Figment's Place

For a short time, Guests visiting Epcot actually had the chance to meet Figment in larger-than-life fashion. The former Kodak film shop at the Imagination pavilion (on the upper lever between the entrance and exit to the Magic Eye Theater) was transformed into Figment's Place, a rainbow-hued home base for everyone's favorite purple dragon.

A handful of interactive elements kept Guests entertained as they passed through the short queue, and then... voila! Just around a corner, Figment is there waiting for a hug.

In spite of Figment's popularity in the Journey Into Imagination attraction and related merchandise, few Guests ever managed to make their way back to Figment's Place. As a result, he has since moved on to "imagine new things" with Dr. Channing at the adjacent Imagination Institute.

Mission: Hidden Disney

Mission: Space at Epcot is a thrilling attraction with lots to see and discover. Apart from the obvious story details and astronaut training information, it also features quite a bit of Hidden Disney.

At the center of the Mission: Space Cargo Bay shop is this statue of Mickey Mouse. Look up at the sky above him, and you'll notice a familiar silhouette formed by the nebula:

Hidden Mickey shapes also show up in this bank of control boxes along one wall of the shop:

This mural behind the register presents us with an un-hidden Mickey, along with his pals, rendered in a comic book style (note the X-2 Space Shuttle from the attraction):

But it's below the mural, on the front of the register counter, where you'll find this - a graphic representation of the symbol for the former Horizons pavilion which once stood on this spot.

The Horizons logo can also be seen in the Mission: Space queue, placed at the center of the large, rotating gravity wheel.

There's something else to look for while you're waiting for your training session. When you're in the corridor alongside Mission Control, watch the small monitors on the workstation behind the glass. You may spot footage of an albatross coming in for a rough landing. It's a clip once used for comic effect during the pre-show of the Mission to Mars attraction in the Magic Kingdom (1975-1993).

There's No Place Like World Showcase

Today, we return to Epcot for a quick jaunt around World Showcase.

Of all the elements of modern-day Epcot, the roots of World Showcase probably go the deepest in Disney history. Way back in the 1950s, an International Street was planned as an expansion of Main Street, U.S.A. at Disneyland. The idea never materialized there, but popped up later as part of the central urban complex in Walt Disney's vision of EPCOT the city.

After Walt was gone, the leaders of the Company at the time didn't feel they could pull off EPCOT without him. Instead, they started looking for ways to bring parts of the EPCOT concept to fruition. The first thing they hit upon was an expanded version of International Street, dubbed The World Showcase. This stand-alone attraction would have been built near the Transportation and Ticket Center, with each participating nation occupying a wedge in one of two modern, semicircular structures.

One thing led to another, and The World Showcase (without the "The") was ultimately combined with Future World, an outgrowth of an early idea for an Industrial Complex, to form EPCOT Center as it was in 1982. Through the process of development, Imagineering artists Herb Ryman and Dorothea Redmond created concept paintings which brought the iconic architecture of each country to the forefront, demonstrating how diverse styles could live side by side in harmony.

Ultimately, building World Showcase in this way helped reinforce the overall theme and story of Epcot, that the various people and cultures of the world come together to help create the future for us all.

Of course, keeping the original design intent for World Showcase in mind also helps to dispel any concerns some might have over purported visual intrusions on the pavilions. Sure, the Swan and Dolphin hotels and the Soarin' show building are visible from parts of World Showcase, but so are Spaceship Earth and the pyramids of Imagination... not to mention the other international pavilions. And that's okay.

The World Showcase pavilions are not intended to be completely immersive environments. Instead, each pavilion is meant to be a dimensional picture-postcard that works on its own as well as part of the whole. Individually, each one offers a selection of the host country's unique architecture, culture, food and shopping experiences. Collectively, they form a "Tapestry of Nations" wherein we can admire our differences yet be bound together by commonalities in the spirit of international fellowship.

There Be a Rolling Gangplank Dead Ahead

At the exit of Pirates of the Caribbean in Florida, Guests must board a "rolling gangplank" to take them back up to Caribbean Plaza. Take a close look at the moving belt, and you'll notice that pirates have passed this way.

