EPCOT Figment, well, to be replaced by Figment

[HMF]

Not entirely sure how they think Walt Disney and his core legacy only appeals to a niche audience.

I think the reason is because most of the people who remember Walt as a person are dead or dying. He is as real to younger generations as Colonel Sanders. Also, there are a lot of myths about Walt that young people tend to be susceptible to believing them even though many of them have been debunked. I have noticed that Gen Z on tend not to have favorable opinions of the Disney brand. The majority of the people who are fans tend to be Boomer through Millennials, those who remember when Disney was actually doing great things creatively. Also, there is a tendency among the younger generations to lack nuance and blanketly condemn most historical figures because a lot of their opinions are controversial by the standards of today such as Lincoln was not anti-racist enough etc.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

I think the reason is because most of the people who remember Walt as a person are dead or dying. He is as real to younger generations as Colonel Sanders. Also, there are a lot of myths about Walt that young people tend to be susceptible to believing them even though many of them have been debunked. I have noticed that Gen Z on tend not to have favorable opinions of the Disney brand. The majority of the people who are fans tend to be Boomer through Millennials, those who remember when Disney was actually doing great things creatively. Also, there is a tendency among the younger generations to lack nuance and blanketly condemn most historical figures because a lot of their opinions are controversial by the standards of today such as Lincoln was not anti-racist enough etc.

Just wanna clarify my reaction btw. I’m not angry with you.. but I ‘am’ angry with Disney Management for letting this kind of stuff be neglected for 20+ years at this point, thus leading to some of the more current day attitudes that are arguably toxic & destroying everything around us. Lack of proper exposure to it & learning about how it was all made, significance during that generation and the influences/inspirations it brought, context, etc. Truly angering & heartbreaking

 

[HMF]

Just wanna clarify my reaction btw. I’m not angry with you.. but I ‘am’ angry with Disney Management for letting this kind of stuff be neglected for 20+ years at this point,

I am angry about that as well and no I did not take the angry emoji as though it was directed at me personally. My observations here comes from talking to Gen Z friends about their opinions and it makes perfect sense. The prime of their childhood was the time when Disney was in the process of streamlining operations at the parks which led to a more bland corporate feeling which we saw with all the "Disney Parks" branded crap. 2D animation had been killed off and of course the IP mandate for WDI. The result of this in my observation is why children born after approximately 2000 lack that emotional connection to Disney many boomers through millennials have because Disney is no more special to them than any other generic brand because what the Disney Company has produced through their lifetimes has mostly been crap.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

I am angry about that as well and no I did not take the angry emoji as though it was directed at me personally. My observations here comes from talking to Gen Z friends about their opinions and it makes perfect sense. The prime of their childhood was the time when Disney was in the process of streamlining operations at the parks which led to a more bland corporate feeling which we saw with all the "Disney Parks" branded crap. 2D animation had been killed off and of course the IP mandate for WDI. The result of this in my observation is why children born after approximately 2000 lack that emotional connection to Disney many boomers through millennials have because Disney is no more special to them than any other generic brand because what the Disney Company has produced through their lifetimes has mostly been crap.

Yeeah, I’d honestly say 2006 was the real drop off point, hate to say. Feature Animation & Pixar were still making some pretty great stuff, but the Parks in regards to stuff ‘produced’ at that time, ehh, couple projects good but more misses than hits.. and EPCOT, before then, ‘99 was the death of that. ( the year Journey Into >Your Imagination opened & Horizons closed) But, thankfully, I’d say there’s still a decent number of folks from that generation that have a lot of love for the older stuff too cause they feel the same way we do. Really hoping folks like that and the older folks team together to really bring a better future to this company sooner than later. Cause we know what it should be. At the end of the day, it’s less age and moreso how passionate folks are about the legacy, quality, and keeping that alive

 

[jah4955]

