Journey Into Imagination is a delightful and creative dark ride that literally appeals to all five senses! Anchoring the Imagination pavilion (which looks great and very sleek in my opinion with the futuristic pyramid look), Journey Into Imagination generally warrants a very brief wait (rarely over 10 minutes) because of the ride’s very fast loading and high capacity, and is certainly well worth the wait. Well the attraction is based around the Neil Channing’s beloved Imagination Institute and his attempts at sparking the imaginations of riders by utilizing each of the five senses. However, everyone’s favorite purple dragon, Figment, appears only to disrupt the tour, launching it into chaos and providing a one-of-a-kind and highly enjoyable experience.
Our tour of the imagination institute begins with the sound lab where Neil Channing’s tour thankfully is invaded by Figment who instantly begins terrorizing him by disrupting his tour, much to my delight. All of the sounds provided in this room are very loud, clear, and crisp, highlighted by the wonderfully well executed whistle of the train. Following this is the excellent sight room, where a vision test quickly becomes a game of scrabble for Figment. Then comes the well-executed smell lab which provides some pleasant smells like chocolate with some really foul smells like a skunk, and trust me, both were very realistic. Afterwards Figment has totally taken over the tour and literally turns the whole room upside-down with plenty of visual illusions like the amazing disappearing butterfly trick. Last comes the very entertaining finale with Figment totally unleashing his imagination showing many imaginative scenes of Figment just having fun.
The whole attraction really is a joyride from start to finish mixing comedy in with the simple good-nature of Figment just being contagious making the entire attraction refreshing and entertaining. All of the scenes are very well executed in my opinion and I especially love all of the animatronics and animations since they worked flawlessly in each of my numerous rides.
Now I have experienced all three versions of Journey Into Imagination, and I have to admit that this new one is my personal favorite, with the original garnering a very close second place. Quite frankly the second one, primarily due to its absence of Figment and it’s overall dull ride experience, was absolutely abysmal since it lacked the undeniable charm each of the other two versions provide. Because of the wonderful experience Figment and the unique attraction provides, in combination with the ride’s constantly short wait, definitely give Imagination a chance since it certainly will spark your imagination and make you come off in love with Figment and his manic antics.
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