The practice of painting images on beltways helps with safety, so that Guests might look down to notice that the floor ahead is moving and take appropriate precautions. It also provides an opportunity to add one more detail to the story. In this case, the footprints of a peg-legged pirate.

In other examples, the moving beltway at the Haunted Mansion features bats flying along, and there are rays swimming forth on the belt at The Seas with Nemo & Friends.

The Seas with Details & Things

At The Seas with Nemo & Friends, Epcot Guests are invited to come down to the shore and dive in to discover a whole new world. The journey starts outside the pavilion, where waves crash upon the rocks and a flock of seagulls squawk, "Mine. Mine. Mine."

Around the corner, the queue winds down Coral Caves Beach past dunes and tall grasses. Along the way are all sorts of fun graphics that not only help set the scene, but refer to characters and elements from the Disney-Pixar film Finding Nemo... as well as foreshadow moments from the ride ahead.

The name Darla on the sign below refers, of course, to Dr. Sherman's niece in the film, but you also have to love the pun: "No Reef Funds"

Closer to the seashore is a lifeguard station labeled "5A" (perhaps a reference to the fact that Finding Nemo was Pixar's 5th feature film?), and just beyond is the ocean. The queue then "dives" right in, as Guests pass rusted railings and schools of animated fish on their way toward an adventure with a certain clownfish.

An interesting detail to note... The logo below, seen a couple of times in the queue for The Seas with Nemo & Friends, identifies the same fictional organization that operates the marine research ventures on the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage at Disneyland: Nautical Exploration & Marine Observation (N.E.M.O. for short).

Flashback: CommuniCore

The attraction we know today as Innoventions traces its roots back to the opening of Epcot. The semi-circular buildings in the heart of Future World were originally home to CommuniCore. Similar to Innoventions, CommuniCore was a place where the park's operating participants could showcase their latest innovations or dive deeper into a subject than could be accomplished in the ride-through attractions.

Short for Community Core, CommuniCore featured hands-on exhibits, information centers, and minor attractions. The photo above (all photos ©Disney) looks across the Sperry Epcot Computer Central toward the American Express TravelPort, where one could preview exciting vacation destinations around the world. Among the highlights of Computer Central were a Build a Roller Coaster terminal (using simple computer graphics, you could then "ride" your creation) and SMRT-1 (below), a little purple robot who played simple question and answer games with Epcot Guests using an early form of speech recognition.

Along the back wall of Epcot Computer Central was a long ramp which led up to the second-floor entrance for the Astuter Computer Review (later called Backstage Magic). In this show, Guests peered down into the large, computer-filled room which operated all of EPCOT Center. With a little Disney magic, our host (later hostess Julie) would appear to shrink down and walk across the tops of the computer cabinets, explaining how everything worked. The show was fascinating in its day. Of course in 2009, everything done in that room could probably be accomplished with a MacBook Pro.

At the nearby Energy Exchange, presented by Exxon, Guests could stand alongside an enormous piece of oil shale or crank away on a handle to see just how much human energy would be needed just to illuminate a few lightbulbs:

Across the way in CommuniCore West could be found FutureCom, presented by Bell System (later by AT&T). The visual icon of FutureCom was the Fountain of Information (below), an ever-moving sculpture of modern media, representing the constant flow of information and entertainment available in 1982 (notice the laser discs; CDs weren't publicly available until after EPCOT Center opened, and DVDs were still more than a decade away).

Elsewhere in FutureCom, Guests could try their hand at managing AT&T's "complex" telephone network (below; mobile phones were still limited to episodes of "Star Trek"). The area also featured a number of interactive games using touch screen technology. Touch screens were put into use throughout CommuniCore, as well as with the World Key Information terminals located at several points around EPCOT Center. Every time I use my iPhone at Epcot, I think about my own first experience with touch screens in that very park and how amazing it is that I can now carry one in my pocket. We really are living in the future!