Yeeah, I’d honestly say 2006 was the real drop off point, hate to say. Feature Animation & Pixar were still making some pretty great stuff, but the Parks in regards to stuff ‘produced’ at that time, ehh, couple projects good but more misses than hits.. and EPCOT, before then, ‘99 was the death of that. ( the year Journey Into >Your Imagination opened) But, thankfully, I’d say there’s still a decent number of folks from that generation that have a lot of love for the older stuff too cause they feel the same way we do. Really hoping folks like that and the older folks team together to really bring a better future to this company sooner than later. Cause we know what it should be. At the end of the day, it’s less age and moreso how passionate folks are about the legacy, quality, and keeping that alive

Let's see what happens with all the projects in MK, AK, & HS. Again, there have been arguable glimmers for hope since this summer (but Zootopia apparently a step backwards). For example, I had "given up" on Disney long before, and the 2024 announcement that Frontireland was replacing most of Frontierland (instead of "Beyond" like they were indicating the previous 2 years) felt like I was, "kicked while already down."

But it was an extraordinarily-poor-quality video of TT3.0 that brought my hopes back to life so much that I returned to the forums after roughly 23 years away. Time will tell if my hopes were in vain.

 

[Brer Panther]

It's probably just the nostalgia talking, I'd say things were still more or less okay in the latter half of the 2000s (after 2005), at least compared to now.

Movie-wise, Disney was still willing to greenlight original live action films (no remakes!), their animated films were getting better, and there was the attempt to bring back hand-drawn animation in 2009 even if it wound up being a failure. In the theme parks? Yeah, there were missteps like American Idol Experience and Journey Into Narnia, but we still had a lot of now-defunct or endangered attractions (Splash Mountain, The Great Movie Ride, DINOSAUR), in fact I think they calmed down on replacing iconic rides during this time, and the new attractions were more often than not good (Expedition Everest, Toy Story Mania).

I'd say things started to go downhill in 2012 or 2013. They abandoned hand-drawn animation again, the earlier success of Alice in Wonderland got the live action remakes started up, they became hyper-focused on recapturing Tangled's success by making most if not all of their animated films just like it - which is how we got Frozen, and when THAT was a huge hit they started pushing it down our throats while ignoring all of their other animated films. The IP mandate in the parks was in full throttle by now, and while we did get stuff like Toy Story Land and Pandora, they took forever to build. After 2018, things got worse and worse... and, well, here we are.

 

[brb1006]

Oh I just love Figment, and always will love him even with all of the stuff that happened over the last 27 years.View attachment 891908

See's Slushi plushie

Holy cow, I found a Chikn Nuggit fan in the wild!

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

Thought this was a lot of fun. Friend of mine shared it with me. Here’s a piece of 80s merch artwork I’d never seen before. I love that it features the Realm of Art outfit on Figment.

 

[BrianLo]

I am angry about that as well and no I did not take the angry emoji as though it was directed at me personally. My observations here comes from talking to Gen Z friends about their opinions and it makes perfect sense. The prime of their childhood was the time when Disney was in the process of streamlining operations at the parks which led to a more bland corporate feeling which we saw with all the "Disney Parks" branded crap. 2D animation had been killed off and of course the IP mandate for WDI. The result of this in my observation is why children born after approximately 2000 lack that emotional connection to Disney many boomers through millennials have because Disney is no more special to them than any other generic brand because what the Disney Company has produced through their lifetimes has mostly been crap.

Of note, I do think generation alpha had an upwards momentum from Gen Z in terms of Disney brand affinity. The studio output was much improved through the 2010’s. That generation has largely had access to Disney films at home akin to the VHS era. The parks are in better shape for their childhood. Whether older generations appreciate them is another question, but WDW in particular was in a bad nadir in 2010-2015.

Mixed with the factor of Gen alpha’s parents largely being millennials. Which again I think is the strongest affinity along with boomers.

 

[HMF]

Of note, I do think generation alpha had an upwards momentum from Gen Z in terms of Disney brand affinity. The studio output was much improved through the 2010’s. That generation has largely had access to Disney films at home akin to the VHS era. The parks are in better shape for their childhood. Whether older generations appreciate them is another question, but WDW in particular was in a bad nadir in 2010-2015.

