[0:22] Hello everyone, I'm Jonathan. I'm Crystal. And this is Haunt Weekly, a weekly podcast, less so than usual, for the haunted attraction and haunted entertainment community. Whether an actor or an owner, just plain official, we aim to be a podcast for you. And we come to you with an apology, first off. Let's start off there. Because first and foremost, we are sorry we missed last week um i think everyone might understand how that happened considering like we didn't get tons of emails and messages and stuff saying where's my podcast yeah yeah a few people did notice but um we were not inundated right exactly which is actually we're actually kind of grateful for that to be honest with you thank you for understanding without an explanation there was a So, yes, indeed, we missed it simply because we were super busy working on our haunt, and my day job got a lot of it crazy last week at the same time. Yeah.

[1:23] Won't go into details, but yeah, it's been a long, long week trying to balance haunt work, day job stuff, and everything else that's been going on. And literally, this just slipped through the cracks. There's no other way to say it. Yeah, and it's weird because this is the first time we've gone to a haunted house and they mentioned you being in the news for something not haunt related. Yeah, that actually did happen this week. But anyways, okay, so the last episode we did was 461. Right. We did an untimed limited episode. Yeah. And I'm going to say a few of you reached out and said that you enjoyed that. Mm-hmm. And so here's the thing. I mean, you enjoyed the longer format. So here's the thing. A, this episode is definitely not time-limited. No. A, because we missed last week, and B, because we got a whole lot of shit to get through. Believe me, it's been a wild two weeks for us with Haunt Stuff 2.

[2:19] So, yeah, we'll re-evaluate the timing of it after Haunt Season, but yeah, this one will probably be a longer episode as well. No promises, we're just going into this to talk and have a chat about things. So, yeah, we'll be, this will probably be a longer episode. And if you don't feel like a longer episode, please feel free to check out other Haunt Weekly. You can find us at HauntWeekly.com, Haunt Weekly on X, formerly known as Twitter, Haunt Weekly on Facebook, and YouTube.com slash Haunt Weekly is the YouTube channel. Check us out wherever you get your podcasts from and please as always whatever platform you're on like share subscribe do all those things it really does help us out.

[3:01] Now first things first we're going to do the question of the week because we do have a new question of the week we actually did the last one previously i believe we did the answers for it right but we got a new one this week and the new question that the question of the week this week is simple it's how has your haunt attendance been this year are you up? Are you down? I'll say most people I've talked to have been down, but not catastrophically. Yeah. Not a lot of people saying, oh, we're so low, we're going to close. Nothing like that. And, but also not a lot of people that seem to be bursting at the seams either. So it seems to be a little bit of, you know, a little bit down, but not catastrophic, so to speak. So that's what I've been hearing. But what's your situation? Let us know at all the places I just mentioned. I won't repeat it. Love to hear your thoughts, and I'll be posting this on the Facebook page shortly.

[3:53] So this episode, this is going to be an episode essentially in four parts. First, we're going to talk a little bit about our season and where we are now. Then we're going to talk about the mortuary. Right. New Orleans Nightmare. And for the final part, Rise. Yes, because we visited those three since we've talked to you last. So that's four parts and it'll cover both our haunt as well as five attractions. Yeah. So I guess just jump in. I mean, there's really not much else to say right now. So what's been going on with our haunt is when we last left you, I'm checking hauntweekly.com now, we last posted on October 9th, we were significantly behind on where we wanted to be. Yeah, we were still putting up walls, I think. Nothing had been painted, and we still had two scares to build. Yep. Well, three now. I mean. Yeah. Yeah, so it was a lot.

[4:55] Yeah, we were nowhere near where we wanted to be with the Haunt. We were getting very nervous about even being able to open. Yeah. I mean, it was looking fairly grim. We've had two excellent weekends of work, though. Right, including some help, some good help this past weekend. The past weekend and the weekend before, too. Yeah. Had some great help. And basically, we went from way behind to now being functionally done. Yeah. We're at the clean out, lighting, security setup, all that type of things. I mean, the last minute stuff. A few little details that I'm going to do, but yeah. You know, there's no major builds. There's nothing significant that has to be done. We could easily open, like, tomorrow if we needed. Yeah. It would be a difficult push, but we could get open in a day, and both of us...

