Chef

Now that we have had the full reveal, I can chime in on this! 1. Body Collectors- Recollections: I adore the Body Collectors Characters, and to me the environment of Shadybook is classic Halloween Horror Nights. I will be visiting with people who are newer converts to HHN, so I can't wait to experience this environment and story with them. I also love the snowstorm idea. Winter's Night was one of my favorite HHN houses ever, so if it can capture even a tiny bit of the wintry aesthetics of that house I will be pleased! 2. Jack Presents: 25 Years of Monsters and Mayhem - Nightingales, Gothic, Forsaken, Bloodengutz...Again I can't wait to share these environments with my friends and family, and to relive some of my favorite experiences that keep me coming back year after year! 3. Run: Blood, Sweat, and Fears - I was not terribly excited for RUN at all, I thought it might be sub par considering all that they are taking on this year and would be a dud, but finding out that it will take place in Hellgate, and rid itself of the terrible hostile territory overlay made me much more excited for this house. 4. Freddy vs. Jason - I'm not a huge fan of either one of the properties, but this seems like a passion project, so I'm hoping a lot of effort was poured into this house and I can't wait to see it. Plus they are accessible horror icons to the public, a great way to celebrate 25 years! 5. Asylum in Wonderland 3D - I know i'm in the minority here, but I enjoy most 3-D houses, (With the Inbetween being the gold standard in my mind) and between my love of the Alice Stories, and the references to things like Ultra Violent Comics, I think they can pull this off. 6. An American Werewolf in London - I loved the original, so I'm sure I will enjoy it once again, but it is a little disappointing that this will be more or less "Scene for Scene" as Mike put it. 7. Insidious - I've never seen the movies, I've been meaning to at least see the first one. Then again a haunted house thriller will likely translate well into a haunted house, so I'm happy to be pleasantly surprised. 8. The Purge- Both of these movies were mediocre. But I thought it worked wonderfully in the streets last year. Beautifully chaotic. I'm hoping to be pleasantly surprised, and I'm hoping after once or twice going through that I start to see the environments of Woodsboro. 9. The Walking Dead: The Living and the Dead - Yawn. Don't get me wrong I like the show. I like Zombies and they work in an environment like HHN. But it's just been done too many times before. I can see them trying to switch things up for the hardcore fans, and I appreciate the money this obviously brings into the event, but to me...meh. I thought I would also take a moment to discuss Scare Zones. To me the street experiences are almost more important in determining the tone of the evening that the houses. And I think we have a great array of zones this year. There is not one of the list that I would consider a dud, and I'm very happy that roaming hordes are happening as well to pad the streets a bit. 1. Evil's Roots - Call me a sucker for classic halloween. The construction pictures we've seen not only reminds me of Classic horror nights (the pumpkins) but smaller Hometown Halloween events from my childhood. I think I will linger in this zone as much as I possibly can! 2. Psychoscarepy- Unleashed: The only thing that could have made this zone better is actually building the Shadybook facade outside. It would have been fun to see the inmates fresh out of their prison, with fences torn down etc. But I'm very happy with this idea, and once again turning it toward classic halloween makes it a winner in my eyes. I love the cheap dollar store looking halloween decorations, I'm hoping they bloody them up a bit though. 3. All Night DIE in- Double Feature: Alternating Black and White and Color Sets, Classic movies monsters, What more could we want? My only fear is that it will turn into a second photo op zone as the original did at points during the night. But I also am happy with some of the photos I took in that zone, so I guess it's a double edged sword. 4. Scary Tales - Screampunk: It took me a moment to realize it said SCREAMpunk and not STEAM punk. I hope the general public doesn't make that mistake. I love the Scary Tales franchise, It's a great year to bring that back. I'm hoping for a variety of different characters and a huge cast, but the production central zones usually have reletively small casts compared to the other zones. Maybe they will do some killer aestectics, or, (and I know it's a stretch) bring back our flying monkeys! 5. Icons - HHN: Don't get me wrong, I'm excited for this zone. Once again I can't wait to share these characters with the newcomers, but it seems like another year, another photo op zone for hollywood. I hope there are enough characters around to keep my interest. Also, RAT LADY is back! I honestly didn't realize that she had gone until I stumbled across a photo of her a few months ago. What a great 25 year surprise!

