Figment Question

[Figments Friend]

Yeah..me too!


I have loved the original JII since it first opened in 1983. Nothing comes close to the sheer stunning brillance this ride showcased....it was Disney's finest ride-thru attraction EVER in my opinion. The concept, presentation, and engineering were first rate, and to this day has never been matched. It was a true MASTERPIECE of execution....appealing, inspiring, and fasinating all in one. To this day this ride inspires me...it was indeed a very unique experience and it is perhaps one of Disney's greatest unforgivable acts for totally destroying it in one quick blow back in 99'. I will NEVER forgive the powers that be (or were) for signing the dotted line to gut it. What a tragety.....

Yes, i realize that a attaction THIS complex must have been a absolute nightmare to maintain and keep running. I am still stunned at the complexidy of the Original JII when i watch the various "tribute" videos of it...it was so amazing how they created this ride!! JII was indeed a truly unique entity all it's own and was the perfect creation to express it's point.....creativity and the power of that "One Little Spark" that can lead to so much. Everything about it was fantastic, from the music, lightning effects, atmospheric sets, and animatronic animation. How they devised that amazing Dream Vehicle rotating stage still baffles me to this day...and i LOVE that!! I would love to see plans of the originals building layout...anyone have any info on this? Other posts/threads have some links listed but none of them seems to have any of the said plans. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I think it's was a outright disgrace what they did to the place after the Original Show was gutted in 99'. The horrid "Institute" ride was absolutely pathectic to say the least!! I was SO incredibly dissapointed and shocked when i discovered the awful truth in the Summer of 2000 when i visited Epcot Center, my favorite of all the parks. Part of the reason Epcot ruled for me was Figment and his fabulous attraction...so just imagine my utter disgust in discovering it was NO LONGER THERE!!! Worse, it was "replaced" by a cheaply executed acuse for a "attraction"....the WORST such effort i have ever experienced with the Disney name attached to it. I was LIVID and i let my voice be heard, but in a respectful way when i expressed my concerns to the CM's at that time. They all knew the new ride was awful themselves, and we had good chats about what to do about it. Thankfully, it was changed and although it is still a rather poor effort to me, at least they listened to the outcry of the paying public and brought two of the Originals highlights back...Figment and the wonderful theme song.

Now...if we can JUST convince them to stick Dremfinder in there somewhere...that would be even better! Surely, with all that open space in the current ride (which again shows you the lack of care and $$$ invested in "improving" it!) they can put in a couple of DF figures doing things. he could be outside of one of the lab doors perhaps...reacting to sounds or sights that are coming from them? Or holding some bubbling beakers if they so insist on pursuing the lame "Institute" theme. Just GET HIM IN THERE SOMEHOW OKAY????

Alright....i'm done ranting now....sorry, i just have such a passion for the Original that i can talk forever about it's past glories!

Final word that most here will agree with i'm sure...

They should have NEVER removed it in the first place!!

Shame on you...SHAME ON YOU!!!! You will never be forgiven!!

 

[KaliSplash]

To me, the biggest problem is the elimination of the original's opening segment, the rotating presentation.
The new version of 'One Little Spark' is not nearly as good as the original.
Obviously, you'd need Dreamfinder to do the opening segment again.

 

[stitchrules223]

Actually there is a small but often unnoticed tribute to Dreamfinder in the current JII. As you are riding through the area where there are the different doors for the labs, there is one that has the name "Dean Finder" or something to that effect (can't quite recall at the moment). I thought it is a nice little (and boy do I mean little) tribute, but there is still no excuse for excluding Dreamfinder!

 

[DarkMeasures]

If it means bringing JIYI back to something similar to its original incarnation (i.e. bringing back Dreamfinder and something that would actually spark your imagination and not turn your stomach), then I'd be willing to wait that long.

No, that's not what I mean. That change will most likely not contain Figment with an even higher chance of Dreamfinder missing. It is most likely that they both will never return. From what I understand, that is what Kodak wants. The only possibility of them returning is if Kodak sold their copywrites to Disney and dropped sponsorship.

