# Tomorrowland is Rotten -- Anyone see it? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 20, 2015, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446 "2015-05-20T21:55:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Hermione](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/cdc98d/32.png) [@Hermione](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2015, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/41 "2015-06-04T05:45:09Z")
> [@gigi](#): > > Ew, somehow I didn’t think of that. I was too busy being hit over the head by what I thought was the message – take better care of the world/environment now. > > It was also disconcerting to see Britt Robertson, who so recently was an adult in the Nicholas Sparks movie, back to being a kid. > > And I was in one of those theaters where they serve you food, so distractions abounded. I didn’t take that away. Remember, Frank said that they were about to share Tomorrowland with the world before it all went to pot, so one would assume that with Tomorrowland back on track, those plans would also be back on track. All the talk at the end was about making the world, OUR world, a better place, not escaping it. Generally, I rather liked it. I really like the message that both hope and despair are self-fulfilling prophecies–which wolf do you feed? It’s a shame that a movie with a message like that (and, ironically, an “enough-with-the-dystopias-already” message) has to struggle while the dystopias and disaster flicks are thriving. But there was one change I’d have made: [SPOILER] Maybe it’s my affection for Hugh Laurie talking, or a desire to have seen him stretch his considerable talents more here, but I’d have made him less overtly villainous–taking the blood from his hands, perhaps, by having his androids memory-wipe rather than kill cops and guards. There are those who saw Nix as more tragic and misguided and thought that if the point of the movie was hope, it should have included him as well. More to the point–it’s clear the audience (before the reveal about Athena’s nature) was meant to think she was Nix’s daughter. Well, what if the movie had taken that and run with it? Have her call him “Daddy” from the get-go, and have him show her real love and affection even though he’s stern and dismissive with Frank. Then, after Frank’s snuck into Tomorrowland, Nix is still reluctant to have Frank there, until his daughter’s pleading turns him around. It’s clear that he can deny her nothing, and we see evidence of his love for her throughout–he’s relieved and overjoyed to have her home safely again. He’d have some expository dialogue later in the film about how he designed this first android with a mixture of his own features and his late wife’s, in her memory, so as to make her the child they longed for but could never have. That he considers her his beloved daughter, robot or no robot–a contrast to Frank’s attitude. If they’d done this, established this, built on this idea instead of letting it drop–then, at the end, when Athena takes the shot Nix meant for Frank (his extremism driving him to murder, as well as the belief that Frank turned her against him) then it would have been DEVASTATING. And would have led to an EPIC My God What Have I Done moment for Nix, as he realized, too late, that “feeding the wrong wolf” had led him to destroy the one person in the world that he loved. Athena, in her last speeches, would have expressed forgiveness for her father and told him “it’s not too late.” So that could have meant his redemption, as he takes part in the speech at the end and tells the recruits never to give up hope, since his doing so “cost me more than I will ever be able to say.” That way, the negativity that is the movie’s REAL villain is still personified in Nix, but even for someone as far gone as him, it’s not too late. [/SPOILER] ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2015, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/42 "2015-06-04T14:28:11Z")
Hermione, you’re already a better writer than Lindelof. 🙂 I was surprised that the happy ending didn’t include the reveal of Athena 2.0. (Like the new Groot at the end of Guardians of the Galaxy). Which would’ve been cheap and emotionally manipulative, but it’s not like the film was above such things. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2015, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/43 "2015-06-04T14:34:20Z")
> [@Red\_Barchetta](#): > > So I saw it last night against my better judgement. And it was pretty terrible. The story is mess, the cg was distracting, the characters weren’t compelling (mostly), and the whole thing was a lot more childish than I was expecting. > > The best thing I can say is the overall idea is decent, but executed horribly There you have it. I saw it too and found it disappointingly thin. I was still waiting for the third act to start when the credits rolled. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 9:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/44 "2015-06-10T09:37:26Z")
A late—probably too-late, regrettably. ☹ —input from me, but I saw it last week, and I rather enjoyed it. Quite charming. There are a few dents I’d probably try and hammer out, if it were up to me, but that’s true of anything. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/45 "2015-06-10T10:00:21Z")