It took me a minute to even remember what we had in the streets in 2012. The Iniquitus maybe? Gothic was the standout house that year to me I would love to see that in the anniversary house.

I was thinking it might be a fire effect, like the gazebo is burning down...

It does specify that it's a house.

Don't be surprised If some of the speculation on locations has changed. From what I've heard our list is more or less correct, but our locations (Meaning which house is where) is dead wrong. Especially Shrek Vs. Tent 3.

I believe the entrance will be Next to Lucy and the exit will be toward the Transformers Meet and Greet.

Just to clarify, it seems that the 9th house will be in one of the Shrek theaters. The Building has two theaters in in that are fairly sizable, and the other one would continue operating as Shrek 4-D on a daily basis. They would remove the seats and most likely use the existing extended queue as queue space. Now which house is going in here I have no idea. I wouldn't be surprised if some of our location spec is way off.

If the entrance ends up being on the Hollywood side to make full use of the extended shrek queue instead of making a temporary queue near monsters, it could spread out crowds a bit.

Really like the 25 logo and the color scheme, reminds me of old school horror nights. Well done.

Prepare to have at least one of your assumptions about house locations challenged. Tent three is not happening, but there's still nine houses.

Wouldn't it be great if they abandoned the one season per house thing, and just did a best of the entire run. From the 'Dead Inside' doors to Herchel's Barn, to the Prison to Terminus, etc.

Jimmy is posting Pictures on his tumblr related to Jack, The Caretaker, The Director, the Storyteller, and The Usher on his Facebook page. All four in a row, nothing so far that I would relate to Eddie, Lady Luck, Cindy, Fear or whoever else though.

So What's with the Brick Wall going up in Sting Ally?

Is anyone else disappointed that there's only four street experiences? They all seem great, but after the last few years I was really hoping for at least six unique themed scare zones, they are what sets the tone for the entire event! I would like to assume that beyond the four there may be some extras like a CDT or whatnot, any rumors on that?

All Four Soundstages exit in front of the New York Public Library.

I saw the walker bomb but it was kind of a let down...It seems like a great idea but ultimately it's....just more walkers....

1. Cabin in the Woods 2. Havoc: Derailed 3. American Werewolf in London 4. Urban Legends: La Llorona 5. Afterlife: Death's Vengeance 6. The Walking Dead: No Safe Haven 7. Evil Dead 8. Resident Evil

I'm glad to see we may be getting out Havoc Sequel. Now If Only we could get Nightengales that would be perfect...

I gotta say the 8:45 B&T show on Saturday had such a terrible audience. It was my first time seeing the show this year, and I thought it was great. I laughed a lot. But the rest of the audience didn't seem to be laughing or reacting with me. Nobody was stomping and clapping during We will rock you....I liked the show but the audience didn't seem to be going for it which threw me a little bit. The only reference I didn't understand was Madmen, never seen that show, so I didn't get the joke and it recurs several times, but the rest of the show I thought was most excellent! My favorite part of this particular show was watching the sign language interpreters use several less-than-classy words. Classic.

...It's not.

Have we heard any updates on this? It's vanishing act? What may replace it? If they will just be Zombies instead of Walkers (Which would make sense)? Anything?

There's a difference between opinion and perception...

I'm certain that there will still be safe zones. Those are just dramatic descriptions.

I Disagree. The Amazing thing about HHN is that it's like having a brand new theme park to experience each fall. Change is great, new houses, new concepts, (New Age of Darkness) But there was a lot of change this year, and a lot of trepidation about behind the scenes changes as well, that to be fair the average guest knows nothing about. I just think this wasn't the year to change up the streets on us as well, especially because they have become more and more immersive over the last few years. I don't know, obviously I can't really judge until the event begins, but those are just my thoughts right now.

Well that's good to know...I was looking forward to it. I feel like from a PR standpoint they kind of made a mistake throwing a new direction for the streets to us the same year as the construction changes and the lack of an eighth house. There was already a lot of changes this year and then to throw this at us was probably a bad move this year, any other year I think we would probably embrace this change, but there was a lot of trepidation about where the event would be, and then where the houses would be, and then impacts from the Parade, etc, etc, etc. They should have stuck with Traditional scare zones this year, and then made the switch next year after we were used to seven houses.