 

[Figments Friend]

Hold on ...are you telling me that Kodak, NOT Disney, owns the rights to the characters Dreamfinder and Figment???

WHAT??!!!

 

[General Grizz]

Hold on ...are you telling me that Kodak, NOT Disney, owns the rights to the characters Dreamfinder and Figment???

WHAT??!!!

Kodak owns a portion of each, but Kodak still sponsors the pavilion.

 

[Figments Friend]

Wow....never knew that...just assumed Disney owned them outright.

Geez, so you mean to say Kodak had a lot to do with the destruction of the original attraction?? Oh man...no wonder there were boycotts agaist them then!

Why would Kodak want to ditch Figment and Dreamfinder to begin with? I mean, they were obviously a big hit and the ride was very popular until they insisted on changing it. Why wreck a good thing?

I suppose one excuse would be that they wanted to dump them to cut costs....but it seems a bad move to give up on what was obviously a good thing, contract or no contract.

Man, i am still so miffed at them for taking the original ride out!!

 

[FamilyMan]

Coming in 7 years... Kodiak, the Kodak Photo Bear. I'm sure General GRIZZ would approve. LMAO

 

[kodakcastmember]

. . . Kodiak, the Kodak Photo Bear . . . LMAO

haha. That's really funny. I hope that my company wouldn't be that lame. I think that Kodak and Disney need to come to an agreement that the original grandeur of the ride should be restored.

 

[wardrobeguy]

yeah, so what are they doing with all that extra space?:veryconfu

Hello... This past June I took the Undiscovered Future World tour at Epcot. One of our stops was the Imagination Pavilion and we were taken to the 2nd floor atrium. A few conference tables and plants were set up there and our tour guide talked some about the history of Epcot, but not the pavilion. She did explain that at one point this had been the corporate lounge, but hadn't been used as such because the sun pouring through the pyramid makes the room hot (which it was) and hard to cool. It now seems to be a cast member break area. Hmmmm....

Since our tour group was very small (4 people), we were allowed to peer into the old ImageWorks area, but not enter it. It was dark and largely empty. It appeared to be mostly used for some storage. My heart melted at the sight of the old rainbow neon tunnel...All at once I was 14 again and it was 1985! Remember? The one where a color would follow you back and forth? It actually had a few orange tubes lit up, and the tour guide explained that the light was on for safety purposes.

Oddly enough, this little peek more than made an interesting backstage tour that was worth the time to take even more so.

 

[Sledge]

I remember when I went back and they had just changed the ride. Those days I didn't really follow what was going on with the parks since I was only 12 or 13. Anyway, I didn't really think anything was different just a few new signs. As soon as we started into the ride and noticed it was different I just turned to my mom and said "This isn't the Figment Ride?" (as we called it). During the ride I wasn't really to upset (probably because I didn't think about it while riding) but as soon as I got off the ride I started crying. At 13 it's kind of weird to cry over something like that. When I went back two years later it really hit me that it was gone for good and just seeing the outside of the building made me teary eyed. We go about every two years so we went two years later from then and it still made me teary eyed. It started becoming depressing to even go near it because it was my favorite ride growing up. I figure I'll cry or get teary eyed everytime I go, which isn't cool because I've never taken my girlfriend there and she won't understand. lol She already doesn't understand what is so great about Disney World. She has never been there so it's not like she was bashing it. I think some of the magic with Disney World is you have to have gone when you were a kid in order to appreciate it more as an adult. I will keep my fingers crossed that the original will come back. They should just build it somewhere else in a new building and leave the one that is in there now. Figment needs to be in more than one ride anyways with as big as a fan base as he has. He should be in a movie too.

Maybe we will eventually get Classic Kingdom where all the old rides are rebuilt. lol Mr. Toad would have to be there t0o. They should just start this now, who cares if it will only have like 5 rides. What I am most worried about is Dumbo, Peter Pan, Snow White and the older rides getting replaced. It's a long shot but I can't help but think how much it would suck if they replaced Pirates of the Carribean. Even if they tried to put in Orlando Bloom and Johnny Depp animatronics and tried to add to it to make it reflect the movie more, it would really suck. The idea of updating the rides sounds good to Disney so that the kids will like them more (Pooh replacing Toad). They should always leave in the old stuff to try to make things appeal to us adults to. Afterall, how are the kids going to get there without the adults taking them? lol

 

[General Grizz]

Actually, from what I heard before, Disney wanted both characters OUT, and Kodak threatened to withdraw sponsorship if Figment wasn't in the new attraction (hence: Figment had a (very small) role in JIYI. I'll look for more on this. . .