Mixed with the factor of Gen alpha’s parents largely being millennials. Which again I think is the strongest affinity along with boomers.

Again, This is based on my own observations about Gen Z plus my own point of view as a millennial seeing the decline that was the post-renaissance period. I am still angry that they killed off hand-drawn animation so I don't really care about the more recent WDAS films since to me Disney Animation died after Princess and the Frog. I still follow Pixar though. Of course, that may just be the obvious bias of a thirty-five-year-old whose sensibilities are still using the 1990s as their metaphorical "Golden Age" and anything that deviates from that is automatically "Bad".

 

[BrianLo]

Again, This is based on my own observations about Gen Z plus my own point of view as a millennial seeing the decline that was the post-renaissance period. I am still angry that they killed off hand-drawn animation so I don't really care about the more recent WDAS films since to me Disney Animation died after Princess and the Frog. I still follow Pixar though. Of course, that may just be the obvious bias of a thirty-five-year-old whose sensibilities are still using the 1990s as their metaphorical "Golden Age" and anything that deviates from that is automatically "Bad".

I wasn’t disagreeing. Gen Z is not a strong demographic. They are the biproduct of the low point of the Disney 2000’s.

Sometimes there’s misattribution though that Gen Z lack affinity due to recent decisions, but they are very much the pre-Frozen crowd and are the result of the late Eisner years.

The long term health of the company is whether or not Alpha maintains affinity as adults. That said, two projects are aimed at Gen Z. They intentionally or not have catered major attraction to every demographic if we want to say Villains are half for the boomers and Indy are for X.

 

[Cmdr_Crimson]

Stumbled across a breakdown video in the sound lab/gutted Dreamport and you hear the rare breakdown Spiel from Nigel Channing..If I was waiting in the Vision lab like the guests are in there I would be wanting to explore that whole area..But, have a look see...

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

gutted Dreamport

it truly is ‘insane’ just how much was gutted here.. like, Honest to God, why?? Yeah, that once intricately designed, elaborate scene showcasing where the ideas Dreamfinder & Figment thought up & collected at the beginning of the ride are sorted and then dispersed to form the rest of the journey. Is now replaced with nothing but a few speakers & black foam walls, a retrofitted opening scene Dreamcatching machine hatch with the old Realm of Art Figment by the ledge holding the jar with a rainbow in it, opening and closing the lid, retrofitted onto it, now holding… a rotary phone with a pose & arm animation that now makes no sense. (What is he crouched down on? Why is he holding a phone in that fashion? Isn’t he supposed to be on the phone, why is he holding it up to the audience?) And again, why were we not introduced to Figment being created again like we were originally? That’s what that lift, left turn, and drop mech was used for at first..Will never fail to confuse me why they thought this was a great idea of a replacement or “return” scene, let alone a “return of the original spirit” as they so claimed back in ‘02 after the first ‘99 screwup. I hope we get those answers sooner than later.

Special thanks to Tom K. Morris, an imagineer who worked on the OG JII for taking and posting these construction photos on X/Twitter.
02-Current utilization:

Original utilization:

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

Will also never fail to amuse me how, instead of being put back into that scene for “Figment’s Return”, some of those same props have now been placed in… (no joke) the current queue area, which was once part of the track that led to the original opening scene), now randomly caged up on the side… I swear man.. what was the thought process here, what made them think it was a good idea to put (or at the very least, keep from the first renovation) them here instead after they were supposed to fix it?

