Defunctland: Walt Disney's City of the Future, E.P.C.O.T. 

Walt Disney was absolutely ahead of his time, he was the first person who developed a crippling SimCity addiction

Walt really said "I'm a good animator, so I think I can manage a small dictatorship"

i dont wanna be remembered for cartoons. i wanna be remembered for something fucking insane

"There will be no retirees" Walt, retirees are 20% of Florida's population.

I love the overarching reason behind Epcot is "Old Walt trying to stop shit that annoyed him."

I get the feeling Walt Disney would’ve really loved the sims.

I clicked expecting a theme park documentary and ended up learning that the bioshock games were a lot closer to potential reality than I'd thought

I really want a dystopian film based on these plans. Everything is EXACTLY how Walt planned it, but it's the furthest thing from paradise

Walt Disney: "Death is not an acceptable Topic" Also Walt Disney: *dies*

Florida Man Attempts to Create Autonomous Dictatorship in Swamp

Despite how dystopian epcot would have been, Walt's thoughts on pedestrian-centric urban planning and gamified remote learning are surprisingly prescient for a mid-century mogul.

I am grateful I live in the timeline where I have to wait 3 hours to see a talking raccoon at Epcot and not the timeline where people are essentially a zoo exhibit with zero rights.

Meanwhile in an alternate universe: Today on Defunctland, we will discuss the history of Walt Disney's EPCOT, from it's inception, it's opening, the political problems, and the infamous 1974 riots that led to it's collapse, as well as explore the ruins of this controversial autocratic city.

Walt Disney really kept that childish innocence up to his old age, including the childish desire to become the iron-fisted dictator of a utopia.

As a former Disney World employee: According to management , EPCOT stands for "every paycheck comes on Thursday." :D

As someone who's been to Florida several times I'm convinced there's something there that turns you insane the more you stay.

"It is worth noting that the unruly generation Walt was attempting to corral, was in fact, the baby boomers" My, how the times, and roles, have changed.

Walt Disney's plans for Epcot sound like the motivation and goals of a Pokémon villain

I work at Epcot now. Never thought I would, but literally every single day I use information learned from this video to explain things to my guests

The image of a dying walt disney seeing a blue print on the ceiling is absolutely chilling thanks defunctland

You know, EPOCT sounds really cool until you get to the crazy dictatorship part.

"Walt and his team noticed a large undeveloped swamp area on Florida's turnpike near I-4, which at the time was under construction, and still is today."

Walt: "From each according to his ability." Me: "And to each according to his need, right?" Walt: *stares* Me: "...and to each according to his need, right?"

Okay, now I get why people say Andrew Ryan from Bioshock is basically a more deranged Walt Disney.

It's seems that Walt's vision of EPCOT was less like a real city and more like a performance of a possible city. He wanted real people to act out what a city of the future could be, as if you were making a sci-fi movie with a entire city as the main cast.

Someone should've given Walt a copy of Cities: Skylines to calm him down.

Level one of learning about the original EPCOT: aw, that's cute. Walt wanted his own little town with fancy gadgets and stuff. Level ten of learning about the original EPCOT: oh god, Walt wanted to be king of his own totalitarian dictatorship in the middle of Florida.

The fact that Walt thinks he has to be more than a storyteller to make impacts on people's lives when the very existence of Disney World continues to drive Florida's economy is deeply, deeply ironic.

Epcot...is a people zoo. That's pretty horrifying.

"Walt Disney the politician" is something from the darkest timeline lol

He had some genuinely good ideas: the radial design, the people movers, the renewable energy, and the underground road and parking. If he treated it like a normal but advanced neighborhood with privacy and freedom it could’ve worked.

wow. when i went to disney world, our family hung out in epcot the ENTIRE time. we loved the cultural theming combined with the futuristic look... and the radial design. we loved it. i always had this feeling in the back of my head that it was somehow *different* from the rest of disney world for some reason. there was just... something about it. never in my FUCKING LIFE would i have EVER GUESSED THIS.

If you don’t have the sims you just gotta do it the analog way, I guess

The irony is that he was so obsessed with his legacy, but if he had managed to do this in his lifetime, he'd be remembered as a madman

Yknow, the viability of EPCOT aside, it's kind of sad that the project literally died with walt. I suppose that most people knew that it was never really going to happen, but they wanted an old man to pass away in peace believing that it would happen, but that line, "Marvin, Walt's dead," just hit quite hard.

I wish someone could have explained to Walt that "entertainment" and "distractions"' are important. Sometimes the stories change lives, sometimes they just provide enough of a breath of fresh air for people to keep going in a hard world. Media is a powerful tool. There's a reason everybody loved what he did, and it wasn't a superficial one.

