Monday, April 12, 2021

The Promise and Problem of, "Tomorrowland," at Disney's Parks

Disneyland and Disney World's Magic Kingdom both feature a Tomorrowland. It is both a neat theme for a park and one filled with issues. All the other lands are mystical and magical places that don't really exist while Tomorrowland is ostensibly our reality, just in the future. As someone who likes science-fiction and thinking about the future, I've always really liked Tomorrowland. It features Cosmic Ray's Starlight Cafe, my favorite park restaurant. It has, "Space Mountain," the whole area contains a neat design, it's just fun! As this fascinating article by SFGate's Katie Dowd points out, tomorrow always comes and can make a place dedicated to the future actually start to seem dated.

Tomorrowland promises us a glimpse into the future, but every decade our idea of what the future looks like changes. We used to imagine a World like, "The Jetsons," with flying cars, meals in pill form, and so forth. Now it's more about how we are always connected to the internet and constantly streaming and watching one another in a World with no privacy. The, "Future," keeps changing and makes the way, "Tomorrowland," pictured the future look weirdly retro for a vision of an upcoming time. It still holds an optimistic promise of a hopeful and happy future compared to how nowadays the upcoming decades look like they'll be trying between climate change, political unrest, a still-raging pandemic that could give rise to other problems, and so forth. There is no easy answer on what to do with the current Tomorrowland setups. I just hope if changes are made over time they keep Cosmic Ray.

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