rocketman23
<font color = green>Zamp in the Lamp<br><font colo
- Joined
- Nov 11, 2001
- Messages
- 964
I'll be keeping updated info of each visit... so for my first night, here's a rundown of my first impressions:
Sunday, Oct. 5, Crowds were thicker in some places than others with Marvel (for once!) being the least crowded of the main 5 islands. House lines peaked around 8 and slowly decreased throughout the night. Here's what I thought of the houses right off the bat in order:
1. Die In- If you are a fan of these movies, which I am, this is THE house for you. Halloween is the first and longest segment of this house. Lori Strode's home is very well detailed and the spots where Michael pops out is set perfectly for him. There's one creative scare in here where it looks like Michael is dead on the stairs, but of course Michael never dies. The next portion is Camp Crystal Lake. Jason never really freightened me, but with the vicious actors playing Jason, it made it hard not to flinch. One particularly effective scare was a long dark woods path. I stared down in and slowly Jason began to walk forward until I can see his shadow then burst into a run and stabbed rather close to me. It also includes a scene with bunk beds, but as long as you keep your clothes on, you should be fine. From here we enter the scariest part for me, Hell's furnace. It's where Freddy dwells. The actors in here really have Freddy down. The upclose taunts were nice and very scary. He would get right up to your face and flash his claws. Next up was the most magnificant recreation over Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Early in the halls, we see the big clunky door Leatherface pulls back to take his first victims in the movie. This time it's for us. After a couple halls, we encounter a recreation of the dinner scene. It really feels like it's out of the movie here! If you escape, you enter the room where all your nightmares return. One after the other, our haunts come at us. Once we're out, we get one last scare from Leatherface. It really does justice to the classics, definitely one for the fans!
2. Psycho-scarepy- The best actors in any house I have ever seen are right here. All of them truly look insane. It starts with the inmate out front telling about the asylum. "It's the happiest place fr... here." "We've got rooms with a view of water, but it's toilet water so you might not want to touch it." The receptionist welcomes us and we enter a long room with many doors and openings. You can fill in the blanks there. Next is the padded electro shock hall. It's blinding and therefore effective when the actors do pop out. From here we enter where the actors really show off an odd crazy side. An inmate operates on a messed up patient, "Uh oh." If they saw my glowing cup, they would say, "Ooo, pretty green." Or if you were to say something, an actor might repeat it and laugh. The TV room also shows off the depth this house has. A inmate stares blankly at the cartoons on TV cradling a ragged stuffed animal. The toilet room is next and the thing everyone remembers. The stench is rotten and the walls are feces covered. Skipping a few rooms, we wind up in the showers where we get hosed by a few crazy inmates. Every walks out talking about the toilets, but pay attention to the perfect acting in here. Look in the actors' eyes and see the madness each one has. This is easily one of my favorite houses of all time simply due to the acting and nice props. Die In beats by a hair just because it caters to my love of classic monster movies.
3. Screamhouse Revisited- It's back and better than before! It's got most of the stuff from last year moved around and shorter with some new scare placements and some new scenes. The Caretaker is there again and is wonderfully played to make him look fake. The best new scene involved a giant distorted head which happened to be on an actor and a bizarre statue like thing laughing at you. The strobes seemed stronger and especially blinding. Forget trying to walk through the mist with this thing going off! Otherwise it's similar, but improved, don't pass up the retake.
4. Ship of Screams- I only got to do this house once, and really want to do it again because I have a feeling there's a lot I missed. The theming is very intense and the sinking ship feel works. You will get wet in this house to some degree or another, particularly in the final scene. I really liked it, but again I feel I have to do it again to be able to describe it well enough. For a gauge on how good this year was, this house was better than last year's best, Screamhouse.
5. Funhouse of Fear- I don't really understand the 3D here, but it does distort the vision allowing for better scares. A lot of the scares here were the same, clowns with noisemakers. Not really all that effect when it's done many times. I only did it once, so I'll have to go back and give it another go next week. The clown head trick was very well done and it was an improvement over Fear Factor last year. The house is fun to visit, but is not worth too long of a wait.
6. Jungle of Doom- I liked the way they used the outdoors this year with the narrow paths created by dense shrubbery. However, there were no unique scares throughout and there weren't that many when there were scares. The whole voodoo atmoshpere works, but the music just didn't fit with the dead time between scares. Maybe they just weren't hitting me and I'll try it again, but this one just doesn't have too many positives on its side... besides dancing to the conga music with the glow cup.
Infestation was fun and the Director had plenty of witty quips to go along with the presentation. The three I saw just weren't scared, so it didn't really work too well. I suppose it all depends on the subjects.
Bill & Ted was very good this year despite some negative reviews. It parodied among others: Sadaam, Osama, Stripperella, Charlie's Angels, Chicago, Shmiegal, Pirates of the Carribean, *******, Matrix, and the Appliance Direct commercials.
Scare Zones- JP, LC, and MSI were good, TL was bad. The leaf blowers with the foam in Toxic City was probably the best touch. JP used good misdirection with the crazy voodoo guys. LC's Ice leader and Fire leader were very well costumed. This island also featured the very cool air pop guns which I saw last week at HOS. As for Port of Entry, the stilt actors had great costume design.
From my first visit, this is my favorite event of any HHN or HOS events I've been to. The top 4 houses are all better than last year's houses. The scare zones however, declined a bit. The absence of the Treaks and Foons was too bad for these Inks and Blots. Lost Coninent was the big winner over last year. Marvel and JP were about equal. The Inks & Blots just really brought the net quality down. The houses are what counts though and they're awesome, so go visit!
