Another year is in the books with the crew. Got to see dozens of new and familiar faces over my massive 10 day(!) trip. 8 days were spent in the parks, with lots of sleeping in, resting, an urgent care visit, and more. Saw the final performance of Illuminations, had an amazing dinner at Takumi-Tei, rode Hagrid half a dozen times, and overall just decompressed.
For HHN this year felt off, what first appeared to be a home run "wow what can they do with the 30th" level of hype in the end the five days I attended were middling to very good. No house stood out as transcendent like a Scarecrow or Monsters and Mayhem yet none sunk to the lows of TWD, Chance, or Saw. This year felt the weakest with scare actors, either because they're inexperienced, immature, more interested in friends, more interested in performing vs scaring, bulky costumes, or bad design. Several of these houses, with a stellar cast, could easily dominate the event, see Blumhouse in 27.
Before we get into the houses lets talk about some positives. First of all the biggest surprise is the quality of the merchandise this year. We've gone from "only the Goths wear this" black t-shirts with red blood lettering to an array of colors, moods, and IPs in mugs, cups, socks, shirts, and more. They absolutely knocked it out of the park and into the stratosphere, same goes for the Tribute Store that somehow tops itself year over year in detail and attention.
They took the complaints last year of a lop-sided event to heart and spread out the scare zones and added a second show. Marathon of Mayhem is the #1 thing at the event for me this year, I saw the show every night I was there and took dozens to see it with me. Unlike their normal water show (or World of Color) the show is all killer no filler, a high density 10 minute show. I'm a huge fan of this and hope something similar returns in future years.
I am not the biggest fan of AoV, they're fine but just not my style. This year's show is very good with high quality performances. The acrobatics and shadow segments are the standouts of the show and I hope they focus more on these in the future.
Now, to the houses. This list is based on five days at the event over the course of the whole night. I took into account fresh casts, missing actors, and more. My biggest driver for my ratings are if someone goes "hey lets wait an hour for this" if I say yes or no PLUS what I'd want to hit during the last half hour of the event on my last day.
- Graveyard - My favorite house this year, yet still can be dependent on which cast you get and the scare timing. What elevates this house more is the consistent creative scares with the punks, physical props (doll heads, mary-go-round, urns, etc), and a great cast.
- Monsters - Similar to why I love Graveyard the cast, art direction, costumes, and sets are fun. Fun fun fun.
- Yeti - Here is where the line is drawn from top houses to lower houses. Yeti has a great premise but long resets and odd spacing pushes this down my list.
- Depths - I never got to see the Brooders heavy cast but the newer, more dynamic cast works for me. They went Jaws with it, save the Brooders for one or two locations and have the rest be crew in various states of frenzy. But repeating sets and some incomplete effects push it down the list for me.
- HO1KC - The standard "throw it all at the wall with scares" house. Makes no sense since I never saw the movie but works in so much "yo there are people doing 'effed up stuff to dead people in here" story. Some neat uses of video screens and projections and an awesome facade.
- Us - There's some clever stuff in this house with some good scares but there's too much blank space to really land with me. I enjoy going through this house but I just don't find myself coming back over and over.
- Klowns - The scare zone last year was a big party, the house doesn't quite match that fun attitude. It shows just how much of a problem the suits were last year but lemonade was made.
- Nightengales - Meh. At least there are hot dudes in it! Only went through twice.
- Ghostbusters - This one is a disappointment. I was willing to give Entertainment the benefit of the doubt on this house. After all they gave us the wonderful Poltergeist and Stranger Things last year! I walked into the house with high expectations and I was initially excited, there's a cool ghost behind the books and a good librarian scare! Wow look a live mic'd actor in the house! But quickly the house falls apart with a lack of intensity. The house doesn't quite deliver the comedy or set design either. The house would be higher on my list if the gargoyles were more intense and the scares were more consistent.
- Stranger Things - Oooohhhhh boy. This was my #1 house last year; it felt epic, grand, crafted with love, and scary. This year feels lazy, smaller in scope (SOMEHOW), and not as energetic. There's a lot of opportunity with the past three seasons and it just does not land. I wish the demidogs were more intense, I wish there were more actors, I wish there was more details.
As for scare zones they all feel like they're out of step with what the event needs. Vanity Ball executes well and is the closest to being great but is missing an "it" factor. I'm not sure what that thing is at all. Anarcade fills the opening scare zone well: setting the tone and theme for the event. Hellbilly is fun and the most interesting as it ticks the "HHN is a giant party" atmosphere the best. Vikings just doesn't really land for me at all. Then Zombieland, which I thought could work but suffers from set pieces and spread, bring it all in front of Mummy and the Tribute store and the zone would have landed a little better. Still, Zombie fatigue is real.
Overall this year is better than 24 but not as good as 25, 27, or 28. They can't all be winners!
Joe's Ranking of Years
1) 27
2) 25
3) 28
4) 29
5) 26
6) 24