<img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v164/grixx/dreamfinder133.jpg">

 

[PurpleDragon]

Hello... This past June I took the Undiscovered Future World tour at Epcot. One of our stops was the Imagination Pavilion and we were taken to the 2nd floor atrium. A few conference tables and plants were set up there and our tour guide talked some about the history of Epcot, but not the pavilion. She did explain that at one point this had been the corporate lounge, but hadn't been used as such because the sun pouring through the pyramid makes the room hot (which it was) and hard to cool. It now seems to be a cast member break area. Hmmmm....

Since our tour group was very small (4 people), we were allowed to peer into the old ImageWorks area, but not enter it. It was dark and largely empty. It appeared to be mostly used for some storage. My heart melted at the sight of the old rainbow neon tunnel...All at once I was 14 again and it was 1985! Remember? The one where a color would follow you back and forth? It actually had a few orange tubes lit up, and the tour guide explained that the light was on for safety purposes.

That makes me wanna cry. To think that the area is used only as a break room and a little storage, and the majority of the Imageworks area is still intact and is simply collecting dust. That is just unacceptable!! Why would they do that? What kind of cheap skates are in charge over there? They have an entire second floor that is practically empty that they could reuse for imageworks, but yet they leave it empty because its too hot up there, and hard to cool. Get some covers to put on the inside of that section of the pyramid to block out some of the sun and VOILA, Cool as a cucumber.

I'm sorry the more I think about the image wardrobeguy has painted for me, the more anger and sadness well up inside me. Its making me physically sick.:hurl: So I'll quit with my rant now.

 

[Djali999]

I think it's going to be years before we get closer to understanding the Imagination fiasco in any kind of detailed level. As far as I'm concerned it really is the lowest Disney has ever stooped, and I think current managament is so activley embarassed as to how badly this thing got messed up that the changeover and 1999 version has been 'struck' from the record, much like Light Magic.

I'm still mad about this thing. It was all politics, much like World of Motion and Mr. Toad.

 

[PurpleDragon]

Let us now all have a moment of slience in rememberance of Dreamfinder and the original JIYI.............................................











...................... Thank you!

 

[Hakunamatata]

 

[Figments Friend]

Dang it..i am SO angry right now.....but let me do a little Tia Chi....(pause)

Ahhhhhh...much better now...calming down....

I'm happy to hear that the Rainbow Tunnel still exists. That is great news, as perhaps someday they will reopen the top level at the Pavillion and we can all have a special day where all of us meet there and walk thru it again after all this time!

If i remember reading elsewhere, the main reason the top level was slammed was because of insurance costs. Also, i read they would need to add a wider ramp for Guests to come up and go out of to be up to date with today's modern demands and fire safety issues.

Boy, i'd love to see them open a new ImageWorks...a REAL Imageworks...not a crappy computer game area.

And to the General.....THANKS YOU for those WONDERFUL photos of our dear friends, Dreamfinder and Figment!!! THE LEGEND LIVES ON!!!!

 

[Bagheera]

Grizz, is that Ron in those photos?

 

[Sledge]

I was too young to really remember the last time I saw Figment and DF out there for people to meet. How was Figment controlled? I know that they make these little puppets where you slip a wire down the top of your shirt and take it through your sleave where you can twist it and make it turn its head or pull out further to make his mouth open. I think these are a lot newer and way after they were around, anyone remember how Figment was controlled. In some pictures it looks like a tradition lap-dummy but in other ones it doesn't and you can see his hand (unless DF just took it out for the picture. :lol: )

 

[FamilyMan]

Poor DreamFinder. Reduced to a name on a door. Sooooo sad.