[5:55] Are taking off at least most of the day tomorrow, which is Wednesday, and Thursday, and also Friday, so that we can open Friday evening. Right, because I put in vacation time like we were going to need the time to get it done, but we worked about 30 hours this past weekend. Yeah, we really pushed through a lot. We were either sleeping or we were working in the hall, and we took a little time out to go to Rise, which we'll get to in a bit. Sunday evening. Sunday evening. But it was a lot of push through to get it done, and there were a lot of complicated builds. And some of it was not, some of it was surprising what was so difficult. Yeah.

[6:39] Like one of the things we are doing this year is a falling wall gag. Right. And we've done falling walls before. Yeah, we have. They were actually much larger than the one we're doing now. Yeah. But this one we were attempting to do in a way where an actor would be near the wall. And so we had to keep it open and all these other challenges. And this one ended up being a bear of a build. And a bear to keep it remotely square or remotely correct. We think we have it now. Yeah. It's safe. It's effective. But it was a lot of learning about this because we couldn't just whack two by fours in the middle of this. Right. You know, our usual solution to these problems is, and throw in another 2x4 and call it done.

[7:25] Um, we also are for the first time using a projector. This also was a, a, a thing that turned out to be a bigger deal than it was. Right. Cause we actually own a bunch of projectors. Yeah. Like three of them. Like three of those Halloween projectors we get like from Home Depot or whatnot or Spirit or whatever. We own a bunch of them. We own like three of them. And to be clear, I don't think we bought most of them. Well, if we did, we, we bought them at like 75% off. It was the last-ditch effort of getting rid of them. Yeah. I don't think we ever paid full price for them. I think we got gifted at least one, though. Yeah. And we've never really used them.

[8:05] And now I understand why. Because we found out that even in hot lighting, these projectors were just not bright enough. Like, we used them to project movies, but we had... I remember when we would do this with the hot tub area. Yeah. The issue was we had to get everything super dark, and even then it wasn't very bright or clear. Yeah. Even with a perfect screen, even with everything. So a less perfect screen because we're projecting it onto a wall. Everything else, they just were not bright enough. So we had to acquire a new projector. This one is about 10 times as bright, and it is significantly better. It is so nice compared to what we had. I've actually got the video we're projecting. In fact, one of my projects tonight is to get that video edited down and onto a flash drive. Yeah. Freeze. That probably should be one of my projects tonight.

[9:00] All in all, it's going great. But, yeah, but mounting that was a motherfuck. Yeah. But, hey, there's nothing you can't do with enough zip ties, it turns out. Yeah, and our friend had a great idea of putting the bore on a hinge so that we could get the angle right. Yeah. and then yeah and then our friend the friend that helped us has actually mounted a lot of projectors works in movies and has mounted a lot of projectors yeah and similar things so they were perfect at this they actually were the perfect person to solve this problem and thank you very much for that because i would not have come up with that solution i'll say that now so yeah the projectors mounted the falling wall is done the other scares we have are done.

[9:43] Honestly, now we're just down to detailing, lighting, and we've got two full days to do four rooms, basically. Yeah. I'm probably going to focus a lot of my time. We've also done a lot of the work in front of house. Yeah, a lot of the queue line's cleared out. Queue line is actually cleared out. We had an issue with our neighbor's plant life. Now, I want to be very clear. We love our neighbor. Margaret, if you happen to be hearing this for some reason, I have no fucking clue how you stumbled on Haunt Weekly randomly in your iTunes or whatever, in your Apple podcast. But if you do, I want you to know we love you dearly. You are the greatest neighbor ever. But the problem is her son, who rents the house to her basically, or I don't know what the deal there is, but it's her son's home.

