Dr. Jimmy

I see the man was actually named. Apparently this is considered inappropriate or a violation of privacy or something? I don't know whether or not James would really mind. But as I have known him for many more years than I have known anybody at all on these forums (I first met him in 1991, he was working The Adventurer's Club at Disney's Pleasure Island. About a year later I started there myself and he trained me!) I will try to clear up as best as I can the confusion about the way he has and does play Jack. He is an actor at Universal NOT a scareactor. There is a difference. He is considered talent, a professional actor as opposed to laypeople who take part time jobs scaring each year for HHN. Thus Icons in scarezones like Jack and the others in Fear Revealed back in 2010 were scareactors. That being said, there is nothing to prevent someone who starts out scaring from later auditioning for a real acting role. And I believe one of the Fear Revealed Jacks from 2010 has done that. James has played so many different characters for Universal I cannot possibly remember them all, even while working the Adv. Club with me back in the early 90's he was already doing Doc Brown and Beetlejuice. I'm not 100% sure but he may even have been Beetlejuice at Fright Nights. He was the very original Jack in 2000. But there were others who also played the Clown that year as well. James was Jack in all promotional materials yes, but he did also appear in the park as Jack then on occasion. In 2007 he was the main Jack for the Carnival of Carnage Show. I'm not certain if he did the Clown for the Arrival in 2006, but I believe he did. In 2010 as I said he did not do Jack in the scarezones or houses, but he was there on certain nights for the photo op. i got my picture taken with him. And this year he has played Jack for the video that you have seen. But the question is - will he play Jack in park this year? Most likely not in any house or zone that features the Clown, but if there is, as rumor has it, a Jack stage show this year, then yes he may very well be appearing in that. As for what part he plays at Universal nowadays, well let's just say he has managed to really get ahead in his career!

To my knowledge this sort of thing was done once before. Back in 2009 Bill and Ted snuck into the soundstage for Frankenstein: Creations of the Damned. At the time they made it sound like the two dudes would sneak into more houses, but they only had the one vid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gFwi8-kVKM

Carmina Burana is a hymn to the Goddess Fortuna. Maybe Eddie got unLucky and Somebody else is Running things in that house. It is after all about a game. This is just speculation on my part based on the alleged leak/rumor that Eddie is not involved in the house.

USA Today said it best, I think: EDIT: Why does anything copy pasted look weird? Why can't I change the text "The Walking Dead" in that quote above to a color that can actually be seen on this forum?

I don't know if the hashtag clue in Mike's tweet means what I hope it means or not. (It's fun to be in the dark again!) But in the old days I might have posted a video of me singing these lyrics: Chances are, 'cause I wear that silly grin the moment you come into view;chances are you think that I'm in love with you.

A John Landis reference would be "See You Next Wednesday". See You Next Tuesday means... um, something else entirely.

Some are wondering if these dates are merely other dates for entering the contest. However the dates do not appear until one has already entered, thus I suspect they are possibly indeed for upcoming reveals. perhaps Marketing has read all the bitching and bad mouthing directed towards them and have responded accordingly. The first date is August 4th. They are telling all of us "See You Next Tuesday!" HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To clear up the moon hints. Those were not about HHN 25. The Blood Moon is the theme of HHN 5 at Universal Studios Singapore. This was given a reveal early today. The web site does not yet have any full details on the 4 houses and 3 scare zones yet - they plan to tease them on the site over the next few weeks. But they sent out a full reveal press release to the media. So it's likely Singapore based media sites (that do, btw use English!) will be posting the line up shortly if they haven't already. Sorry for the confusion, but that's what the whole Moon thing was actually about.

Yes Shadybrook was near the town of Seneca Falls in New York. Mary Agana's office was also likely in the same area - thus an NYC investigator, Boris Shuster was involved in the case. Mary was originally from Carey, Ohio but her practice was in New York. I have theorized that the asylum Mary was involved with in her own patient cases was indeed Shadybrook, which explains the "cameo appearance" of Dr. Agana in the Echoes of Shadybrook house in 2010. As for the Body Collectors, I had always assumed they were natives of Terra Cruentas. But there must be ways of crossing over from that realm into our own. They were able to cross over in 1888 in London. But the children of the Skool somehow crossed over (in spirit or body?) in the early 20th Century in Carey, Ohio. I would not be surprised if there isn't a very easy passage from Carey to Cruentas. Mary was from there and had some heritage from those very Skoolchildren. And the Collectors' campaign in London was somehow a part of "Mary's World". There are all sorts of connections here, like roots or branches spreading out through time and space. Unfortunately, a lot of nifty back story stuff like all this that we fanatical types, the HU, LT, types who trace our own damn Legion bloodlines, is not likely to be developed much further unless things change in corporate policy about HHN. I believe there was a lot more to the whole "What Evil Has Taken Root" concept two years ago that was jettisoned in favor of more TWD. A whole forest of interesting back story stuff. They seem to still do a bit of that, but nowhere near what they had before or would like to. But with the 25th anniversary and a bit of bringing back old characters stuff it is possible there still might be little more filling in connections in these narratives. Mike has mentioned discovering new connections between seemingly unrelated events and also presenting people from Jack's history we have never realized before.

