Greg Maletic
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With two victories under their belts, how did the designers of Disneyland's new Tomorrowland, built in 1998, turn out such a disaster? Forget that the Rocket Rods never worked properly; that's beside the point. What were they thinking in the first place? Unfortunately, they stumbled early on by thinking that a design concept as vague as "Imagination and Beyond" could lead to anything good. It's so broad that virtually any ride concept or architectural element could fit under its umbrella. Take a quick walk through Disneyland's Tomorrowland, and it shows. Unlike Discoveryland, it doesn't feel like one man's dream. Unlike Disney World's Tomorrowland, it doesn't present a single, consistent face to the guest. A direct clone of Discoveryland's Victorian Orbitron sits only a hundred yards away from Redd Rockett's Pizza Port, a funky 50s style restaurant with a TWA Moonliner sitting out front. It doesn't hang together.
The main fault with Disneyland's Tomorrowland? It doesn't "point" to anything. Tomorrowlands of the past pointed towards transportation and outer space exploration; Paris's points towards the Victorian ideal of scientific achievement; Disney World's points teasingly towards a Hollywood-style sci-fi future. Disneyland Tomorrowland's architectural references don't really look like anything we've seen elsewhere, so they don't resonate. And it's all presented as a wacky melange of futuristic ideas, almost like a museum or science expo. If it were stated that that's what it was--a museum--it might work. But we're never told what we're looking at, and it's too hard to figure out on our own. It's been claimed by many outsiders that Disneyland's renovation fell victim to a tiny budget that couldn't pull off its ambitions. Maybe, but that's not an excuse. If budget's a problem, then use a smaller sum of money to sharpen the old theming rather than try to invent something expensive and new as was done in Paris and Orlando. Contrary to what most believe, fine-tuning the old Tomorrowland could actually have worked: it had been great in the past, and as I've tried to show here, its success had absolutely nothing to do with whether it was accurate, or even relevant, to today's concept of the future. All it needed to be is fun, beautiful, and exciting--and none of those qualities required ditching the old theming.
So Anaheim is a strikeout, but Paris and Orlando do show that it's possible to radically change the concept of Tomorrowland while still leaving the inspiration intact. Interestingly, today's far-out Tomorrowlands make obvious what wasn't clear to me as a child: the old Tomorrowland's white concrete vision of the future wasn't "real" like I thought; it was a dream, only a tad more authentic than the cannon that launches Discoveryland's guests to the Moon. In that sense, these new lands aren't inconsistent with the old ones. New or old, they're all about dreaming, and viewed in that light, the best of the new Tomorrowlands work as well if not better than their ancestors. "Inspirational" doesn't have to mean "accurate." Discoveryland isn't accurate in even its smallest detail, but to me, it's moving: we're seeing the physical expression of one man's dream of the future.
The Home of Future Living is a far cry from what we find in Tomorrowland today, and it is a little sad that we don't see that particular vision of the future in the Disney parks anymore. There is, however, one place you can find it: Magic Highway, U.S.A., an episode of the Disneyland TV show that airs occasionally on The Disney Channel. (Note: its next airing is this Saturday night/Sunday morning, April 28th at 2am.) Its first forty-eight minutes tell a relatively dull tale of how our nation's interstate system was built, but its last ten minutes feature a spectacularly animated vision of how we'll move about in the future. Its predictions are rarely on target, but its artistry and vision are never less than thrilling. Spend ten minutes watching this, and you'll remember exactly what you felt the first time you cast your eyes on "Progress City," or took the speedramp by the Home of Future Living. Visions of the future don't need to be accurate. They just need to point to something: something beautiful and inspirational.
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-- Greg Maletic
Greg's column is not posted on a regular schedule.
The opinions expressed by our guest columnists, and all of our columnists, do not necessarily represent the feelings of LaughingPlace.com or any of its employees or advertisers. All speculation and rumors about the future of Disneyland and the Walt Disney Company are just that - speculation and rumors - and should be treated as such.
-- Posted April 25, 2002