012 (to make way for Princess Fairytale Hall, a meet-and-greet location,) is the one I find most fascinating.

Tasked by Roy Disney with replicating the three opening day dark-rides from Disneyland (after their original plans for ones based on Sleeping Beauty, Mary Poppins and the “Sleepy Hollow” segment of The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad were cut,) WED Enterprises’ Imagineers decided to alter them in different ways. Thus the new Peter Pan’s Flight became more detailed and scenic, and the Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride redux became twice as large (and twice as manic.) With their new Snow White ride, the Imagineers apparently decided to scare eager young riders shitless, as it featured wailing skeletons, a darkened cottage full of terrified forest animals, the shadow of a horned demon that chased the Dwarfs away (!), and a pursuit by a gaunt, relentlessly shrill Witch that leaped out suddenly at several points during the experience. At the ride’s conclusion, the Witch appeared above the ride track in the Dwarf’s mine, seeming to tip a giant diamond onto riders’ heads. This lead to the final room before riders departed, in which strobe lights flashed as the hag’s cackle echoed like a skipping record; basically, the Witch killed you. God, I’m sorry I missed this one!

We all float in here, dearies...

Versions of the ride exist in Disneyland Paris (Blanche-Neige et les Sept Nains - a clone of the current California version) and Tokyo Disneyland, which is an interesting hybrid of Florida’s original first half and California’s “happy ending.” Additionally, Magic Kingdom received a Seven Dwarfs Mine Train attraction in 2014 to replace it’s defunct dark-ride, which is a nicely detailed “family-friendly” roller coaster that was later duplicated at Shanghai Disneyland. It’s well worth a ride if you can snag a FastPass (you won’t see me waiting no two hours in line - I could be spending that time eating, like, 24 Citrus Swirls.)

The Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin
Well, you’d think one would be hard-pressed to find this little gem represented in the parks - and yet there exists a shout-out at Florida’s Magic Kingdom. Inside the Main Street train station, right at the front of the park, there is a railroad bulletin board chock-full of references to some of Disney’s older live-action films. Among them, there is a train that’s listed as arriving from “Bullwhip,” which is then then scheduled to depart for “Griffin Gulch” (and which is noted as having a flood delay.) A small reference, to be sure, but it’s better than nothing!

I'll probably be using this board a lot in coming posts...

The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band
Aarrgh!! Anyway, this excruciating musical doesn’t seem to have a direct reference in any of the parks, though the time period portrayed in the film isn’t too far off from Main Street’s turn-of-the-century ethos. I wouldn't be surprised if instrumental versions of one or more of it’s Sherman Brothers tunes have shown up in Main Street’s background-music loop at some point. Louis Armstrong did a jazzy cover of “Ten Feet Off the Ground” on his Disney Songs the Satchmo Way album … and he performed a few times at Disneyland … so there’s that.

Admission costs how much now!?!

Darby O'Gill And The Little People
Despite being ripe with fantasy (and touched by the hand of Walt Disney himself,) Darby O’Gill is sadly without direct theme park representation, as well. There is a tenuous link, however, between Walt’s effects-heavy film about Leprechauns and an easy-to-miss curio at Disneyland. In 1955, Little Golden Books published a story entitled The Little Man of Disneyland, a cute little piece of marketing that told the tale of a Leprechaun who was displaced by the construction of Disneyland - until Mickey, Goofy and Donald helped to re-locate the wee man into his own private tree inside the new park. A tiny door, window and chimney can still be spotted on a particular tree in Adventureland. Why a little Irish Leprechaun was living in California is still a mystery to me, though.



Canya believe I've godda drag meself all the way ter Califahrnia Adventure fer a wee nip?

Donald In Mathmagic Land
Perhaps no other entry in this post points to the futility of this exercise more than Donald In Mathmagic Land. I mean, am I serious? Well, the narrator here is Paul Frees, who also narrates The Haunted Mansion and the long-shuttered Adventure Through Inner Space - and his is still the voice heard as Pirates of the Caribbean’s pirate-auctioneer in both California and Florida (I imagine this not to be the case overseas, since those pirates don’t speak English.) Plus, if you look closely, you can see that tucked behind every cash register in Disney’s gift shops sits a basic numerical calculator. Math!

This building, Donald, is shaped like a square. MAG-NI-FI-CAY-SHUN!

A Goofy Movie
Brace yourselves ChildrenOfThe90z, but our beloved Goofy Movie is sadly underrepresented at the parks. There is a rarely-seen Max walk-around character that sometimes accompanies Goofy, though his purple pants indicate that this is the junior Goof circa the Goof Troop series, rather than its' feature film follow-up. However, the pair have been spotted doing impromptu performances of “the perfect cast” dance, sometimes accompanied by the film’s Powerline song “I2I” (especially on Father's Day in recent years.) As noted in my original review, the films “Lester’s Possum Park” is a bare-faced parody of Magic Kingdom’s Country Bear Jamboree, but we’re not looking for reverse-references here - and it’s not like Disney added a “Lester the Possum” animatronic to the Bear Band line-up or something. That’d be silly.