Although I have asked my former sources to NOT give me any more inside info, as I did not do that until after the leaks happened, and as I did receive the info for HHN 25 already, I have contacted them and asked for one tiny bit more.... I asked if any thing they had already told me had been changed. BUT, I was very clear to ask that I did NOT want to know exactly what or how anything might have changed. In other words I simply asked if there would be any surprises left for me. And thus for all of you, if hopefully, any such surprises are not also leaked!!! If I hear that there is anything that we don't know yet, I will happily post here about it. AGAIN I emphasize, I will NOT be getting any details at all, if there are surprises they will remain surprises for me and everybody until they are revealed. Hopefully officially and not by some leaker.

Meanwhile, over at Universal Studios Japan they have already revealed their whole event! I can't find a thread or forum here for HHN in Japan, so I guess I'll just post my silly announcement here. Maybe a nice mod can move it to the appropriate place? Hey Kids! There are Four HHN Events at Universal parks worldwide, here in Orlando, Hollywood, Singapore and Osaka, Japan. This hasn't been widely noticed yet, but the first full reveal for an HHN was given yesterday!!! Universal Studios Japan has revealed their two sided Event a Daytime "family" event, Universal Surprise Halloween and the HHN Event after dark! For the daytime they are bringing back their usual Carnival Parade and Trick or Treating with happy characters from Peanuts, Sesame Street and Hello Kitty. But this year they have added in Minions! Returning to HHN this year are the Street Zombies, Chucky, the lazer-tag like Biohazard the Real attraction (Resident Evil), Sadako (Ringu) and Ju-On (The Grudge). New this year for Japan is Alien Vs Predator, Freddy Krueger, the Japanese IP Gakkou no Kaidan (Haunted School) and a first for USJ an original house! That house, Trauma has a Hospital theme and appears to be an "extreme" house!!! It is the first time at any HHN that an age restriction has been put on a house/maze. This one is restricted to guests 15 years and older. http://www.usj.co.jp/halloween2015/?utm_source=tw_official&utm_medium=social_official&utm_content=20150721__012&utm_campaign=halloween_15_non_jp I forgot to add the dates, It runs from September 11 till November 8 the longest Event ever!

And those codes have nothing at all to do with the characters portrayed, In recent years they used colors, flowers, fruits and even ice creams!

Well, David Kessler was Jewish after all....

Going by last year could be tricky. In case you don't recall the second reveal was for From Dusk Till Dawn and there was a spoiler when the video made by the cast talking about the house was somehow posted at YouTube openly rather than privately a few days before the official reveal! Also Halloween was spoiled several weeks early when a website devoted to the films prematurely posted promotional material about the house! And last year, although most of the IPs were revealed official first, the three original houses and two original scarzones were all announced well before Halloween was "officially" revealed. So this year they probably will reveal the remaining IPs over the next few weeks... but we do not know exactly what the contracts with the copyright holders for the brands entail. Often these include an agreed to "reveal date" which sometimes can be much later than what we would think makes sense. And accidents do happen and IPs could get spoiled the way it happened last year again. The schedule changes every year, and they don"t tell us what it is in advance. So the suspense builds.... what fun!

I love/hate the show scenes. I went through Nightingales 10 times before I saw the ripped in half scene. But once I did see it... I loved it!

Last year the first official reveal was exactly three months and ten days before the start date of HHN. Should they follow that schedule again this year that would be tomorrow.

My take on Jack's new look: Corrupt, debased, debauched, decadent, decaying, declining, degenerate, degraded, depraved, dissolute, effete, evil, gone bad, gone to the dogs, immoral, lost, moribund, overripe, perverted, wanton, wicked and very dangerous to know.

Also, that animated logo at the end has a bit of Steampunk with the revolving saws.

To give hhnmatt some credit, that does sound like a heavy metal guitar riff version of "Pop Goes the Weasel" at the end of the video.

