Worst mistake in Epcot history

What is the worst mistake in Epcot history?

  • Journey Into Imagination into JIYI and JIIwF

    Votes: 208 49.5%

  • Horizons into Mission Space

    Votes: 109 26.0%

  • IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth into Harmonious

    Votes: 103 24.5%
  • Total voters
    420
TwilightZone

TwilightZone

Well-Known Member
Casper Gutman said:
Where the HECK is World of Motion?!?!?! That’s the answer. Like ripping out Disneyland’s Pirates.

Really, the destruction of WoM, Horizons, and Imagination (and Kitchen Kabaret) can’t be separated. All sprang from the same completely misguided sense of corporate panic and foolishness and all were replaced by massively inferior attractions. Nothing afterwards can come close to that miscalculation, since it effectively destroyed EPCOT and subsequent mistakes have just been rearranging a hollow, meaningless shell.
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Kitchen Kaberet to Food Rocks is a downgrade, but I would argue that Soarin' is an improvement over both. But then again, I am not the biggest fan of animatronic shows.
 
Disstevefan1

Disstevefan1

Well-Known Member
There are so many things other than these three, and its tuff to even pick one of these as the worst since all three are really bad mistakes.

I was a huge horizons fan and I really miss that attraction but I love mission space, my wish would have been to have both Horizons and mission space.

Anyway, back to this survey, I picked Harmonious, because the barges are so ugly and permanently there and I dont have an emotional tie to the new show.

If I was in charge of reimagining EPCOT, I would have:
1. Kept both innoventions, just gutted the insides and build new stuff inside.
2. I would have kept the fountain of nations and updated the fountains adding a water screen to project on, making the fountain a true attraction.
3. I like the points of light on SSE, excellent update.
4. I like three acrylic the spires back, excellent.
5. I like the the addition of Walt statue that is coming.
6. I am ok with Frozen. A nicely done overlay.
7. The Rat is ok, it’s always good when an attraction is added.
8. Illuminations would have stayed, I would have just updated the globe with 2022 technology.
9. I like the return of the classic EPCOT logos and fonts.
 
UNCgolf

UNCgolf

Well-Known Member
In addition to these three and the earlier mentioned World of Motion and Fountain of Nations, I'd add the slow butchering of the Seas pavilion from a unique cohesive experience into just an aquarium without much else to offer (and which doesn't have the kind of viewing space you'd expect since it's been divorced from its theme).

I'd probably pick Imagination off the list (even though I slightly preferred Horizons as an attraction), solely because it could exist in its original form right now and still be one of the best attractions at WDW. Horizons would have needed significant changes/updates.
 
yensidtlaw1969

yensidtlaw1969

Well-Known Member
Illuminations: Reflections of Earth was my favorite, and I agree with those who feel it's really unlikely to be bested by Disney as far as EPCOT Night shows go - but the decline in the park from losing Illumations was not nearly as steep as it was from losing Horizons and Imagination. It's not like losing ROE broke the park; the wheels had already fallen off by the time Illuminations closed up shop.

With that in mind, I'm really inclined to agree with whoever said losing the original Imagination ride was when the park lost its heart and losing Horizons is when it lost its soul. I don't especially feel like Disney can be counted on these days to imbue EPCOT with either meaningful new heart or soul, but losing Imagination seemed to be the start of the fall from which the park has not yet recovered. So I feel inclined to vote for that.
 
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TwilightZone

TwilightZone

Well-Known Member
OK so I decided to make a list of future world (cause that's the extent of my Epcot history knowledge lol) mistakes Disney has made over the years. YMMV of course on whether these are mistakes or not. Sorted by pavilion to keep it kinda bias free.

Communicore
  • Downgrading the Innoventions experience over time (from tech marvels and cool products....to The Piggy Bank Adventure. Yikes)
  • The entire concept of Innoventions, as sponsorships wouldn't last Disney long
  • Demolishing Innoventions West
  • Demolishing the fountain (I count it as part of Innoventions anyway)
Spaceship Earth
  • Downgrading the script to "talk down" to kids
  • The integration of screens
  • Downgrading the fantastic ending of Irons (which IMO didn't need much updates) into the terrible "choose your future" ending (which isn't even in the same caliber as the ending it's supposed to be a successor to)
  • The infamous backwards paperboy

Imagination
  • Replacing it with YOUR Imagination, done entirely on a budget of 5 cents, with barely any Figment, and themed to various IPs that did not have staying power. Made worse by recent Ebay auctions ( one | two | three | four | five ) suggesting Figment may have had more of a role. (Of course I will make my own thread about these later)
  • Updating Figment's personality to fit in with the edgy early late 90s/early 00s standard that Disney thought was cool and "in" at the time (hint: it wasn't)
  • Tearing out and abandoning the upstairs Imageworks, replacing it with a DVC lounge with no sign in sight it will ever return to it's original "fun for all" state ever.
  • Lack of maintenance or replacement for With Figment in sight
  • Failing to replace Captain EO Tribute/Honey I Shrunk the Audience with anything substantial

Motion
  • Test Track 2.0's meh theming and clunky execution
  • Replacing World of Motion with Test Track when the two could have co-existed

Horizons
Replacing it with Mission Space

Mission Space
Making it a lethal thrill ride that appeals to very little and wasn't even a good choice or idea to begin with.