Sunday, Oct. 5, Crowds were thicker in some places than others with Marvel (for once!) being the least crowded of the main 5 islands. House lines peaked around 8 and slowly decreased throughout the night. Here's what I thought of the houses right off the bat in order:
1. Die In- If you are a fan of these movies, which I am, this is THE house for you. Halloween is the first and longest segment of this house. Lori Strode's home is very well detailed and the spots where Michael pops out is set perfectly for him. There's one creative scare in here where it looks like Michael is dead on the stairs, but of course Michael never dies. The next portion is Camp Crystal Lake. Jason never really freightened me, but with the vicious actors playing Jason, it made it hard not to flinch. One particularly effective scare was a long dark woods path. I stared down in and slowly Jason began to walk forward until I can see his shadow then burst into a run and stabbed rather close to me. It also includes a scene with bunk beds, but as long as you keep your clothes on, you should be fine. From here we enter the scariest part for me, Hell's furnace. It's where Freddy dwells. The actors in here really have Freddy down. The upclose taunts were nice and very scary. He would get right up to your face and flash his claws. Next up was the most magnificant recreation over Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Early in the halls, we see the big clunky door Leatherface pulls back to take his first victims in the movie. This time it's for us. After a couple halls, we encounter a recreation of the dinner scene. It really feels like it's out of the movie here! If you escape, you enter the room where all your nightmares return. One after the other, our haunts come at us. Once we're out, we get one last scare from Leatherface. It really does justice to the classics, definitely one for the fans!
2. Psycho-scarepy- The best actors in any house I have ever seen are right here. All of them truly look insane. It starts with the inmate out front telling about the asylum. "It's the happiest place fr... here." "We've got rooms with a view of water, but it's toilet water so you might not want to touch it." The receptionist welcomes us and we enter a long room with many doors and openings. You can fill in the blanks there. Next is the padded electro shock hall. It's blinding and therefore effective when the actors do pop out. From here we enter where the actors really show off an odd crazy side. An inmate operates on a messed up patient, "Uh oh." If they saw my glowing cup, they would say, "Ooo, pretty green." Or if you were to say something, an actor might repeat it and laugh. The TV room also shows off the depth this house has. A inmate stares blankly at the cartoons on TV cradling a ragged stuffed animal. The toilet room is next and the thing everyone remembers. The stench is rotten and the walls are feces covered. Skipping a few rooms, we wind up in the showers where we get hosed by a few crazy inmates. Every walks out talking about the toilets, but pay attention to the perfect acting in here. Look in the actors' eyes and see the madness each one has. This is easily one of my favorite houses of all time simply due to the acting and nice props. Die In beats by a hair just because it caters to my love of classic monster movies.
3. Screamhouse Revisited- It's back and better than before! It's got most of the stuff from last year moved around and shorter with some new scare placements and some new scenes. The Caretaker is there again and is wonderfully played to make him look fake. The best new scene involved a giant distorted head which happened to be on an actor and a bizarre statue like thing laughing at you. The strobes seemed stronger and especially blinding. Forget trying to walk through the mist with this thing going off! Otherwise it's similar, but improved, don't pass up the retake.
4. Ship of Screams- I only got to do this house once, and really want to do it again because I have a feeling there's a lot I missed. The theming is very intense and the sinking ship feel works. You will get wet in this house to some degree or another, particularly in the final scene. I really liked it, but again I feel I have to do it again to be able to describe it well enough. For a gauge on how good this year was, this house was better than last year's best, Screamhouse.
5. Funhouse of Fear- I don't really understand the 3D here, but it does distort the vision allowing for better scares. A lot of the scares here were the same, clowns with noisemakers. Not really all that effect when it's done many times. I only did it once, so I'll have to go back and give it another go next week. The clown head trick was very well done and it was an improvement over Fear Factor last year. The house is fun to visit, but is not worth too long of a wait.
6. Jungle of Doom- I liked the way they used the outdoors this year with the narrow paths created by dense shrubbery. However, there were no unique scares throughout and there weren't that many when there were scares. The whole voodoo atmoshpere works, but the music just didn't fit with the dead time between scares. Maybe they just weren't hitting me and I'll try it again, but this one just doesn't have too many positives on its side... besides dancing to the conga music with the glow cup.
Infestation was fun and the Director had plenty of witty quips to go along with the presentation. The three I saw just weren't scared, so it didn't really work too well. I suppose it all depends on the subjects.
Bill & Ted was very good this year despite some negative reviews. It parodied among others: Sadaam, Osama, Stripperella, Charlie's Angels, Chicago, Shmiegal, Pirates of the Carribean, *******, Matrix, and the Appliance Direct commercials.
Scare Zones- JP, LC, and MSI were good, TL was bad. The leaf blowers with the foam in Toxic City was probably the best touch. JP used good misdirection with the crazy voodoo guys. LC's Ice leader and Fire leader were very well costumed. This island also featured the very cool air pop guns which I saw last week at HOS. As for Port of Entry, the stilt actors had great costume design.
From my first visit, this is my favorite event of any HHN or HOS events I've been to. The top 4 houses are all better than last year's houses. The scare zones however, declined a bit. The absence of the Treaks and Foons was too bad for these Inks and Blots. Lost Coninent was the big winner over last year. Marvel and JP were about equal. The Inks & Blots just really brought the net quality down. The houses are what counts though and they're awesome, so go visit!
. Secondly, there's a lot of background character action I'm just now picking up and it's hilarious! Things include: Johnny Depp's character getting bizarrely intimate with a wooden crate and the Matrix character going hogwild in jail. Worth a couple views to catch these hilarious bits!
