“You’ll float too.” — About a zillion Georgies.
In the land of the BIG HAUNT, Warner Bros. — the venerable Hollywood Studio — is the new kid on the block.
This year is just the second that the Warner Bros Studio Tour — which is still a studio tour and not a theme park that evolved from a studio tour — has rolled out the blood red carpet and turned its backlot into the devil’s playground. Which puts it in an odd position: Warners’ is one of the most powerful media companies in the world — holding the rights to franchises as popular as The Conjuring, It, and Friday the 13th — and yet it doesn’t have the themed entertainment footprint in Southern California of a Knott’s or Universal, the standard bearers of big scale terror.
Which creates a kind of gorgeous paradox for Horror Made Here: Festival Of Frights.
The event, which features four walk-through attractions along with a special screening, felt like a small town had decided to go all out for all hallow’s. The opening ceremony on press night culminated in dozens of actors racing through the streets of the Warner back lot town square screaming in gleeful terror as they flooded the streets. Many of them were in masks, making it seem as if someone had let a high school class of eager Halloweeners loose on the public. That initial burst of enthusiasm set the mood for the night.
My wing for the night and I jumped first into True Blood’s Fangtasia to grab drinks and get a quick pose in Eric Northman’s chair. It was a bit bright and didn’t have any vampires — fictional or otherwise — or True Bloods, but the decor was spot-on as a studio event should be.
Around the town square the It maze was the clear heavy hitter of the night: with jump scares so on point they got me a few times. While I didn’t get to see the original version of the Neibolt House that was stood up at Hollywood & Vine last year, my companions assured me that this was bigger and better. The actors inside — particularly the teen bullies who are there to taunt the “losers” that make up the audience — were uniformly fantastic. One bully was so good at his job that I could tell he was giving some former real-life losers flashbacks as he menaced passerby’s in the street. It was almost too real.
Arkham Asylum was set up next door, and while it was definitely a maze it wasn’t what you’d really call a haunt. Instead it was more of a series of clever vignettes, starting with Judge Joker sentencing you to the sanitarium for being too sane and a threat to criminals like him, and winding through encounters with the Scarecrow, Two Face, Poison Ivy, and Harley Quinn. There were actually two Harley’s, which the eagle eyed could spot, and one of my companions pointed out that they were swapping out characters and scenes over the course of the night. As a massive Bat-fan just getting to be inside an Arkham-themed space was a joy.
Our trip through the Conjuring experience — this more vignettes than a maze, but definitely more of a haunt — was sullied by the presence of a real TV crew for our run. The experience was short, but had the vibe of a creepy haunted house.
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The only real disappointment in the batch was The Exorcist Forbidden Screening, which took a supercut of freaky moments from the horror classic and welded them to some William Castle style moments. Tonally it doesn’t really work, as The Exorcist is a bit too dignified for blasts of air under seats, and the moment where the AC loudly comes on to drop the temperature in order to match what’s in Regan’s room ended up a cheap laugh. There’s some potential in the subtler effects, but nothing is really a showstopper.
Which leaves us with the crown jewel of Horror Made Here: Camp Crystal Lake.
Further out on the lot and accessible by a tram ride, the journey to Camp Crystal Lake itself can be a blast depending on which driver you get. Greedily I went twice, and on our second run our driver left me nearly in tears with his banter. If you ever wanted an “adults only” trip on the Jungle Cruise, this is as close as you’re going to get. Well, if you’re lucky.
Once the tram is left behind you’re in the dark of Camp Crystal Lake, and it’s here that the real darkness and open trail combine to get the willies going. Within seconds a terrified camp counselor is getting attacked by Jason, and there’s something surreal about watching people snap photos of a slasher attacking a screaming teenager. It feels like we’ve wandered on to a movie set, and the actors are in a liminal space where they’re trying to reach out but can’t. Like something out of a dream.
Which is right when Freddy showed up, emerging from the darkness.
Jasons and Freddys and terrified campers repeat over and over, the whole experience eliciting jumps, screams, and the uncanny sense that on some plane of reality this is someone’s actual nightmare. We’re just lucky enough to have a day pass and not be the target of the dream kings.
That said: I could trod that path over and over and maybe never get bored watching unsuspecting maze walkers get menaced by Jason.
Now tickets aren’t cheap, at just shy of $90, which puts it on par for price with Universal Horror Nights but without the sheer volume of mazes and attractions that park can offer up. That said, there’s a lot of potential for a really great night out with your horror loving friends. Our press badges gave us access to the VIP version of night, which includes front of line access and two drinks — and that breeziness definitely added to the vibe that night since we got to roll up on mazes more than once, pretty much at our discretion. If you really, really like the toys Warners has to play with, you’ll be quite pleased.
Simply put: I had a great time.
Warner Bros. Studio Tour’s Horror Made Here runs Thursdays through Sundays until October 28th. Tickets start at $85 and the VIP tickets run $169.
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