Nobody else but you...

Tarzan
Passing through Disneyland’s Adventureland on your way to New Orleans Square you’ll encounter a giant fake tree, containing the walk-through Tarzan’s Treehouse attraction. Opened to the public in June of 1999 (exactly one week after the release of its' namesake movie,) this one caused a minor bugaboo amidst Disneyland die-hards, as it was a quick-and-dirty re-theme of the cherished (if infrequently traversed) Swiss Family Treehouse attraction that had shaded the western edge of Adventureland since 1962. While the closure of older attractions to make way for new ones is part-and-parcel to the life expectancy of Disney’s parks, this example of budget Imagineering (instigated by then-Parks and Resorts chairman and miserly bottom-line feeder Paul Pressler - aka The Dark One) was an unfortunate harbinger of such future IP re-brandings as the Tower of Terror/Guardians of the Galaxy redesign, and the impending transformation of Paradise Pier into Pixar Pier (poor California Adventure can’t seem to catch a break!) On the other hand, the attraction proved a popular enough draw, and was copied as an opening-day attraction at Hong Kong Disneyland in 2005.

Evidence of a rushed makeover at Disneyland’s Treehouse soon came to light, however. Originally guests would ascend the attraction via a steep set of stairs that took you up into the Swiss Family Robinson’s jungle dwelling; for the Tarzan rebranding, however, a separate “rotting tree” (at least that what it looks like to me) was constructed out in front of the original, and guests would climb this before crossing a nerve-racking suspension bridge over to the main attraction. All fine and good - kids liked the new bridge, and it helped set the updated attraction apart from the original. However, the added stress of this extra structure soon took its' toll on the 37 year-old tree, and one day in March of 2007 the entire attraction was suddenly shut down without notice. It took crews over a year to assess and repair the structural damage. The attraction has operated without incident since then.

Tarzan and Jane: swingers

While the Treehouse in Florida’s Magic Kingdom has remained unaltered, Tarzan did inspire a memorably silly stage show at Animal Kingdom. Staged in the “Theater in the Wild” adjacent to Dinoland USA, Tarzan Rocks! (don’t ya love exclamation points slapped onto things?) featured energetic performers swinging on simulated vines, belting out less awesome renditions of Phil Collins’ songs from the film. Tarzan Rocks! ran for seven years before being replaced by a Finding Nemo musical show in 2007. But the likeliest reason it’s so fondly remembered can be summed up in two words: rollerblading monkeys.

Enchanted
Disney’s 2007 animated/live action rom/com is itself a treasure-trove of Disney references, but references to the film itself are lacking in the theme park world. In my review, I went into brief detail about Disney’s last-minute decision to pull Amy Adams’ Giselle from the roster of “official” Disney Princesses, primarily due to the fact that discerning theme park patrons (can you hear the sarcasm in my writing?) would call foul on a walk-around character who didn’t look like the actress. Since then, it’s been brought to my attention that both Disneyland and Walt Disney World did in fact have a Giselle character, who was featured in a “pre-parade” float promoting the film, which would preceed afternoon parades at Disneyland, Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. Since then, the character has been a no-show, even at those ridiculously over-priced hard-ticketed events that annual passholders and Vacation Club members attend to stand in line for two hours to take pictures with “rare” walk-around characters. Various theories as to why this is the case are floating about in the internet’s ether - some say it’s because Disney’s feature animation didn’t do the animation in Enchanted, some say because the character’s elaborate dress is too expensive to maintain, others say it’s so they don’t have to pay royalties to Amy Adams (though this issue obviously hasn’t stopped Mary Poppins or Jack Sparrow characters from appearing - unless Amy Adams has a dynamite agent?)

I'm just as surprised as you!

A Far Off Place
It should be clear by now that we’d come up dry once again seeking any theme park references to Disney’s obscure 1993 adventure film. If you squint hard enough, one could possibly take portions of Animal Kingdom’s Kilimanjaro Safaris attraction as a close-enough substitute. And, as noted in my Animal Kingdom TV special post, the attraction did originally have a much heavier ivory-theft storyline behind it, which fit hand-in-hand with Disney’s “evil poachers as go-to villains” theme of the 1990s. Perhaps if one were to ride along with somebody who resembles a teenaged Reese Witherspoon or Ethan Embry, they could pretend … no, never mind, it’s not worth it.

Keep your eyes open, Mr. Giraffe - you might be replaced by a Marvel attraction any day now!

Well, that takes us through our first "Theme Park Rundown", and clearly we’re going to have our work cut out for us moving forward. As we’ve already seen, some movies have big, obvious rides and attractions, while others have more obscure references that typically go unnoticed by the casual guest; many, of course, have no presence whatsoever. Luckily, some of us have a gift for seeing references where none may actually exist!