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

it truly is ‘insane’ just how much was gutted here.. like, Honest to God, why?? Yeah, that once intricately designed, elaborate scene showcasing where the ideas Dreamfinder & Figment thought up & collected at the beginning of the ride are sorted and then dispersed to form the rest of the journey. Is now replaced with nothing but a few speakers & black foam walls, a retrofitted opening scene Dreamcatching machine hatch with the old Realm of Art Figment by the ledge holding the jar with a rainbow in it, opening and closing the lid, retrofitted onto it, now holding… a rotary phone with a pose & arm animation that now makes no sense. (What is he crouched down on? Why is he holding a phone in that fashion? Isn’t he supposed to be on the phone, why is he holding it up to the audience?) And again, why were we not introduced to Figment being created again like we were originally? That’s what that lift, left turn, and drop mech was used for at first..Will never fail to confuse me why they thought this was a great idea of a replacement or “return” scene, let alone a “return of the original spirit” as they so claimed back in ‘02 after the first ‘99 screwup. I hope we get those answers sooner than later. View attachment 893370
View attachment 893371
View attachment 893372
Special thanks to Tom K. Morris, an imagineer who worked on the OG JII for taking and posting these construction photos on X/Twitter.
02-Current utilization:
View attachment 893375
Original utilization:
View attachment 893376
View attachment 893377

Oh, and speaking of that scene.. here’s a fun little filmed segment made for Christmas ‘84. Featuring Dreamfinder & Figment venturing around the Dreamport, showcasing where they’re storing WDW guests’ Christmas dreams. :
Man, you know that fun little sweater they put Figment in every Holiday season? Imagine if they put it on him in a ‘real’ return/ enhanced original ride and then did a Christmas overlay annually where they search for, collect, and explore the realms of Imagination of Christmas Dreams. That’d be awesome. And much of the scenes could be redressed fairly easily to be winter themed, otherwise it’d mostly be film projections being changed, some outfits changed here and there, and some new audio ala DL’s Small World Holiday. That’s what you’d call a truly awesome Epcot Festival of the Holidays overlay.

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

Original:

Current:

Again folks, ^ that’s the “whimsical ride through the realms of imagination” we’ve had since ‘02. ‘The’ same section in the track/area, I kid you not.
But Disney promises, that ride is the same iconic classic ride “with Figment” we all remember. “Figment’s Back!” It’s only had “a few changes”, it was all fixed, we promise.

I seriously wish we knew how someone (let alone a whole group of people) could’ve genuinely pitched this to multiple execs, told them it was a return of the original’s spirit, showed them all the storyboards of each scene (a hearing test in a room full of nothing w Figment on a phone, eye exam interrupted by a Figment sing along, skunk farts by Figment on a slot machine, and an upside down toilet on the ceiling (now painted neon) with a Figment toilet bowl cleaner (seriously!) oh and we’re bringing back Dr. Nigel Channing from the last horrible redo! It’s a must! Figment totally pairs well with him! And Dreamfinder’s only vaguely referenced, not even with his actual name, on a door! Possibly explained with the same exact BS description they have the gall to list on the sign outside the attraction’s doors and got it greenlit into production. It’s genuinely ‘the’ craziest thing ever greenlit into production by WDI in history, no exaggeration. How did no one say or do anything before they were allowed to open this the way they did? ‘Especially’ after the absolute cluster the redo before this was.

 

[jah4955]

Stumbled across a breakdown video in the sound lab/gutted Dreamport and you hear the rare breakdown Spiel from Nigel Channing..If I was waiting in the Vision lab like the guests are in there I would be wanting to explore that whole area..But, have a look see...

yeah...I'll treasure that scene with the deepest nostalgia forever and ever

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

yeah...I'll treasure that scene with the deepest nostalgia forever and ever

I know man.. those foam textured black walls, the sound control board, & clearly visible speakers (even in the dark) are gonna be absolutely painful to lose. The amount of clear creativity & imagineering that went into that man. Nothing’ll compare

 

[jah4955]

I know man.. those foam textured black walls, the sound control board, & clearly visible speakers (even in the dark) are gonna be absolutely painful to lose. The amount of clear creativity & imagineering that went into that man. Nothing’ll compare

the amount of IMAGINATION!

 

[FigmentsBrightIdeas]

the amount of IMAGINATION!

And those wonderfully detailed & immersive forklifts lying around & the office break room chairs & water dispensers after that ever nostalgic skunk fart smell. I’m seriously gonna miss those magic little touches a ton whenever they go. *sniffles & sobs*