[10:31] He planted a whole bunch of high maintenance vegetation. Because he liked gardening. He loved gardening and landscaping. It was his thing. And then he moved out and doesn't do it anymore. And now there's a jungle.

[10:44] And so I had to go through with a reciprocating. So Margaret has given us carte blanche to cut whatever we want. Yeah. But I'm sticking to our side of the property line. And this is like right up against where our queue line is. So I went through the reciprocating salt and I just went a little fruity cocoa pebbles and cut a bunch of branches and fill two trash cans up with them. But the queue line is clear of vegetation it has been swept out and needs the fine sweep but it's ready to go yeah it's ready to rock i mean it's it's it's done um we also have our storage situation under much better control i think um we have probably got the most confused home depot reps ever yes send us all of the buckets um our bins to store stuff in and skeletons Yeah. Well, basically, you know, one positive this season for us is because my job has been so crazy, we're not quite as cash-strapped. We're not, like, rich or anything. Yeah. But we're not, like, we're not counting every penny. Yeah. And basically, one of the things I'm trying to do with that is set us up for success next year.

[12:02] And so because we know we're doing at least one more season we definitely have to do 20 yeah so we got to think about next year and we may do 21 we don't know we have not decided past that to be clear we just know we're going to 20 yeah.

[12:17] But the point is, so one of the things we did is we found out that our local Home Depot has those really nice black and yellow buckets for sale, $10 each. The big 27-gallon ones. So we may have bought like 20 of them total. Plus two extra large ones. Yeah.

[12:39] Yeah. And so this A makes our storage consistent.

[12:42] Because previously, it had just been whatever buckets we have to hand. We would we would go and buy them whenever they went on sale we didn't care get two here four here one here it was a mess they didn't never stacked no never worked well together couldn't close most of them because they would either they would latch close but you couldn't like zip time close like you can these right and so basically we're like yeah this is the shit now we're all in on the system and it was really funny because we went to rise and on the way out as we were going to the t-shirt shop we noticed they use the exact same organization system for their t-shirts which i just thought was like yes vindication yeah um so yeah that's under control and the other funny thing is we've addressed two of the major time sinks we have while working on the haunt back to back we've addressed them one i did not know existed and found out it existed and immediately bought like a shit ton of them and one i knew existed but never thought of it for this use the first time i think we talked about the torx bit issue in a previous episode the haunt mistakes right where we kept switching screw types it turns out i did not know this there are impact drivers that are dual head so you can get them with a phillips head on one side and the t20 torx on the other yeah i um i did some i was looking around for some.

[14:11] Washers yeah for for bulk washer suppliers and found them and we were like we have to have those and it has been a life-changing event like and it was really it was really interesting like the next project i had to do yeah was we had an old slam doll slam wall door we had i had to take apart um and this thing had been built over a myriad of years this thing had been part of the haunt in some capacity for at least five to six years or so probably 12 because dad was here to build that's true and it was his style of support too i should have known that but yeah basically it had both phillips head and torx bits everywhere it was so fast to take that apart where previously even if i had known where the other bits were you know it would have been a problem now i know exactly where the other bit is it's already in the drill just flip it around or an impact driver, I should say. Yeah. That was one. The second thing is finding the fucking impact drivers has been a problem. Yes, because one of us will go and work on something and then set it down somewhere random. And it'll just be poof, disappear. It's the wildest goddamn thing. I know. And it was really bad because I'm out there one day going, Dear God, where's the impact driver?

[15:25] Why can't I make it go beep? Like I can't my wallet or my keys. And it's like, well, that's because it doesn't have an air tag. I'm like, why doesn't it have an AirTag? Yeah. And so I went out and bought AirTag holders and AirTags for the major tools we use.

[15:45] And I'm still in the process of setting that up. We haven't had a run-in where we've used that yet. Those are brand new. But, man, I have a feeling next year that's going to be a big help. Because when it comes time to find Impact Driver, the black Impact Driver, the green one or whatever, it's going to be a huge asset because that's always a major time sink is finding those because those are things what we are constantly using.

