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Halloween Horror Nights 29 General Discussion

I’m curious to hear why the war setting turned you away?
You asked...

Because war isn't entertainment. It's not "fun." And in physically presenting it as a walk-through attraction, Universal dismissed and trivialized the actual gravity and horror of it. Using war as a real-life "experience," that you're walking through at a theme park, is a tasteless and insensitive decision. Leveraging scenes of war wounded, literally having war nurses taking advantage of those already knocking on death's door because of war it's, is mortifying. They turned war into a "setting," when war is a blood-thirsty behemoth that should never be trifled with.

And I've heard the arguments, comparing movies and video games as entertainment mediums to haunted houses, and they're incorrect. When I watch a movie or a play a video game, the experience doesn't extend beyond the edges of a screen. When I walk into a haunted house, I'm immersed in a setting. We can argue suspension of disbelief, but it doesn't change the principle that Universal turned an ACTUAL war into an attraction that made people jump and laugh and squeal with delight. People who dismissed the crassness of "the WW1 house" because "war isn't like that anymore" are dismissing what war itself is. What experiencing war is. The methods in which wars are fought has changed, but the oppressive terror of it never will. Throwing cut-rate banshees into the trenches implies that war itself, isn't enough.

Never mind how the house affected individuals with combat-related PTSD.

If Universal did a "school shooting" house, people would be tearing them apart. It's the same principle. It's trivializing true horror. I hated the house. Hated the idea and the mere existence of the house. The fact that it was presented less than 12 months after the final WW1 veteran died still horrifies me, and tainted my view of A&D (and Universal) as entities. Part of me hates every single person who thought it was okay to do that. Because war isn't "fun."
 
Yeah but same can be said for houses that are about murderers and slashers. People get murdered and cannibalized in real life yet that's still entertainment. Slippery slopes be bad. You can hate someone for enjoying a war house but they can hate you for enjoying a house about murdering people...which is most houses. This is why houses about monsters are great cause...well...monsters. Not serial killers and war which are reality.
 
Yeah but same can be said for houses that are about murderers and slashers. People get murdered and cannibalized in real life yet that's still entertainment. Slippery slopes be bad. You can hate someone for enjoying a war house but they can hate you for enjoying a house about murdering people...which is most houses. This is why houses about monsters are great cause...well...monsters. Not serial killers and war which are reality.

I strongly respect Legacy's opinion. Even though I don't quite agree with it, I understand I just couldn't possibly have his perspective on the matter.
 
You asked...

Because war isn't entertainment. It's not "fun." And in physically presenting it as a walk-through attraction, Universal dismissed and trivialized the actual gravity and horror of it. Using war as a real-life "experience," that you're walking through at a theme park, is a tasteless and insensitive decision. Leveraging scenes of war wounded, literally having war nurses taking advantage of those already knocking on death's door because of war it's, is mortifying. They turned war into a "setting," when war is a blood-thirsty behemoth that should never be trifled with.

And I've heard the arguments, comparing movies and video games as entertainment mediums to haunted houses, and they're incorrect. When I watch a movie or a play a video game, the experience doesn't extend beyond the edges of a screen. When I walk into a haunted house, I'm immersed in a setting. We can argue suspension of disbelief, but it doesn't change the principle that Universal turned an ACTUAL war into an attraction that made people jump and laugh and squeal with delight. People who dismissed the crassness of "the WW1 house" because "war isn't like that anymore" are dismissing what war itself is. What experiencing war is. The methods in which wars are fought has changed, but the oppressive terror of it never will. Throwing cut-rate banshees into the trenches implies that war itself, isn't enough.

Never mind how the house affected individuals with combat-related PTSD.

If Universal did a "school shooting" house, people would be tearing them apart. It's the same principle. It's trivializing true horror. I hated the house. Hated the idea and the mere existence of the house. The fact that it was presented less than 12 months after the final WW1 veteran died still horrifies me, and tainted my view of A&D (and Universal) as entities. Part of me hates every single person who thought it was okay to do that. Because war isn't "fun."

Well, I agree. I can’t explain it as well as you did, but anything that is a real live situation that involves terror simply isn’t for me. Actual war, actual murderers like Charles Manson (which I’ve seen on people’s house wishlists before), etc., imo, I could never welcome at HHN.
 
Well, I agree. I can’t explain it as well as you did, but anything that is a real live situation that involves terror simply isn’t for me. Actual war, actual murderers like Charles Manson (which I’ve seen on people’s house wishlists before), etc., imo, I could never welcome at HHN.

I mean, BC2 was a take on an actual murderer, but one that was so long ago that it wasn't an issue.
 
I guess I just have to disagree for you guys. Whether something is based on an actual war or fictional war, based on actual murder or fictional murder, it's still all based on reality. Video games, movies, music have all turned it into entertainment. It's incredibly dumb to hate people for what they are entertained by. People get killed in war, people get murdered, people get eaten by animals. The problem is where do you place the limit. 'Cause once you do that, it's becomes a slippery slope. I can respect your opinions on the subject matter, but I cannot respect people for hating others based off what house concept they want to see, or what movies or video games or music they like. I just find that disgusting.
 
