What is the difference between Mission 1 & 2 of Space Mountain?

[kcnole]

I'm very intrigued by the SM in Paris as it seems like its by far the most interesting of all the space mountains. I've never been able to see this in person though. I did have a question about it. What is the difference between Mission 1 and Mission 2?

[yesitsme]

Mission 1 is regarded by many as the superior version of the ride and was based on a journey to the moon. It had an amazing on board soundtrack which I still miss to this day. Mission 1 ran from opening in 1995 to 2005.

Mission 2 is based on a journey further into space, can't remember where off the top of my head at the moment. It uses a different onboard soundtrack which isn't a patch on the original and also all new effects inside the mountain which I'm not convinced made the ride any better. Mission 2 opened as part of a majour renovation of the ride in 2005.

I can't wait for the day when Space Mountain is returned to it's former Mission 1 glory. It just isn't as 'special' now.

[pussnboots]

When the ride opened, it was meant to evoke the (from our perspective) retrofuturistic world of Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon. It had a sweeping score and was filled with arty props and design elements akin to Baz Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge.

Then they tore it all out and replaced it with halfheartedly designed crud in order to promote it as a marvelous new upgrade that's totally jiggy with it, yo. None of that dusty old quality crap for the Disneyland Paris of 2005, no, today's guest paying €40 to get in gets to enjoy this wonderful new soundtrack. Yes, I think that's the correct link.

I think the idea now is that you travel to the sun or to Mars or to that planet where the monkeys put the Statue of Liberty... In any case it's something far cooler than the moon, which of course is so 1995. Doesn't Ryanair fly there now?

Of course it's all still in the same Vernian building, so I think we can all agree that the upgrade was an overwhelming success and a feat of genius.

[Zarniwoop]

Bringing this up (again) makes me angry!

Discoveryland used to be my favourite land (avec Frontierland) because it had nice Jules Verne story and theme, topped with "todays" visionary G. Lucas. You met Verne at Timekeeper, then you met him at SM 1 and finally you could walk through Nautilus. There are several props around Discoveryland imagined by Verne, bigger and smaller.

Then came some shopping mall counsultant who played few numbers in Excel and then ripped the land. There's no more a bonding story for Discoveryland. Instead we got saluting animals from Lion King, Buzz Lightyear and SM 2 that is just a cool half functional roller coaster. (I found a loose 5" bolt inside a coaster wagon that'd have killed somebody if left behind). We still got some props from Verne novels, but no story at all.

Ripping Discoveryland made WDS look well executed. What a waste of money!

[pussnboots]

Wow, this subject sure invokes a lot of anger, doesn't it. Makes me feel like we should do something...



But ah well.

[tasman]

Mission 2 plus Buzz minus A la terre de la lune (did I spell that right?) minus timekeeper = goodbye Verne-land and hello hodge-podge Tomorrowland.

[WDITrent]

Mission 2 plus Buzz minus A la terre de la lune (did I spell that right?) minus timekeeper = goodbye Verne-land and hello hodge-podge Tomorrowland.

If you were going to the Earth from the moon, you would be spelling it correctly.

I have never been to DLRP, but I wonder why they completely rethemed the ride. Couldn't they have simply plussed the current version? Or maybe that would have made tourists disappointed because it's not what they were expecting. Usually when the average guest thinks of "space" it's what "space" is seen as today or in the future. They might have been getting thrown off by the De la Terre a la Lune idea.

[Zarniwoop]

I have never been to DLRP, but I wonder why they completely rethemed the ride.

Marketing department needed something, but share issue wasn't completed yet and there was no money for investments. So they took the money from maintenance budget and "updated" SM to M:2.

To fix things, Buzz should move to WDS's Pixarland. And what to put inside Visionarium? How about Soarin' Over France/World with Jules Verne's Air baloon?