If it is indeed true that Universal reads the forums in ANY CAPACITY, I really hope there is some sort of Easter Egg in some house for this debacle.
Side note: Legacy was talking about Icon Canon a while back, and I think it’s safe to say that the major icons (aside from Luck, Chance, Mary, Eddie, and Cindy, I think) would Canonically be waiting for someone to tip the lantern over and release them again. Perhaps LT has a storage facility in Carey, and someone broke it. Maybe it fell. Perhaps it was PUSHED! Maybe Fear, from inside the lantern, willed it.
Or else one of the non-locked characters has done it. Hey, Cindy was always supposed to unleash the demons, Halloween Tree and all that. Maybe the earthquake is the roots of evil of FEAR/The Tree breaking the cement around Carey, OH, with Boris Shuster somewhere at the beginning or end to try and stop the madness. Perhaps you’ve even been enlisted in LT in this storyline (goes along with the App experience).
If the App Experience is indeed coming in the way rumored, instead of a Jack skin it could easily be LT themed and “tie the event together” in that sort of way, like they used to do. “We need you to investigate the Maitland house...” “There’s strange activity in a place called Hill House...” “a rift has opened into the nightmares of a woman named Billie Eilish...” ... whatever. Boris could even be giving the quests, etc, on the app. It makes total story sense: “LT requires all to wear face coverings. If not, you will he removed from the investigation.” More sense than Jack, an agent of chaos, telling you to put on your face mask, if you ask me.
To me, it seems like there are two houses here, or a double-house of some sort: Icons and Carey. Both are “anniversary” themed, but I can’t see a way that all the content fits together in one house unless it is extra-long. I may have missed the post where it was said where “earthquake” goes and where “anniversary” or “icon” goes or if they’re separate or the same...?
Idea 1: We adventure past the lantern and find ourselves in a distorted Carey, OH, where we must adventure through the Carey Library, where Storyteller awakens the Terra Queen and puts the earthquake into motion. Next, unsteady, we must go through the Universal Palace (or the Die-In), where Usher and Director attack. We find ourselves in a Casino, where we might find Lady Luck and run through the restroom to find an exit, only to run into Bloody Mary. As we run further from Carey, we must go through the ScreamHouse and the Orfanage, encountering Careraker and Cindy, and finally through either the Jail, RUN, a Carnival of Carnage, or scenes of all as we face off against Chance, Eddie, and Jack. Finally, we see Fear take root once more for a final scare and take an LT member as a final gag.
Idea 2: The house is a tribute to all things Carey, OH, and the Terra Queen has destroyed the earth. Throughout, characters like Eelmouth, the Gentlemen, the Terra Guards, etc, are seen doing their duties in transitional hallways. The main rooms feature popular Carey, OH houses from over the years, like the ones featured in the blog (Leave It To Cleaver, Hive, Twisted Tradition) as well as other fan favorites, like maybe H.R. Bloodengutz, Gothic, etc, with the scenes being transformed by the earthquake. At the end of the maze, Terra Queen has the blade created and kills Boris Schuster, or else some other prominent LT character. (as Boris would have to return to the app to narrate the instructions to the next house.)
In either house, we see LT members battling the villains, much like the original intent for The Fallen, and we are able to escape the town before it crumbles, or else is sucked into the ground or made demonic or... whatever. We also see a return to the “Forsaken”/“Dead Waters” floor.
