Rumor Spaceship Earth Redo Shelved Indefinitely

[ImperfectPixie]

Narration cab be a rather lazy form of storytelling and a crutch. Much like slow-moving diorama rides, EPCOT used them far too often though it also sett the bar for theme park info-dump incredibly high. Learning something by being told is fine. Learning something by self-discovery is far more engaging and lasting (IMHO).

Which is why what happened to the entire Imagination pavilion is such a tragedy.

 

[HauntedPirate]

Seems familiar…

Seen on a hallway wall in a hotel outside of Nashville, TN. Maybe The Zach could do an Instagram series on them!

 

[DoleWhipDrea]

Exactly. I remember when HWS was a relaxing park experience. Ever since RotR opened, your entire day revolves around getting on that ride, and you seriously miss or can't fully enjoy other attractions because your constantly worried you won't get your boarding pass. It's extremely annoying and I wish there was a better way to solve this issue.

Heck, Epcot opened to every pavilion having lines stretching around Future World, and they didn't need a Boarding Pass, even with JII and it's unreliability. I really don't see how RotR is any different.

Unfortunately DHS was underbuilt and continues that tradition. If there were more rides with a higher capacity (without height and health restrictions), the park would be a much better experience. Missing out on getting a boarding group while wandering around a park with about half of it's attractions closed from shows not reopening, with no shade anywhere and mostly uninspired theming in the Florida heat is a miserable experience. The layout is a mess and either WDI doesn't know how to fix it or management isn't interested in giving them the funds to do it. The park could benefit from the DCA treatment, but no one at the top is going to admit how bad it is after having invested the funds into building TSL and G:E.

JII was unreliable when it opened? I know that the opening was delayed by several months, but from what I understand, WED actually fixed those issues before actually opening it (which, you know, would be great if current WDI could do.)

Ugh, now I'm almost convinced that them re-doing the track for SSE will somehow go horribly wrong.

 

[Mickeynerd17]

JII was unreliable when it opened? I know that the opening was delayed by several months, but from what I understand, WED actually fixed those issues before actually opening it (which, you know, would be great if current WDI could do.)

JII was delayed several months because of issues with the turntable scene and vehicle timing associated with it. While they did improve it, it was never fully fixed and vehicles would constantly speed up, slow down, or just stop altogether from what I've seen in videos. It wasn't perfect, but it was enough to operate. The unload belt was removed after a few years because of those timing issues leaving the vehicles at different speeds than the belt, so they just replaced it with a stationary floor. If you look at YouTube videos, you'll see the ride speed up and slow down at times. The ride itself also was prone to breaking down because of said turntable from what I've heard, which is why they removed it and 40% of the original track when they made JIYI.

In the long run though, it didn't affect the rides popularity by any stretch of the imagination!

 

[Mickeynerd17]

Ugh, now I'm almost convinced that them re-doing the track for SSE will somehow go horribly wrong.

To be completely honest, I wish they actually closed it back in March when plans were more solid. Now that it's been kept open, all those plans are in the air and we could be getting something better or worse that what it would've been.

I'm still crossing my fingers they'll keep the rear building (where Project Tomorrow is), but I'm not optimistic.

 

[Thelazer]

"If you look at YouTube videos, you'll see the ride speed up and slow down at times. The ride itself also was prone to breaking down because of said turntable from what I've heard, which is why they removed it and 40% of the original track when they made JIYI."

Cough... BS.. COUGH.. They needed more gift shop and merch selling space.

 

[Rich Brownn]

JII was delayed several months because of issues with the turntable scene and vehicle timing associated with it. While they did improve it, it was never fully fixed and vehicles would constantly speed up, slow down, or just stop altogether from what I've seen in videos. It wasn't perfect, but it was enough to operate. The unload belt was removed after a few years because of those timing issues leaving the vehicles at different speeds than the belt, so they just replaced it with a stationary floor. If you look at YouTube videos, you'll see the ride speed up and slow down at times. The ride itself also was prone to breaking down because of said turntable from what I've heard, which is why they removed it and 40% of the original track when they made JIYI.

In the long run though, it didn't affect the rides popularity by any stretch of the imagination!