I dunno if this is a strange thing to admit, but I'm currently watching this with my hands clasped together on my desk like this is some kind of secret presentation

“I-4 was under construction...and still is today” bruh central Floridian gang lol

Been watching a lot of old defunctland lately after the disney channel theme documentary, and honestly this is one of your best. Your ability to paint a mental picture is insane, and the description of a man on his deathbed fruitlessly planning his legacy nearly brings me to tears every time i watch

Perjurer using Citizen Kane as a framework for Walt's hunger for power and legacy stemming from something Walt tried to get back is hauntingly apt.

"a conservative obssessed with progress" is probably the best description I've heard of Walt Disney in my life

“Why be a major when I’m a king?” *worried laughter*

the minute kevin mentioned that you would be _required_ to work in Epcot, if alarm bells weren't ringing before, they definitely were now. and as much as Walt hated the suburbs, he was essentially making another suburb, a much more authoritarian one.

Walt Disney was so concerned about his legacy. Did he ever consider who was going to rule EPCOT after he died?

"Teenage crime was a major problem in cities." I'm sure it had something to do with all that homosexual fast dancing.

The more this video went on the more it felt like it was becoming Disney's Bioshock.

I legitimately believe this season should be included in any museum about Walt Disney/the Disney company. It is a fair and well-researched series of videos portraying both the positives and the negatives about this iconic and pivotal figure in American history.

It's kind of sad that Walt couldn't see his contribution to industry and culture through the arts. He changed people's minds about animation, and themed attractions in general. Convincing many that these were forms of art that deserved appreciation, instead of derision. If only he understood how important entertainment and storytelling is to the preservation of America's cultures for future generations. If only he could have actually looked to the future, instead of trying to recreate the feeling of the past.

Me at the begging of this episode: wow! This sounds great so sad he never built it! Me at the end: thank you god for not having him create this dystopia.

"'Why would I run for mayor when I am already king?' It was a joke." I love that this needed to be clarified.

Kevin, I want to give you the highest compliment I can give within the context of my family: While discussing the Reedy Creek Improvement District controversy, I told my 82 year old father about this documentary and how he'd walk away from it understanding everything. I know he never likes sitting through ANYTHING for very long, so I figured he'd never get around to it. The next day he texted me and we discussed the issues in your video, from beginning to end, meaning he watched every second. This is, truly, a testimony to how great this is.

I remember hearing in an interview at least a decade ago that character of Andrew Ryan from Bioshock was in some part based on, from his mannerisms to his ideology, Walt Disney. I guess I see what they were getting at now. Really goes to show how you'll never quite know how history will remember your actions until you are long gone. I'm glad he's remembered for his effect on our childhoods and not whatever the hell this would have ended up becoming.

if you ever feel scared or hopeless about the world today, just remember that we narrowly escaped a world where schools, churches, hospitals, and roads were all owned and designed by disney.

This feels like a genuine classical tragedy. Hubris, fatal flaws, and sorrow in the end as the protagonist fails. You’re a storyteller among storytellers.

“Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow? No, says the man in EPCOT, it belongs to the Mouse”

As an Australian who has never been to the Us, I know there are a lot of surprising things in this video, but I'm honestly still shocked to learn that Disney Land and Disney World aren't the same thing

EPCOT was just a giant transmutation circle so Walt could sacrifice his workers for eternal life. I've seen this plot before.

"A futurist, that traded in nostalgia." Excellently put, Kevin.

I kept trying to think of what EPCOT reminded me of, and I suddenly realized: it was just like the communities in Lois Lowry's The Giver. They're made to be absolutely perfect, and everyone is given a distinct purpose to make that community function, practically assigned their roles from birth. In order to achieve "perfection", the citizen's rights, freedoms, and even some of their individuality is stripped away. When a citizen grows too old to be a productive member of the community, they are no longer viewed as having any value and are systemically disposed of. The parallels aren't perfect, of course, but they're similar enough to be very, very concerning.

As questionable as EPCOT’s success would have been had Walt built it, the last days of Walt’s life sounds like it was truly heartbreaking.

"And still is today" *laughs, then cries* *honks horn*

'The teens of the 60s loved nothing more than hanging out with a bunch of narcs in a building designed by a 60-year-old man'

"Walt tries to create a futuristic city, an utopia for all artists and creative people..." Wow thats amazing, whats wrong with tha- "...where he would micromanage everything down to molecular level" ....oh

Walt is really fascinating to me because he was clearly a megalomaniacal plutocrat, but he was a megalomaniacal plutocrat who sincerely believed in his own bullshit, which is almost scarier and more dangerous than one who just cynically puts on an act.

