The Horizons Story (Part 2)

When Horizons finally opened on October 1st, 1983, it would easily become on of the most impressive attractions developed by Walt Disney Imagineering at the time, in terms of both content and costs. The ride was approximated to have cost about $60,000,000 USD, and this was after the team working on the ride had scaled back the budget by about ten million dollars.

The unique design of the pavilion was meant to mimic the look of a spaceship and symbolize an infinite, ever expanding horizon: an allusion to the endless possibilities of the future, and the logo of the ride was given a similar, three-dimensional design.

The attraction layout was also somewhat unique, as it featured a continuous ‘omnimover’ ride system that is present in other Disney rides such as the Haunted Mansion, but instead of vehicles being locked onto a grounded track or conveyor belt, they were suspended from above in a similar fashion to Peter Pan’s Flight.

More aspects that differentiated the attraction from others included the use of two OMNIMAX screens, which were groundbreaking at the time of its opening, advanced audio-animatronic figures, and a one of a kind “choose your own ending” finale segment which was brought to life through the use of rotating projection screens, movie-quality camera work, and extremely detailed scale models of different landscapes. The ride was also known for its use of music, particularly the “New Horizons” theme song composed by George Wilkins, who would go on to work on the music for the Living Seas pavilion.

The Horizons ride was, no doubt, a long one and spanned a total duration of 14 minutes and 45 seconds. Guests would enter the ride’s queue, themed to Futureport, the transportation center of tomorrow, which featured a board advertising the different locations the ride would take them to. They would then step on to a moving conveyor belt and board their omnimover ride vehicles.

These vehicles looked similar to the doom buggies in the Haunted Mansion attraction, but were attached from overhead, fit four people across, and took on more of a box-like shape. Also, each vehicle came with three buttons, each of which had the names of different locations on them. These would come into use later on during the “choose your own ending” finale of the ride.

As omnimovers disembarked, the first segment of the ride began, entitled “Looking Back at Tomorrow.” This part of the ride focused on what the future would look like as dreamed by visionaries of the past, and included an audio animatronic figure of Jules Verne in the spaceship from his novel ​From the Earth to the Moon​.

This scene transitioned to one of a city apartment from the perspective of the future by people in the 1930s. This scene had a very abstract style and consisted of robots doing simple housework for their owners including giving haircuts, vacuuming the floors, and preparing food in the kitchen. The chef robot seemed to have been having a bit of a malfunction, however, as the kitchen would be in complete disarray with food splattered everywhere.

The scene would transition once again to reveal the future as perceived by people of the 1950s. This scene comprised mostly of neon lights and billboards, all aligned to depict a nighttime skyline of a booming city. The designs of the buildings would be similar to something one would see in an episode of ​the Jetsons, complete with needle-shaped sky towers, flying cars, and people soaring through the air on jet-packs.

The second segment of the ride would then begin, and omnimovers would move into the omnisphere portion of the building. The huge, spherical screens would show footage of the technological capabilities of the present day. This short film segment highlighted scientific achievements including being able to harness energy from the sun, deep sea diving, cutting-edge medical technology, and space shuttle launches. It also touched upon the idea of colonizing outer space, which foreshadowed the third portion of the ride.

As omnimovers entered the 21st century, riders would be met by the main narrators, an older couple enjoying their evening in their technologically-advanced living room in the city of Nova Cite. The father, who would play a song on his synthesizer device, sat next to his dog while the mother was across the room, having a holographic video chat conversation with their daughter. All the family members, particularly the father and the dog, were believed to be the same characters from the Carousel of Progress.

Next, riders would enter the Mesa Verde homestead of the daughter. Her husband and son could be seen decorating a birthday cake in the kitchen while her daughter, (or the granddaughter of the narrators), would be seen in a different room, having a video conversation through the television with her boyfriend, who was working on repairing a SoloSub submarine vessel.

As the omnimovers moved forward, riders would find themselves on the other side of the conversation, now in the boyfriend’s perspective in the underwater colony of Sea Castle. Riders could see the boyfriend working on his damaged submarine and talking to his girlfriend back in Mesa Verde. The boyfriend character was modeled after the story designer of the attraction, imagineer Tom Fitzgerald, and was therefore given the nickname ‘Tom II.’

Riders would continue past Tom II’s workshop and explore the outside city of Sea Castle, passing by a classroom full of students interacting with a sea lion, a couple eating dinner while looking out of their bubble-shaped window, and the same classroom of students now swimming by in scuba suits on a trip through the community kelp farms.

The third and final stop of the tour would then begin as omnimovers passed into the outer space colony of Brava Centauri through an anti-gravity chamber of one of the station’s docking bays. A family could be seen experiencing weightlessness, and riders with a keen eye could spot a Winnie the Pooh doll from the parks floating towards the ceiling above.

Next, riders would pass into one of the laboratories of the space station where research on giant space crystals was being conducted. The main story would soon start to come to a close when vehicles entered the living room of the narrator’s grandson and his family, who is celebrating his birthday. The other family members from Nova Cite, Mesa Verde, and Sea Castle could be seen celebrating with them over a holographic chat (completed using a classic Pepper's ghost optical illusion).

It should be noted that during the birthday party scene, Disney had to pay an extra $3000 in order to use the ‘Happy Birthday’ song in the attraction due to it being copyrighted!

After the omnimovers exited the room, a voice from overhead announced to riders that it would be up to them to decide which path they wanted to take to fly themselves back to Futureport. It gave them the options of traveling through Mesa Verde, Sea Castle, or Omega Centauri. This is where the ‘choose your own ending’ element came into play, as the buttons attached to each omnimover would light up for passengers to press; the majority would rule when it came to selecting each return route.

Using a system of screens that rotated continuously for each passing omnimover, short, 31 second videos would play that would create the illusion of the omnimover flying back to Futureport. Each video would be unique to the environment voted upon, resulting in a total of three different ride endings.

As vehicles returned to the loading platform, they would pass by a giant, glowing General Electric logo prior to arrival. When guests disembarked, they were left with a final thought by the narrator; “If we can dream it, we really can do it. And that’s the most exciting part!”

In order to create the video footage seen throughout the ride’s three endings, it took advanced camerawork and extremely detailed scale models to create an effective simulated flyover of the outdoor scenes. Keep in mind that this was made at a time before computer imaging software was conventionally used for special effects in movies, so the models created had to be so large that they could accommodate at least 30 seconds of screen time.

To give a better idea of what this meant, the model for the Mesa Verde sequence was said to have measured 32 by 75 feet, and had to be filmed in a hanger at the Burbank airport in California. Being produced in 1983 by 30 model makers and taking over a year to build and shoot the three segments, the Horizons Mesa Verde ending is, to this day, the longest continuously shot miniature sequence ever filmed.

As riders exited their omnimovers to leave Futureport, they would pass under several colorful, crystal-like glowing tunnels, and be led past ​The Prologue and the Promise, an incredible mural painted by artist Robert McCall. This huge, beautiful piece of artwork was created to showcase civilization's journey from the present to a hopeful, undecided future.

Overall, the attraction became a huge hit with guests of all ages and due to its impressive animatronics, beautifully composed musical score, and focus on the concepts of innovation, progress, adventure, and discovery. Horizons quickly became known to many as one of the greatest, most imaginative attractions ever produced by Walt Disney Imagineering, since it best encapsulated Walt's fascination with the unknown possibilities of the future.

The Horizons Story isn't over just yet. Stay tuned for the next installment.

Until next time. -Max