You could tell it wasn't fixed as the Speedramp at unload could never be turned on. Apparently the cars kept crashing into the turntable, so the solution was to change it so the cars would hold for the turntable if out of synch.

 

[Mickeynerd17]

"If you look at YouTube videos, you'll see the ride speed up and slow down at times. The ride itself also was prone to breaking down because of said turntable from what I've heard, which is why they removed it and 40% of the original track when they made JIYI."

Cough... BS.. COUGH.. They needed more gift shop and merch selling space.

Yea. The technology to make that work has been around for a while now, they just didn't shove the money into it, and Kodak was lacking the funds for it too (digital cameras were coming in hot).

They just got lazy and ripped it out for cost cutting.

 

[NoChesterHester]

On again… off again… on again? Where does this stand?

 

[J4546]

I heard it wasnt cancelled and still under consideration for the next year or 2.

 

[Richie248]

They need to put this ride out of it's misery. I rode it last week and it stopped for extended periods (3 times), scene lighting was so dim (could barely see anything), many of the animatronics weren't working, no A/C, the descent continues to age quickly....this ride is a shell of what it used to be and this park icon deserves better.

 

[Otamin]

They need to put this ride out of it's misery. I rode it last week and it stopped for extended periods (3 times), scene lighting was so dim (could barely see anything), many of the animatronics weren't working, no A/C, the descent continues to age quickly....this ride is a shell of what it used to be and this park icon deserves better.

Better = IP in the mind of Bob Chapek, so be careful what you wish for.

 

[Poseidon Quest]

They need to put this ride out of it's misery. I rode it last week and it stopped for extended periods (3 times), scene lighting was so dim (could barely see anything)

I've noticed that Disney is wildly inconsistent with their lighting. Sometimes Spaceship Earth is so dark that you cab barely make out the mammoth scene and other times its so bright that you can see everything behind the screen. Same with attractions like Nemo or Space Mountain. There's inconsistent light levels that appear to change even week to week.

 

[peter11435]

I've noticed that Disney is wildly inconsistent with their lighting. Sometimes Spaceship Earth is so dark that you cab barely make out the mammoth scene and other times its so bright that you can see everything behind the screen. Same with attractions like Nemo or Space Mountain. There's inconsistent light levels that appear to change even week to week.

It’s not the light levels that change. It’s your eyes.

 

[donsullivan]

It’s not the light levels that change. It’s your eyes.

Yup. If you ride SSE at night when it’s dark outside you’ll see everything (especially the early scenes) in much more detail because your eyes are already adjusted to lowlight conditions from the lack of sunlight outside. When you ride during the day it takes multiple scenes (depending on your eyes) before they adjust to make all the detail clear.

 

[sedati]

Yup. If you ride SSE at night when it’s dark outside you’ll see everything (especially the early scenes) in much more detail because your eyes are already adjusted to lowlight conditions from the lack of sunlight outside. When you ride during the day it takes multiple scenes (depending on your eyes) before they adjust to make all the detail clear.

That will be the benefit of an indoor queue and a preshow instead of outdoor switchbacks, if we do in fact get that.

 

[aladdin2007]

It’s not the light levels that change. It’s your eyes.

I think what the poster is referring to is work lights, for whatever reason through the mammoth scene sometimes there are bright fluorescent spot lights turned on that are awful along the sides of the tracks, lighting up the entire room, other times they are not on. Whether this is someone forgetting to turn them off or not no idea but its happening a lot. SE has a lot of sporadic show quality problems all the time now.

This was also happening prepandemic and isn't new, the teams that work this attraction are very inconsistent or they don't understand show quality anymore, probably the latter unfortunately.

 

[trainplane3]

Big spinning wheel in the printing scene is broken/turned off again.

So it's normal operation I guess.

 

[JustInTime]

Yeah. This ride is ROUGH. It really drags the park down, imo.

 

[DoleWhipDrea]

Sadly the majority of WDW attractions aren't kept up very well, but at EPCOT it feels like it has a magnifying glass due to the neglected in juxtaposition with the construction.

SSE has needed a good refurb for a long time, at bare minimum to clean up what are supposed to be the current effects. At present they can't afford to lose the capacity. It's going to have to stumble through until after GotG and PLAY! open, at the very least.