Tragic that some people just miss their true calling of starting a cult -R

Notoriously anti-communist Walt suggesting that everyone be “employed to the best of their ability” threw me for a loop

The Burj Khalifa and many buildings in Dubai took design directly from Walt's EPCOT blueprints. Really cool to see on google maps, and see actual images of places built almost identical to what he sketched. To their credit.. the researchers weren't wrong. These cities are largely ghost cities, incredibly separated by wealth.

for a somewhat Disney-centric channel this is one of the most level headed and unsentimental documentaries on Walt Disney that I have ever seen...admirers of uncle Walt get a refreshing dose of harsh reality here...

There's something tragic about Walt's drive to construct EPCOT in the waning hours of his life. His desperation to secure his legacy at the very cost of it comes across like a man hopelessly searching for immortality.

Walt's attitude that there should be no retirees and that everyone must "productively" contribute until the moment they died seems to mirror his own obsession with work and his aversion to thinking about mortality, aging, and death. But it also seems like a reflection of the kind of America that reared him, where the primary measure of a person's worth was their labor-based contribution to the capitalist engine of production. We see this reflected in the progress of American culture over the course of a century, as the elderly are increasingly pushed away into hidden places and special homes to keep them out of view and out of mind. Had Walt lived longer, and continued to develop the epcot concept, I wonder if the realities of human life would have altered his perspective or if he would have stayed in denial.

I love that venomous shift in tone when Kevin mentions Monsanto.

You had me at “No retirement” LMAO I don’t think anyone would want to live somewhere where they have to dream of labor till they die.

Living at EPCOT sounds a bit like having to deal with Windows Update. "New appliances are ready to be installed. Would you like to restart your house now or tonight?". Then sometimes you won't get the warning and the appliances get installed anyway, right in the middle of cooking a meal.

Every time I caught myself thinking "You know, that doesn't sound so bad," I then remembered that a lot of EPCOT's function hinged on corporations being benevolent overlords and I'd almost immediately think of both mining towns (good on you for mentioning company cities!) and cyberpunk wageslave cities.

One of the ultimate failures of Walt's entire concept was his apparent refusal to consider old age and death. "No retirees"? So what happens when someone is too old to work? Do you just kick them out? Are you making space for cemeteries near the churches, or would people have to leave town entirely in an expensive rented car to go visit a loved one's grave? Old age and death are facts of life, and it seems like he (very mistakenly) assumed that we'd have achieved immortality or at least a way to completely halt the detrimental effects of aging by the time this city was complete. Also he wanted so much to be automated, but also everyone to be employed. Why not focus on the automation and implement a universal basic income to guarantee a base quality of life for all residents? This would also go a long way towards promoting what he claimed to want - an emphasis on the arts. Art is at its best when it's done for the love and passion of it, not for commercial gain. Would Epcot-housed artists considered "employed" if they're not working for Disney? I think that Walt's problem is exemplified in how the people close to him had to respond to his ideas - you could never just tell the man "no". You had to say "yes, but..." even if the idea at its core was unfeasible. And you know what happens when a creator stops being told no? The fucking Star Wars prequels is what happens. Nobody would tell Lucas "no" anymore because the original movies were so successful, even though it was partially because so many of his ideas were shot down that the original trilogy was any good in the first place. If Epcot had ever even come close to reality, that's what it would have been - Walt Disney's Prequel trilogy: overhyped, poorly executed, and focusing on the aesthetic over the actual necessary tangible aspects that make a film (or a city) work the way it has to. Also a "one man, one vote democracy" is not a fucking thing. That's called a dictatorship. Democracy is by definition a process involving a group that can agree and disagree. From OED: "a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state." So yeah, he wanted a literal Walt Disney World - his own world, his own magic kingdom, where his imagination ruled, logic and the happiness of the inhabitants be damned.

I think about this video constantly because it begs us to consider Walt’s legacy and what to make of it. And honestly i think the whole thing reflects how we see him today. Because Epcot and all its likely consequences never came to be, it remains simply a heap of inspiring ideas to consider. And that’s a blessing in disguise. Because its consequences never came to reality, Walt’s reputation doesn’t have to be tangibly tarnished by it. He remains a fascinating figure in a grey area between inspiring and troubling. For better or worse, that’s his legacy, but in my opinion its for the better as far as he should be concerned.

Nobody: Walt Disney: "EVERYTHING NEEDS TO BE CIRCULAR!"

pretty sure the three major symptoms of depression are fatigue, loss of interest in activities, and crying to feed the birds on a daily basis

What’s crazy to me is that Walt didn’t realize the legacy he already left behind. All of the cartoons, movies, and theme parks he created raised generations and will continue to do so. He truly was a visionary, but he was his biggest obstacle. The ideas for Epcot weren’t so bad, he just needed outside influences to help balance out the feasibility of his plans. Epcot was sounding great until he said that the residents there had to work and that they couldn’t retire, or that if you were fired from your job you were evicted as well. Walt knew how to build a city, but he didn’t know he had to let the city function by itself without his involvement, or he didn’t want to

It's sad that Disney got so ambitious, thinking he needed to go bigger and bigger to be remembered and change people's lives, because his studios movies DO change people's lives! Every time I watch a good Disney film, I feel touched with how brilliant it is.

