It's also really difficult to properly design or build anything when every step is micromanaged at the top. When you have people forced to work on projects you don't want or care for, you get the mediocracy of something like NRJ or SR. Copying attractions is nothing new, but when zero effort is put in to build something new, extraordinary and within a reasonable budget that's hard. After all Disney doesn't build any attraction. That all gets outsourced to companies that build the majority of track layout, parts, and to some extent some A.A.'s. It's been like this for a long time. Now a days Imagineering is merely just concept art, design, layout, and story. Very rarely is it technology. Those Imagineers have long left after loosing patience from how many times they have been shut down. It's hard on ones creative thought process. But loosing many friends and colleagues to this decision really has me wondering what comes next. There's nothing wrong with moving to Florida I mean we all get moved around a lot. We have parks in the US, Paris, Mainland China/ HK, and Japan.
Anything to be built in say Brazil or the UAE has long been killed due to cost, economic downturns, socioeconomics, politics, ect. Like any company burnout is legitimate. The last 3 years of Iger made Eisners Dark Years look like the Wonder Years. Galaxies Edge was butchered from what it could have been instead a huge chunk of what was supposed to be included with park admission became a luxury hotel for the better words of it, which will probably shut down faster than it will open. I don't see the average SW's fan being able to afford SWGS. That hurts because it's not like Imagineering is full of Ivy Leaguers. A vast majority of us all grew up coming to the parks and dreaming of having the jobs we now have. Some of us are lucky and we had family members who worked for Disney in one form or another, but still.
Walt's vision was for affordable family fun. Not greed, if he were alive today I doubt he would be fond of the direction of the parks. Whilst it does make a significant portion of annual profits for TWDC, it has become so vastly diversified that there's no need to bleed out guest. Things like that affect morale to people who do care and have families of their own. We all constantly walk in our guest shoes and try and think of what it is a family would want to do, an adult would want to ride, and all around.
Most of my colleagues are leaving the company because a move cross country just doesn't make sense for them in between job security and family. As I've stated before in earlier post Imagineering isn't just architectural or engineering, it has grown to include set designs, literature, storylines, music, ect. Industries which some exist in Florida, and others which for better or worst we don't have film in Florida. Armchair Imagineers cannot begin to fathom what goes on behind closed doors or what happens to many of us when we place away the name tag and go home.
For my personality and my future career, I look forward to returning to my home state of Florida on a more permanent note. I recently got married and look forward to raising my future family in Celebration or surrounding areas. But I also keep an open mind of the possibility of working for my own or joining a Architecture firm in Orlando, Tampa, or Miami. Mindfulness and openness is something all imagineers and any career base should be on. Log gone are the days imagineers stayed on the job from when they got hired until they died. The same can be said about nearly every company and job in the world. It's just how we live now.