The guidebook page below (from 1987) details the original locations of these and other CommuniCore features. At the Electronic Forum, Guests responded to a series of questions using buttons on the arms of the theater seats (American Idol Experience anyone?) and could see the poll results in a matter of minutes. In the early 90s, Electronic Forum also served as a voting location for the Person of the Century poll, an initiative sponsored by Disney but abandoned a few years later when it looked like Walt Disney himself was receiving an overwhelming majority of votes. While a good argument could be made for Walt Disney as one of the most significant individuals of the 20th century, announcing him as the Person of the Century might have appeared self-serving. In 1999, the Electronic Forum and Centorium gift shop were merged to form Mouse Gear.

The Stargate Restaurant and Beverage Base became Electric Umbrella. Across the way the Sunrise Terrace Restaurant was converted to Pizza & Pasta for a while, but is today the spot for FountainView Terrace and the Epcot Character Spot.

The space labeled Robot Show below has housed a number of short-lived experiences. In the first year of EPCOT Center's operation, the building was graced with a billboard for the TRON Arcade, a feature which was never added. After the Robot Show closed, the Walt Disney Imagineering Labs were located here, offering Guests an opportunity to test drive an Aladdin virtual reality attraction (eventually added to DisneyQuest). The front side of the space now is home to Club Cool (a recent update on Ice Station Cool) where international Coca-Cola products can be sampled. On the back side, the most recent tenant has been the Epcot 25th anniversary exhibit.

Most notable among the features of CommuniCore was EPCOT Outreach and the Teacher's Center, where Guests and visiting educators could pick up all sorts of additional information about the subjects presented within the park - although information about the park itself proved to be one of the most sought-after topics.

EPCOT Outreach moved around a bit over the years. At one point it was located in CommuniCore East as part of the Electronic Forum area. Later, it was moved to the present-day location of the Epcot Art of Disney shop, where it was known as the Epcot Discovery Center, and the Teacher's Center found a new home upstairs.

With the growth of the Internet in the 21st century, EPCOT Outreach's original Guest service mission became less relevant, and the location was closed. The internal research functions EPCOT Outreach provided for the Walt Disney Company have been carried on, however, with the Walt Disney World Library and Research Center, still staffed today by dedicated Cast Members who once worked in CommuniCore at Epcot.

What remained of CommuniCore was replaced by the first iteration of Innoventions in 1994. In that version, Innoventions was a far more chaotic presentation than it is today, having been inspired by consumer electronics shows. The opening of Innoventions also brought to the area the dancing fountains and colorful kinetic sculptures, designed to add some motion and interest to the center of the park. The Innoventions attraction was streamlined in 1999 with the introduction of the "Road to Tomorrow" and mini-matronic host Tom Morrow 2.0. Tom has since moved on to delivering weather reports on TNN (part of the pre-show for Stitch's SuperSonic Celebration in Tomorrowland at the Magic Kingdom), but the "Road" concept remains a part of Innoventions today.

A Crummy Commercial?

Critics often deride Innoventions as nothing more than blatant advertising, but this attraction goes right to the thematic heart of Epcot and Tomorrowland, as a place where Disney Guests can get an up close (and sometimes hands-on) look at the latest ideas coming from companies the world over.

Participant companies have been part of the Disney theme park experience since the very beginning. In the 1950s, Tomorrowland at Disneyland was dotted with fascinating exhibits of current and future technology.

The American Dairy Association Dairy Bar (above, scan taken from Disneyland the Nickel Tour) previewed a world where flying milkmen would deliver fresh milk straight to your front door. At the Kaiser Hall of Aluminum Fame, Kap the Aluminum Pig hosted a bright and shiny future, filled with new aluminum products.

The latest ideas in bathroom design were featured at the Crane Company Bathroom of Tomorrow, while Monsanto’s Hall of Chemistry used animated displays to tell the story of how chemicals contribute to modern living.

Monsanto also sponsored the original House of the Future, composed almost entirely of plastics (below, image from D23). The House was a fixture at the entrance of Tomorrowland from 1957 to 1967.