"Because the teens of the 60s loved nothing more than hanging out with a bunch of narcs in a building designed by a sixty year-old man." I love how completely neutral you deliver great lines like that.

Epcot sound like the setting of an amazing dystopia game franchise. The law of Disney isn't aggressively enforced, but all the citizens know to stay in their line. You've lived there since birth and have never left. Your father moved to the secondary community three years ago, and you have very little contact with him. Theres a big reveal about the outside world being 1992, despite Epcot still having a 1960s Futurism vibe. Your objective is to get your family out, but the authorities are onto you and have locked down all the outermost regions of the city. You meet a journalist from the outside who has a reputation for going to dangerous parts of the world, and she wants an interveiw with whoever is in power in the city. Whammo, video game shenanigans ensue

Walt Disney's father actually worked as a carpenter at the Chicago World Fair, creating parts of the famous White City. According to "Devil in the White City," Walt Disney was inspired by this unearthly (now almost mythical) city and used aspects of its design in his own theme park.

Its sad seeing how drawing and animation went from being Walts passion and success story when he was in his 20 and 30s to being in his 60s and that being the thing he was absolutely terrified of being his only legacy. He forgot about and just completely ignored his roots in favor of becoming some weird dictator of a city.

As a West Virginian, the moment I heard the words "company town" was an automatic NOPE.

Imagine had Walt built it in the 60's and it was successful for a few years, then eventually becomes dated and abandoned as economic interests pull away and Defunctland in this alternate timeline has a video exploring the decaying city.

RIP Walt Disney, you would’ve loved city skylines

On one hand, this is totally insane, on the other hand I can totally see why Epcot was such a big deal to him, and why he thought he needed to build it. It kinda sounds cool as a concept.

"You can't experiment with people's lives?" Walt Disney: "Why not?" Modern Megacorps: "Yeah why not?"

"The problem with tomorrow is that it keeps turning into yesterday."

I had no idea Epcot reached this level of aspiration. Pretty scary but impressive stuff.

Nicely put together documentary! It really does come off as something of a harrowing as well as cautionary tale... painfully ironic, almost. Walt focused so much on "tomorrow" that he missed "today," it would seem. He was unsatisfied with his life as head of a film studio and wanted to be more than that. Which, I mean, is understandable, but like...that's what makes it a cautionary tale, I think. Anyone can get obsessed over a dream. Anyone can make that dream all about them and fail to think of all the other people involved and affected by it, hence him falling into this classic trap of making a utopia which quite likely could have fell into the opposite direction. However, even though most people don't nearly the amount of resources as Walt, I just find the story in this light to be so striking, because I feel like I *see* this exact attitude in so many other places, without us even realizing it. I guess, at the end of the day, it comes down to balance? Don't get so wrapped up into yourself? Pursuing passion is great, but don't let any project become your god, especially when you make yourself the god of that project

Since Epcot is just Disney's version of Rapture, I'd like to see it after the society collapsed and theres just 10 foot tall Mickey animatronics roaming the overgrown swampy grounds.

Imagine being so mad about garbage trucks waking you up that you make a whole new city.

The radial design of Epcot kept reminding me of Midgar from Final Fantasy VII. Even in the way all the different sections and layers were divided off.

I find it interesting that walt disney’s nature as he got older was that he didn’t like the legacy he had created. To me making films that brought smiles to children and families globally is about as aspirational as I could imagine. But he didn’t want that, instead he wanted to be what appears to be a dictator of a cardboard utopia. Actually very interesting how he seemed consumed by epcot.

Walt was worried about his legacy, but if this EPCOT thing had actually happened, he would have been remembered as a crazy semi-dictator.

I feel like if Walt stayed alive, this could've been fleshed out into a working concept. It's a beautiful city from a design standpoint but because the city design came before the city planning, it didn't get the chance to work out these problems. Or maybe it would've stayed as this dystopian city overseen entirely by one person. Who knows? Still badly wish its transportation concepts were used more though, even Disney's own parks underutilize them.

Is a man not entitled to his city of the future? “No!” Says the cynical EPCOT board member. “Nobody will want to live here!” “No!” Says the arrogant permanent resident. “I deserve basic rights and freedoms!” “No!” Says the selfish 7 year old child. “I don’t want to see boring buildings, I want to see Elsa!”

90s and Early 2000s Disney was a special place. It may not have been exactly what Walt wanted but I think he would have been proud