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Is Spaceship Earth rally that bad
- Thread starter THEMEPARKPIONEER
- Start date
cblodg
Member
Great analogy! This is probably the best comparison/explanation of this whole thing. I think seeing how well they did with Haunted Mansion psyched people up for SSE, and then we get a good cleaning up and new naration, but the end is just horrid.
There's nothing wrong with getting a good laugh. Horizons had an ending like that but it wasn't as funny.
HMF
Well-Known Member
I remember when it re-opened. The stench of The Seas with Nemo & Friends and Gran Fiesta Tour were still strong but I felt that there was something good was under the surface. LaL ended. The Wand came down' the new SSE looked like it was going to be great judging by the outside' I was blown away by the HM re-do and then the moment arrives overall the ride looks great I have a few problems with the dialogue then the ending and I see they completely butchered it and I have myself a little cry.
EPCOT Explorer
New Member
Yes, because in Horizons it was presented in a much more realistic fashion and it WAS cutting edge tech back then. :lol:
joel_maxwell
Permanent Resident of EPCOT
a version that launched a reborn fascination with SSE.Same here. I remember Tomorrow's Child and all, but Irons WAS SSE. That model, with the fiber optics, and Glitter City...good times.
wolf359
Well-Known Member
Even though I'm not one to throw ALL of the new Spaceship Earth under the bus just because of the unfinished decent, I have to admit that the Irons decent, with the cheesy fiber optics and neon, and the Bach fugue soundtrack was extremely memorable, and I do miss it quite a bit.
I prefer Irons. I miss the old tunnel with the fiber optics along with the music. The greed squares are more realistic but dim and my camera picks up more of the projector behind the cloth that they are projected on to. Remember this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPPI9YdtQG4. Maybe we should make a move to bring back tomorrows child. There was a rumor that it was going to come back and if you look there are screens like the old ones on the ceilings. Maybe there will be a tomorrows child ending with another great recording with Kelly Coffey. I have to admit I dont thing the old version would work. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iY0UG9W6c1Q Heres the celling figures.
captainkidd
Well-Known Member
The Irons narration is much better than Dench's. The music in the Irons version was superior as well, but I can deal with it the way it is now. The updated scenes look excellent. But like everybody else, I'm incredibly disappointed with the final 2/3 of the ride. Once you've done the little on-screen game once, it loses any fun. They need to either bring back or add something new into the final descent of the ride. It reminds me of a cheap carnival spook ride.
EPCOT Explorer
New Member
Most assuredly. We took a EPCOT only trip for a few days one year, in the late 90's, and I must have ridden it at least 10-15 times, JUST to see the city and the SSE Model...
imagineer boy
Well-Known Member
If there's one thing they should not have changed (other than the descent) it was the score. Why? There was nothing wrong with it. It was very beautiful, mysterious, and IMO embodied the feeling of Epcot.
As for the narration, I loved the Jeremy Irons narration. But did it need some updating? Yes. Judi Dench's voice is simply not right for the attraction. No offense to her, she is a fantastic actress, but when you just hear her voice it sounds like a first grade teacher giving a lecture. :shrug: Plus, SSE really should be narrated by a man to give that "father time" feel. I'd personally choose Lawrence Fishbourne to narrate.
I think the changes to the first 2/3 of the ride were generally good though. But was it really necessary to replace the topless statue? Come on, its the Rennaisance!
As for the narration, I loved the Jeremy Irons narration. But did it need some updating? Yes. Judi Dench's voice is simply not right for the attraction. No offense to her, she is a fantastic actress, but when you just hear her voice it sounds like a first grade teacher giving a lecture. :shrug: Plus, SSE really should be narrated by a man to give that "father time" feel. I'd personally choose Lawrence Fishbourne to narrate.
I think the changes to the first 2/3 of the ride were generally good though. But was it really necessary to replace the topless statue? Come on, its the Rennaisance!
joel_maxwell
Permanent Resident of EPCOT
I hate over use of P.C.