Partnering with companies like these adds richness to the Disney theme parks, as well as a degree of realism and credibility to Disney’s storytelling. The tradition of Participants continues today, most notably at the Innoventions attractions at Walt Disney World and Disneyland.

Recent shows within Innoventions at Epcot have included the Test the Limits Lab, presented by Underwriters Laboratories; Velcro Industries “What’s Your Problem?” game show; Liberty Mutual’s “Where’s the Fire?” attraction (above); and the T. Rowe Price "Great Piggy Bank Adventure." These exhibits change regularly to keep Innoventions new and exciting.

In Tomorrowland at Disneyland, the House of the Future has now entered the 21^st century with the Innoventions Dream Home.

For this attraction Microsoft, HP, Lifeware, and homebuilder Taylor Morrison have come together with Disney to present a vision of the future where amazing technology enhances the everyday lives of the fictional Elias family.

So the next time you’re visiting Disneyland Park in California or Epcot at the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida, be sure to stop in and see what’s new at Innoventions, and enjoy a link to Disney's theme park heritage that stretches all the way back to 1955.

A Hidden Disney Open House

The Sensory Labs at the Imagination Institute are hosting an Open House event, and we're invited to participate... and to seek out lots of fun Hidden Disney references. In fact, the Imagination pavilion probably features more Hidden Disney than any other single location at Epcot.

It actually starts in the lobby, where the "inventions" on display are actually props from Disney movies. There's Weebo (below), the personal assistant robot (voiced by The Little Mermaid's Jodi Benson) from Flubber, the 1997 remake of The Absent-Minded Professor. Just inside the entrance and to the left, where the queue rarely extends, is even Wayne Szalinski's video camera helmet from Honey, I Shrunk the Audience.

A little further along are portraits of the Institute's recent Inventor of the Year award recipients: Dr. Nigel Channing (Eric Idle), Director of the Imagination Institute; Professor Ned Brainard (Robin Williams), inventor of Flubber; and Professor Wayne Szalinski (Rick Moranis), creator of the incredible Shrinking Gun. Aside from referencing the films, this detail also helps tie together the story of the individual attractions in the Imagination pavilion. In the Honey, I Shrunk the Audience attraction next door, we get to see Szalinski's Inventor of the Year award ceremony, hosted by Nigel Channing.

Of course, the details on this wall might lead one to believe that there's some revisionist history afoot, claiming that Dr. Channing created the Figment of Imagination, but this isn't the case. Channing was inducted for the invention of the Sensory Labs themselves. Everyone knows it was Dream Finder who put together the tiny sparks which formed Figment, and Dream Finder is still part of the attraction today. In fact, he's the Dean of the Institute. He's just a little busy dreaming up new things behind his office door to come along with us on today's Open House tour.

On our way to the first stop on the tour, the Sound Lab, we pass a computer room. Note the sign: "No Tennis Shoes Allowed". It's a nod to Disney's 1969 film The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes. You may even spot the pair of high-tops on the floor or the letter jacket hanging on the coat rack inside the room... with a letter "M" for Medfield, the college from the movie.

There's even more in this scene, but you have to have a really sharp eye. The names ID'ed on plates by the front door each refer to characters from Disney films which combined science with imagination: Professor Quigley (William Schallert in The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes), Dexter Riley (Kurt Russell in the same film), Wilby Daniels and Merlin Jones (Tommy Kirk's characters in 1959's The Shaggy Dog and The Misadventures of Merlin Jones in 1964)

This next detail is actually a nod to Disney fans. When the original Imagination attraction closed in 1999 and reopened as Journey Into YOUR Imagination, the character of Figment only appeared as a hidden tribute in a constellation of stars. Among other things, the Imagineers involved in the redo of the pavilion underestimated the public's affection for the little purple dragon. A group of fans quickly emerged, calling themselves Friends of Figment and asking for the return of their favorite character to Epcot. When the attraction was redone once again in 2002, it became Journey Into Imagination with Figment. As a tribute to the fans who helped bring him back, Figment has hung a banner over the front window of his upside-down house that reads, "Welcome Friends of Figment."