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I knew that was going to open up a can of worms.

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Yeah but same can be said for houses that are about murderers and slashers. People get murdered and cannibalized in real life yet that's still entertainment. Slippery slopes be bad. You can hate someone for enjoying a war house but they can hate you for enjoying a house about murdering people...which is most houses. This is why houses about monsters are great cause...well...monsters. Not serial killers and war which are reality.

Exactly why slasher films and related houses don't appeal to me at all. Or any movie in any genre where a child dies. Well said.

To each his own.

Although to be fair, Legacy WAS asked for his opinion. So good on him for simply answering the question.
 
I actually will go on the record and say that anything that involves being shot at in a haunted house is cheap and tacky. I and my fiancé hated the allusion to the school shooting in AHS and to a lesser extent being shot at in Ghost Town. It’s just not needed. (Keep in mind I don’t hate the scenes where they include a protagonist shooting at the monster like in Halloween 2.)
 
I think everyone's been respectful so far. It's nice, and I'd even argue it's important, to dig into deeper topics surrounding hobbies like theme parks as long as everyone is respectful about it.

You asked...


Because war isn't entertainment. It's not "fun." And in physically presenting it as a walk-through attraction, Universal dismissed and trivialized the actual gravity and horror of it. Using war as a real-life "experience," that you're walking through at a theme park, is a tasteless and insensitive decision. Leveraging scenes of war wounded, literally having war nurses taking advantage of those already knocking on death's door because of war it's, is mortifying. They turned war into a "setting," when war is a blood-thirsty behemoth that should never be trifled with.


And I've heard the arguments, comparing movies and video games as entertainment mediums to haunted houses, and they're incorrect. When I watch a movie or a play a video game, the experience doesn't extend beyond the edges of a screen. When I walk into a haunted house, I'm immersed in a setting. We can argue suspension of disbelief, but it doesn't change the principle that Universal turned an ACTUAL war into an attraction that made people jump and laugh and squeal with delight. People who dismissed the crassness of "the WW1 house" because "war isn't like that anymore" are dismissing what war itself is. What experiencing war is. The methods in which wars are fought has changed, but the oppressive terror of it never will. Throwing cut-rate banshees into the trenches implies that war itself, isn't enough.


Never mind how the house affected individuals with combat-related PTSD.


If Universal did a "school shooting" house, people would be tearing them apart. It's the same principle. It's trivializing true horror. I hated the house. Hated the idea and the mere existence of the house. The fact that it was presented less than 12 months after the final WW1 veteran died still horrifies me, and tainted my view of A&D (and Universal) as entities. Part of me hates every single person who thought it was okay to do that. Because war isn't "fun."


These are some wonderful points, and I just wanted to build on some of your ideas.


The idea of how theme parks/haunts handle sensitive ideas and situations is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. Comparing mediums like games and film to haunts, another important distinction is context. In the former cases, creators have more artistic freedom to infuse their work with more thoughtful ideas and artistic expression. There’s nothing fun about watching a film like Come and See and Paths of Glory, they are miserable, horrific experiences. But the important part is they don’t need to be fun, they’re trying to say something else. Whether they succeeded or not can be debated, but at least they had the opportunity to say something meaningful with their medium.


Haunts, especially corporate ones like HHN, don’t have that luxury. You need to please rights holders, keep people moving through the house in a conga line, and provide a fun enough experience that nobody’s complaining they didn’t get their money worth at the end of the night. You can’t exactly dig into the inherent politics of a situation since that’s only going to anger people. For most situations, that’s totally fine, not too many people are going to have problems with something like Killer Klowns or Scary Tales or a Bigfoot shows up. Where issues really arise is when dealing with incredibly sensitive topics, something that Universal has tried and failed at handling in a sensitive manner on multiple occasions.


Legacy basically covered some of that in his post about how the event has handled war. It’s why I think you’ll never see a prison house like Hellgate done in a straight way again, policing and the prison system in America is way too sensitive a topic for HHN to ever effectively handle (I know RUN was technically set there, but that was a Running Man rip more than anything). They do continue to use insane asylums and freak shows as settings, however, which infuriate me to no end. I understand how it can be fun for the actors to play “crazy” but all it does is reinforce the stigma of mental illness as violence in this country which in turn is used to explain away the disturbing patterns of things like school shooting which have deeper, more complex roots while making those with mental illnesses’ lives worse.


I know people cite slippery slopes as reasons why HHN shouldn’t ban houses, but I think it’s a reasonable ask of Universal to show discretion in the types of scenarios employs. My barometer is this: if the nuance and context lost converting your idea into a house creates a situation where a decent segment of the population will be alienated, whether due to stereotypes, emotional triggers, etc. it shouldn’t be a house.


I understand if mods want to try to curtail the politics, or maybe spin it off into a separate thread, but I think there’s a valuable conversation to be had on this subject. After all, most of the best horror out there is deeply political.
 
I feel like almost anything could be sensitive to someone

^This.

I do agree though that war is a bit real for a haunt, but at the same time Nightengales 1 was a great house.

Back to HHN29, looks like the only codenames we have yet to solve in terms of spec are Onyx, Cotton, and Salt
 
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