I had been avoiding these forums this morning, waiting until the reveal. You see Chad jumped the gun again and tweeted a spoiler for this. I did not click on the link and read what he had to say until after the reveal. And I was afraid that it might be discussed in here - I am quite pleased it wasn't! But now that I've read what Chad said, although he must have seen this video before it was released his take on it was all about how fat Jack is now. If I had read his post before I saw the vid I would have expected some kind of "Big Fat Party Animal" Jack instead of the decadent and dissolute Jack that has been revealed, He's not some latter day clown version of John Belushi but rather a weathered and decayed version... I like It! You could even say Jack has gotten a bit krusty with age... but I won't say that they've had too much trouble with Fox already!

I know it seems a tad hypocritical of me, as in the past I was perhaps the biggest culprit of all in hinting at inside info. What goes around comes around and karma's a bitch, right? But, now that I have converted, and am "redeemed" so to speak, like any who has gone through such a drastic revival I'm the one to jump up at the tent meeting and testify! Glory hallelujah! This is a speculation thread after all, it is for speculating about what we do not yet know. It is not a thread for spoilers, I doubt there will be any need for such a thing. Indeed there is a device incorporated in these forums to post spoilers that cannot be seen unless they are deliberately highlighted by those who wish to view them. So I don't think my request was all that unreasonable. At any rate we hopefully will all get see whatever Jack's new look, persona or whatever will be when that may be revealed tomorrow. Unless it is something else at all that is to be revealed? Oh dear, the suspense is terrible,,,, I hope it will last!!!!

Yeah, there were rumors before of Jack getting a "new look". I actually DO NOT know what that new look may be at all. I am very happy about that! So if some of you have learned this.... please do not post it openly here! In fact don't hint too much about it either. I wanna wait till the reveal. Which may be as early as tomorrow, but still I wanna wait!

For reasons that should be quite obvious I have to word this very very carefully: As Jeramy (JDW) has said the sources that had formerly given inside information were such that needed to have actual and correct information about the event well beforehand in order to do their jobs. Indeed the person whom I believe was my primary source would fit that description exactly. However I believe that it may be very possible that the person in question may have actually been known to be such a source at Universal, that they were allowing some leaks perhaps even deliberately to create buzz amongst the hardcore fan base - that is to say, us. And furthermore it may be very very possible that this year that person was asked to deliberately give misinformation instead. Knowing that this would still create buzz, but without spoiling everything so prematurely. I do NOT know this for a fact, and it may very well be that the leaks are indeed the actual plans as they were up to the time they were leaked. But I personally rather hope this is the case as it would mean I actually do not have the info yet! I would love nothing more than to learn that all that I think will be at the event this year is part of an elaborate red herring, a joke on me and on us! How fitting for a year in which our own demented Joker is expected to return in some form! HAhahahHahahHAAHHAhhahaha!!!! But this may not be as likely as I hope. Nevertheless I am very pleased with the latest teasers as they allow me now to actually speculate on this as I have not been able too for some time. So speculating on it here's my thoughts: The blurred silhouetted figure does look like Jack to me, the hairstyle reminds me of him. It seems to fit the rumors of his being given a "new look" or new wardrobe this year. But if this is Jack, what is he wearing? I have read those who say they think it looks like a rocker's leather coat, or a trench coat of some sort, but those types of garments usually have long sleeves. This figure's forearms and legs look quite bare. It seems to be short sleeved, but loose - it almost looks like a dress! Some have thought it may be a female figure for this very reason! But putting aside any notion of Jack in drag, and continuing with the idea that it is indeed Jack, what sort of clothes would match that look? I cannot help but think about all the rumors already circulating about an increased use of Psychoscareapy this year. According to the leaks there will be both a house and a zone featuring the inmates of Shadybrook. And remembering that there's a profound connection between Jack and that franchise I wonder if this has something to do with it? Remember the words written in the popcorn box? They seem to be about Jack: "You will hear his laughter", "He's back He's back He's back" etc. But they are not written by him. Rather they are written in the plural - "We know the way" "Join us" etc. So who are these people obsessed it seems with Jack? There is a clue in these writings "There is freedom in madness" and especially "They call us lunatics, but we are legion". Consider especially that the tunnel image appeared on the HHN website on a page marked "maniacs"! Who were more obssessed with Jack and saw him as their "leader" of sorts more than the very inmates of Shadybrook as they were presented in the house Psychoscareapy: Maximum Madness in 2006? Yes I think the messages scrawled inside the popcorn box were written by the Shadybrook inmates themselves! And so I think that shadowy figure in the teaser IS jack wearing the hospital gown of a Shadybrook Asylum inmate! Thus I speculate (and I so love being able to do this again!) that this year will simply be quite CrAzY!!!!!!

Ben drowned.

It was announced on the morning of June 9th.