Finally, as everyone's imagination is set free in the attraction's climactic scene, we're bombarded with visual references to the original Journey Into Imagination attraction. Figment is hang gliding from sheet music of "One Little Spark," the theme written by the Sherman Brothers. There's even a silhouette of the Dream Catcher on the top of the page. Words are styled to resemble images, a common design motif in the previous show, and Figment appears in a variety of different roles: rainbow painter (painting with Figment Pigment, naturally), pilot, mountain climber, astronaut.

There's even a bit of an homage to another former Epcot attraction, Horizons. The image of Eric Idle as the Man in the Moon, singing with Figment in the finale, recalls the old Jules Verne From the Earth to the Moon scene from that other Epcot favorite of the past.

One Little Spark

Another fun detail tucked away inside Epcot Mouse Gear is a contraption that was capturing thoughts and ideas and turning them into new things long before the Mouse Gear machine was constructed. Look closely above the wall bays near the duck office windows, and you'll notice a blast from the Epcot past:

It's the Dream Catcher from the original Journey Into Imagination attraction. While Dreamfinder is enjoying his retirement and Figment is off causing trouble for Dr. Channing at the Imagination Institute, the Dream Catcher has been put to work inside Mouse Gear. In the old show, Dreamfinder would pilot the Dream Catcher around the world, collecting little sparks inspiration to be brought back to the Dream Port. Today, it draws inspiration from Disney's classic cartoon characters to help magically create tangible memories for Walt Disney World Guests.

Since the Journey Into Imagination attraction closed not long before Mouse Gear was built in the late-90s, it was the perfect opportunity for the Imagineers to not only reuse a perfectly good prop, but to pay tribute with a little bit of Hidden Disney.

Making Memories

Mouse Gear, the main shopping location at Epcot, opened in 1999 as a replacement for the former (and smaller) Centorium. The story behind Mouse Gear is that the Disney characters have come together to create and operate this incredible, fanciful machine, capable of turning Disney magic into tangible memories for their Guests to take home with them.

The shop is filled with fun details, from the enormous gloved hand and magic wand, bringing the room to life as it rotates:

To the tiniest components of the fixtures:

All around, iconic imagery of the classic Disney characters combines with an Epcot-appropriate technology angle. Of course, gears and gauges are decidedly "old school" technology, but it all seems to work with the nostalgic nature of the characters.

One detail that's often overlooked by visitors to Mouse Gear is the apparent goings-on in the second story offices of the shop. In one set of windows, Donald Duck is barely able to control his temper as Webigail Vanderquack and his nephews turn the office into a playground. Just around the corner, though, Scrooge McDuck and Daisy are hard at work alongside Mouse Gear inventor Gyro Gearloose. It's a rare park appearance for characters like Webby and Gyro, and if you hang around long enough, you might get to do more than just see them. Periodically, you can actually hear what's happening upstairs. Next time you're in Mouse Gear, stand around and listen. For the less-than-patient, below is a complete transcript of everything that goes on...

HUEY: Quackaroonie! Look at this one fly!

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DEWEY: Epcot Mouse Gear. Dewey speaking. What can I do-ey for you-ey? (chuckles)

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LOUIE: Look at this, fellas! These drawers are full of stuff we can use to make things for Mouse Gear!

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WEBBY: Look at all the pretty cutouts I'm making. Maybe they'll like these at Mouse Gear, too!

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DONALD: Hey, you kids! We've got work to do around here. Wha... Hey! What's the big idea?! (goes ballistic)

SCROOGE: Daisy, were there any calls for me?

DAISY: Yes, Mr. Scrooge. Mickey called from Quality Control to say that everything is looking swell.

SCROOGE: That's great news!

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GYRO: Once I get the kinks out of my Electro-Levitational Numerometer, we'll increase productivity here by 243%! (a power surge is heard) Whoops!

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SCROOGE: Daisy, take a letter. My dear associates, things here at Mouse Gear are running like a dream! (a loud crash is heard) Oh, dear....