There’s an interesting [article](http://io9.com/no-tomorrowland-isnt-really-an-optimistic-movie-1710146704)on the movie’s false “optimism” in today’s io9: > [@](#): > > On the surface? Sure. Tomorrowland has an optimistic wrapper around its pessimistic core. The surface message of Tomorrowland is, “Remember when we used to believe in the future?” And all of its most beautiful imagery is in the service of retro-futurism, recalling the Jetsons aesthetic that signified “futuristic wonder” 50 years ago. Jetpacks! Cool robots! Spaceships! Walkways! Blue skies! It was so cool, and now everything is just emo. > > But that’s part of the problem — nostalgia for optimism isn’t optimism. Optimism means looking at the world we have today, and saying that we can make it better. Optimism includes pointing to all the actual reasons in today’s world to be hopeful. > > * * * > > Nostalgia is closer to being optimism’s enemy than its friend. Nostalgia is a fundamentally regressive, non-constructive sentiment. Geek culture, and by extension the activities that geeks are engaging in, are overloaded with nostalgia for futures that didn’t pan out, and images that we loved decades ago. We don’t need more nostalgia. > > * * * > > But that’s not the main reason why Tomorrowland, in its heart, is pessimistic. > > The real problem is, Tomorrowland is a deeply misanthropic film that believes that people are sheep, apart from a few “dreamers” like Casey (Britt Robertson). There’s an early montage where Casey is the only one in her school who keeps asking “how do we fix it,” while the other slack-jawed students listen to the teachers drone about all the reasons we’re doomed. Casey gets singled out by the cute robot girl because she, alone, still wants to make the world better. > > And the actual plot of Tomorrowland is also incredibly negative, in almost every way. Tomorrowland itself is defined by what it isn’t — it’s a place without politics and bureaucracy, so you can actually create innovation without the stupid regular people getting in the way. (So, basically, John Galt’s happy place.) This ignores the fact that we didn’t land people on the Moon thanks to rugged individualism, but rather thanks to a massive government bureaucracy. At one point, Frank (George Clooney) says that there was a plan to open up Tomorrowland to everyone — but when Frank gets the chance, he still decides to open it up only to the select few. > > * * * > > I don’t think you can be that pessimistic about human nature, while still claiming to be optimistic, in the abstract. It also misses the main point of the 1960s Space Age shininess this movie claims to be pining for. Back in the 1960s, optimism about our future and faith in human nature were intertwined. Humanism was a huge part of the can-do spirit, and the notion that people can rise above, and the potential for greatness is inside all of us, is preached in dozens of classic Star Trek episodes. It’s pretty much THE philosophy of the Space Age. I basically agree with that. In my eyes, _Mad Max: Fury Road_ was in many ways a far more optimistic movie than _Tomorrowland_. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2015, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/46 "2015-06-11T20:20:43Z")
The motivation of the antagonist was poorly thought out. One aspect of the ending, though, is that I can imagine headlines about hundreds of creative people killed when they walked into traffic while under the impression they were standing in a wheat field. ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2015, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/47 "2015-06-11T20:28:38Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > The motivation of the antagonist was poorly thought out. One aspect of the ending, though, is that I can imagine headlines about hundreds of creative people killed when they walked into traffic while under the impression they were standing in a wheat field. Transport to and from Tomorrowland seemed to be a bit…uh, variable. Frank as a kid got there via the It’s a Small World ride, with just some minor turbulence. But to get back, they had to get launched into outer space from the Eiffel Tower. Returning from Tomorrowland to our plane was just a matter of walking through a door. Did Casey actually visit when she touched the coin? Or was the “advertising pitch” she saw just a hallucination? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2015, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/48 "2015-06-11T20:52:15Z")
> [@jsc1953](#): > > Transport to and from Tomorrowland seemed to be a bit…uh, variable. Frank as a kid got there via the It’s a Small World ride, with just some minor turbulence. But to get back, they had to get launched into outer space from the Eiffel Tower. Returning from Tomorrowland to our plane was just a matter of walking through a door. > > Did Casey actually visit when she touched the coin? Or was the “advertising pitch” she saw just a hallucination? I gather getting to Tomorrowland is easy, if Tomorrowland invites you. Tomorrowland was starting to look pretty rough, though, probably much like the 1964 World’s Fair site - weathered, largely forgotten, long past its heyday… I was mentally rewriting the movie as I was watching it and thought it would work better if the Hugh Laurie character was the last human in Tomorrowland and he was surrounded by robots that had started to go a bit squirrely in their compulsion to only let the “right” people into Tomorrowland, with the result being the gradual exiling of the human population (including Frank) and no invites extended to replacements. Athena, the only still-functional bot from 1964, is bucking the system. I could give it some thought, I’m sure there are numerous ways to doctor the script into coherence. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2015, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/49 "2015-06-11T22:08:23Z")
To be honest…I actually thought that io9 review was “protesting too much.” Like it was bit of a reaction against the film’s undertone of “endlessly droning about how horrible and problematic things are won’t galvanize people to work _against_ the problems, it ends up causing malaise and fatalism.” Y’know, not that I’m implying I think any political or social creed fashionably overindulges in that sort of thing. 😃 😉 ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2015, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/50 "2015-06-11T22:26:45Z")
> [@jsc1953](#): > > Did Casey actually visit when she touched the coin? Or was the “advertising pitch” she saw just a hallucination? It was a “hallucination”, thus the bit about walking into walls and the lake. I had the same thought as **Bryan Ekers** - not everyone is going to survive the advertising pitch. ---
