Mission: Space - New Horizons?
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EPCOT: The Present
I always hoped that the Millennium Celebration would be the making of EPCOT. Despite average makeovers and transformations of existing Future World pavilions, such as Imagination!, Ellen’s Energy Adventure and Innoventions for much of the nineties, there has been no new pavilion since Wonders of Life in 1989 (that is without replacing an existing one). Test Track was mired with WDI software failures that cost EPCOT millions in budget overruns, wasted publicity and negative PR. Although it remains the most popular attraction at EPCOT, the high maintenance costs continue to suggest that this ride technology has little future (it’s only clone, Journey to the Center of the Earth at Tokyo DisneySea, is the most unreliable Disney attraction in Japan).

IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth is the thrilling climax to every EPCOT day with its dazzling pyrotechnics, awesome LEDdisplay screen, wrapped around a floating globe and the one of the greatest scores ever commissioned by a Disney theme park. IllumiNations has always proved how “grown-up�? EPCOT was and still is, without the need to populate the park with Disney characters. The storyline is highly emotive and the concept unlike anything ever conceived by Disney before. However, EPCOT attendance rapidly falls off after lunchtime, and even park hopping for the lagoon show is not making up the numbers anymore.