Energy
  • Everything about Ellen's Energy Adventure, it is like a ride meant to date itself and it continues to be more dated as time goes on. The fact it lasted as long as it did is an odd miracle.
  • The vast boringness of the original attraction. It's an attraction meant to sell products by a sponsor and unlike the other classic EPCOT attractions, it's extremely obvious.

Seas
  • Retheming it to Nemo
  • Failing to re-retheme it into Finding Dory while the iron was still "hot" (a case with many IPs that would actually fit in Epcot)

Wonders of Life
  • Body Wars' theming, a thrill ride themed to the body just makes people sick
  • The Making of Me. Yeah understand why it was there kind of, but still weird
  • Failing to update the attraction alongside the others in the 90s
  • The strange 80s circus theme

Play
  • The name, it's not "Wonders of Play", "World of Play", "The Magic of Play" or anything more descriptive that fits within the Disney/Epcot naming scheme. It's just....Play.
  • The total lack of theming or cohesion. It could have easily fit Epcot if it was about the connection with technology and play, the history of play (though dunno fully how that would work), if it had a health focus (similar to Wonders of Life minus all the doctor stuff), or was billed as a replacement/spiritual successor to Imageworks to allow for an expansion update to Imagination. Instead it's a weird mishmash of IPs in a generic future city setting.

The Land
  • Replacing the arguably timeless Kitchen Kaberet with the not-so timeless and cheesy Food Rocks
  • Making Soarin' over the World a CGI fest, missing the appeal of what made Over California so beloved (though this is more of a "Disney" issue rather than an "Epcot" one, but still fits)
Summary: The main issue with Epcot, especially as time goes forward, is Disney constantly attempts to make it "hip" and "relevant" without really thinking about making it "timeless". This was an issue beginning since at least Wonders of Life, with it's strange 80s circus theming (or Splashtacular if you count stage shows) and continues on to this day. Though there is also an issue with Disney failing to strike when the iron is "hot", especially in cases where an attraction does need a makeover or integrating an IP in an area where it would fit (such as the case with Finding Dory's institute and The Seas pavilion).
 
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Animaniac93-98

Animaniac93-98

Well-Known Member
yensidtlaw1969 said:
With that in mind, I'm really inclined to agree with whoever said losing the original Imagination ride was when the park lost its heart and losing Horizons is when it lost its soul.
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Side note, that's how I feel about DHS losing both the animation studio (its heart) and Great Movie Ride (its soul). One justified calling it a "studio" at all and the other spoke to the idea of the park being a celebration of film history at large, not just a marketing tool for Disney.
 
Sir_Cliff

Sir_Cliff

Well-Known Member
Casper Gutman said:
Where the HECK is World of Motion?!?!?! That’s the answer. Like ripping out Disneyland’s Pirates.

Really, the destruction of WoM, Horizons, and Imagination (and Kitchen Kabaret) can’t be separated. All sprang from the same completely misguided sense of corporate panic and foolishness and all were replaced by massively inferior attractions. Nothing afterwards can come close to that miscalculation, since it effectively destroyed EPCOT and subsequent mistakes have just been rearranging a hollow, meaningless shell.
Click to expand...
Epcot is a very interesting case study in that they did dismantle and replace almost all of the original attractions during the park's second decade. Unfortunately for everyone involved, none of the replacements (with the partial exception of cloning Soarin') really resonated with guests. Someone should be looking back on that period and evaluating what went wrong so this doesn't happen again.
 
D

doctornick

Well-Known Member
Sir_Cliff said:
Epcot is a very interesting case study in that they did dismantle and replace almost all of the original attractions during the park's second decade. Unfortunately for everyone involved, none of the replacements (with the partial exception of cloning Soarin') really resonated with guests. Someone should be looking back on that period and evaluating what went wrong so this doesn't happen again.
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I think Test Track has resonated with guests and, in general, was a reasonable replacement considering it was the first second generation ride. Although I did really like WoM, it doesn’t seem to be regarded as the top of classic Epcot and was a reasonable choice to replace first (though why not both WoM and Test Track - they would be great compliments).
 
Sir_Cliff

Sir_Cliff

Well-Known Member
doctornick said:
I think Test Track has resonated with guests and, in general, was a reasonable replacement considering it was the first second generation ride. Although I did really like WoM, it doesn’t seem to be regarded as the top of classic Epcot and was a reasonable choice to replace first (though why not both WoM and Test Track - they would be great compliments).
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I kind wonder about the extent to which Test Track resonated. It's a popular attraction in the context of a park with few headline attractions, but do many people consider it among WDW's best attractions or a draw in its own right? I don't really have the answer to that, but my impression has always been that its popularity has more to do with it being amongst the best of a mostly mediocre collection of attractions and the only one with some thrill value that doesn't risk making you vomit.

I do think the concept was good and appropriate for the location, but I think that was also true of Mission: Space. In both cases, though, the end result just fell a little flat. Far more so in the case of M:S, though.
 
TikibirdLand

TikibirdLand

Well-Known Member
Sir_Cliff said:
I do think the concept was good and appropriate for the location, but I think that was also true of Mission: Space. In both cases, though, the end result just fell a little flat. Far more so in the case of M:S, though.
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I really like both M:S and TT 1.0 (haven't ridden 2.0 despite trying). Don't get me wrong; I'd rather have Horizons. But, I never got to see WoM to know what I missed. IMO, both are the kinds of dark rides EPCoT should have kept -- maybe with updates AND Maintenance. But, both replacements are pretty solid with my family.
 

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