**Author:** ![Strassia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2015, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/51 "2015-06-12T14:14:56Z")
> [@Declan](#): > > Just got back from seeing it. **Has a very anti-Rand theme to it at one point**. The main point of the movie, which is spoiled in the trailors, is that the pin gives the bearer a glimpse at the future world, is selectively or was supposed to be selectively seeded to certain individuals. I think this was the point of the movie, in terms of audience viewing. > > In a few years, I think it will end up getting more sympathetic reviews, regardless of the numbers that its pulling now. > > Plus it had a star wars trailer. > > Declan > [@Zebra](#): > > I’ve seen it. > It is the most spectacular after school special ever! > I enjoyed the actors but the story is so paper thin. **Of course it is an Ayn Rand novel complete with the very late long monologue.** Tomorrowland is a place where only the ‘exceptional people’ go and non-exceptional people make it bad. > > but the young girl has ‘hope’ and that saves the day!!! ugh > [@Hermione](#): > > I didn’t take that away. Remember, Frank said that they were about to share Tomorrowland with the world before it all went to pot, so one would assume that with Tomorrowland back on track, those plans would also be back on track. **All the talk at the end was about making the world, OUR world, a better place, not escaping it.** Saw it yesterday with my kids. I had hope at first. Until the end, it looked like they were going with a failed Galt’s Gulch that would teach them to take better care of world etc. But there big plan at the end to save the world is to pull out all the people actually doing that. What was their eventual plan? Build up an all powerful tomorrow land and then take over the world as a benevolent over-class? Infiltrate world governments and industries with their advanced tech and rule from the shadows? The whole idea of of Tomorrowland seems to be to drain the most talented and dedicated individuals from the world and put them to work making Tomorrowland better. In the world of the movie that had been going on for almost 100 years before it shut down. Think what that would mean for world progress and politics. No wonder the world was in such bad shape. Every innovator disappeared forever or came back as jaded and pessimistic misanthrope. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2015, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/52 "2015-06-12T15:19:39Z")
> [@Strassia](#): > > Saw it yesterday with my kids. I had hope at first. Until the end, it looked like they were going with a failed Galt’s Gulch that would teach them to take better care of world etc. But there big plan at the end to save the world is to pull out all the people actually doing that. What was their eventual plan? Build up an all powerful tomorrow land and then take over the world as a benevolent over-class? Infiltrate world governments and industries with their advanced tech and rule from the shadows? > > The whole idea of of Tomorrowland seems to be to drain the most talented and dedicated individuals from the world and put them to work making Tomorrowland better. In the world of the movie that had been going on for almost 100 years before it shut down. Think what that would mean for world progress and politics. No wonder the world was in such bad shape. Every innovator disappeared forever or came back as jaded and pessimistic misanthrope. I got the impression that Tomorrowlanders didn’t make a mostly-one-way trip, like pre-Jet Age emigrants to the New World, or withdraw from the “real world” but commuted back and forth regularly. The capsule Frank used to arrive from the World’s Fair was a pastiche of a New York subway car of the same era, implying the trip was as common as riding the subway. The 19th-Century founders (Verne _et al_.) at the Eiffel Tower were real people who didn’t disappear _a la_ Galt’s Gulch. My impression was that they’d live in both worlds, use Tomorrowland as a retreat or safe haven where the creative can work without interference and in cooperation with the like-minded, and then bring their creations back to the outside world to the benefit of humankind. IMHO, the implication of having Victorian-era innovators as the founders of Tomorrowland was that the accelerated technological innovation since the Victorian age was (in the universe of the movie) the result of Tomorrowland. ---
**Author:** ![Strassia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2015, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446/53 "2015-06-12T21:04:58Z")
> [@John\_Bredin](#): > > I got the impression that Tomorrowlanders didn’t make a mostly-one-way trip, like pre-Jet Age emigrants to the New World, or withdraw from the “real world” but commuted back and forth regularly. The capsule Frank used to arrive from the World’s Fair was a pastiche of a New York subway car of the same era, implying the trip was as common as riding the subway. The 19th-Century founders (Verne _et al_.) at the Eiffel Tower were real people who didn’t disappear _a la_ Galt’s Gulch. > > My impression was that they’d live in both worlds, use Tomorrowland as a retreat or safe haven where the creative can work without interference and in cooperation with the like-minded, and then bring their creations back to the outside world to the benefit of humankind. IMHO, the implication of having Victorian-era innovators as the founders of Tomorrowland was that the accelerated technological innovation since the Victorian age was (in the universe of the movie) the result of Tomorrowland. The way it seemed to me was that some of that accelerated progress was to get to tomorrowland, after which the normal world stagnated. Tomorrowland was hundreds of years ahead of where we are now. 90% of all advacement and progress was happening and staying in Tommorrowland. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tomorrowland-is-rotten-anyone-see-it/720446.md?page=2)