Some is warranted, but most is over the top (pun intended)
imagineer boy
Well-Known Member
I think that's the main problem with the ending. SSE is not supposed to be a comical silly ride, otherwise people won't take the message of communication improvement seriously. SSE is supposed to send you out in the world inspired, and ready to bring a better tomorrow. Not leave you laughing saying "Ohmigod, that was friggin hilarious!"
captainkidd
Well-Known Member
They did the same thing with Gran Fiesta Tour. They're trying to appeal more to kids. Instead, they're simply dumbing Epcot down.
imagineer boy
Well-Known Member
:lol:
But I agree, its silly. Its nothing different than what you see at your local art museaum. :brick: Its just a statue!
Agreed. :sohappy:
You know, there are ways to appeal to kids without dumbing things down.
EPCOT Explorer
New Member
Leaving the old music in with the new narration would have been amazing. Someone made a mashup of it, and it nixes the silly feel out of a few of the lines. The mood for the entire ride, even the ENDING is completely changed.
Its funny that you say that. The first time I wet on the ride me and my family all were baffled how it ends with steve jobs than its the screens.
Future Guy
Active Member
Actually, I think it's funny how you go right from the Steve Jobs lookalike to a Matrix-y datastream. Is the ride trying to tell us that we're already enslaved by the machines, and it's all Steve Job's fault?
I really don't think that SSE has been "dumbed down". I think the narration is geared toward the current (and future) generations that don't remember what the world was like before the Internet, and this makes those of us who fell in love with EPCOT back in the '80s interpret it as less intelligent.
I hadn't ridden the current version until this October, so I went in with all the criticisms I've read on this and other message boards ringing in my head. I fully expected the descent to be a Journey-Into-Your-Imagination-With-Eric-Idle-style hack job. And . . . it wasn't. At least not in my opinion.
The first time I experienced the descent, I was too busy with the touchscreen to notice the stuff on the walls (or lack of it) until the very end, when the wall acquired sparkly lights right before you exit. When I was at WDW two weeks ago, I paid more careful attention to the descent tunnel. And it's not necessarily worse than previous versions, it's just different. Because people are focusing on their touchscreens, it makes sense that the descent tunnel is decorated with more of a minimalist sensibility. Once you descend though the starfield-grid effect, the tunnel begins to be dotted with those irregularly-shaped triangles, first on the ceiling only, and then eventually they spread to the walls. Halfway to three-quarters of the way down, the triangles are lit. It's all very minimalist, but again most people's attention is going to be focused on the touchscreens.
The real problem, I think, is that there's a contingent of us that thinks Disney took the cheap way when they turned the entire descent into a Jetsony cartoon that you watch on a little screen. Sure, it's generic enough to appear futuristic for years, maybe even decades to come, thus negating the need for a costly refurb every few years when reality overtakes the "future" as depicted in the ride's last few scenes, but when all is said and done it's an uncomplex Adobe Flash game.
Of course, it's entirely possible that all our grumbling about the descent is the equivalent of crochety old people complaining about kids these days and their crazy music, and how in our day we listened to Bing Crosby and liked it. I really don't know.
marcriss
Member
I totally agree! How can you lose "All roads lead to Rome"???? The old script used to be a history lesson centered around communication in all it's forms (as a kid I actually remembered things for tests from the ride). It's been so totally dumbed down that it makes Judi Dench look bad. I'd prefer silence.
The end is a bit cheesy but reminds me of the end of Horizons...
Sigh. It`s much worse. It is unfinished. They ran out of money.
Imagine a finale taking the best off-car visuals of the `86 and `94 versions, with the added bonus of the incar LCD. Now you know why we get upset. It`s such a waste of a vast, promising space. Face it, the screens could have been put on podiums in Project Tomorrow and still gotten the same amount of laughs and results.