[16:10] When we're pretty good at putting, and the bad thing about it is, when we're very good at putting our tools back, that's when we lose them the most. Yeah, because we never expect it to be in the toolbox. Or in the tool shelf, or in the place it's supposed to be. We never expect that. We never look there. So the times in our lives we've been very diligent about putting those back exactly where they belong, we totally lose them. So this is going to help with that a great deal. I'm looking forward to that. So, yeah, basically trying to set future us up for success so maybe next year we're not cursing past us so much. Right. And, you know, tools also move whenever we have help. Our help is great and wonderful, but they also leave tools in places where we don't think of. Sometimes because they are significantly taller in high places than we would not put them. Because, I mean, I'm six foot. I'm not sure, but this person's really tall, and they'll just, like, set it casually on top of a wall, and I'm like, fuck. Go get the ladder.

[17:18] Or just jump up and grab it. In my case, I can usually jump up and get it. Yeah, I cannot. But no. So, yeah, it's been kind of a while, two weeks, though. Like they said for the tld l who long didn't listen yeah i guess is that we went from completely panicked freaking out to now really kind of wondering how much we have to do over the next three days yeah and in the uh at on friday this past friday we only had three actors including myself confirmed for inside the haunt yeah for all three nights now we have uh four now five possibly five possibly six they're still working on one of them but we may have six and and honestly this haunt can run very smoothly with four yeah five is nicer and six would be great but not necessary and after six you get into well these are the extra spots we made for people exactly, Six is about perfect. I think six is about the sweet spot for us. We do have room for more. Believe me, there are scare opportunities are plenty in here.

[18:29] But six, I think, operates everything major and puts one person per task. You know what I mean? Yeah, so I think we're going to be set for actors, which is nice because we were also kind of panicking about that. Yeah. So yeah, I think we are doing well all on all fronts, and we're now actually excited about opening. Yeah, I will say that due to time constraints, and who knows, this may change because I do have more time than I thought I was going to.

[19:07] It's probably not going to appear as steampunky as I had hoped, but like I said, I may be able to throw out some more gears. Just glue some gears on it and call it steampunk. Exactly. Great song. Y'all should look it up. So yeah, we're going to, even though it's totally dissing the idea of doing that. Oh no, I know. We're taking it as an instruction manual and it's absolutely not the intention. No. But yeah, so all in all, we're in a much better place now, both practically and mentally. Yeah. Because that was one of the other problems last week.

[19:48] We were not in a good mental space to record. No, not at all. So even if... Everything was stressful. Yeah, we were panicked. And now you could probably hear the relative chillness in the voices. There was another thing that happened also. So not only did your work blow up, not only did, you know, the haunt work continue, we also had a grandkid during the middle of that. Yeah, it's pretty wild that in the last two weeks we had a grandkid or a grandkid, I don't know if you want to phrase it, it was like bumped to third in the insane shit that happened.

[20:28] Yes, we did though. That is true. Up in St. Louis. You might remember we were up there right before. In fact, our last episode once came out by Kansas City and St. Louis Haunts. We were there for the baby shower. You might remember that. And you might also remember that the baby wasn't due until mid-November. And you might realize that this little guy decided he was going to come out early. Yeah. That's really about the end of it. He's going to be a baddie baby. Yeah, so he was born, I believe, what day was it, the 10th? I think it was the 11th or the 12th. She was at the hospital for multiple days. And the baby was also born, like, at midnight, basically. So there may be some confusion there, too. The baby was born overnight, basically. So, yeah, we'll look that up. But, yes, we are grandparents now. Mm-hmm. Little baby Sean Ferguson III. Mm-hmm. is out in the world baby and mom are doing well but yeah none of the usual issues you would expect with the baby coming out early baby was a big boy hmm yeah it was six pounds nine ounces I think yeah a big baby.

[21:44] So, yeah, none of the usual issues of a baby being born early, but baby and mama are doing fine. It was just time for the little one to come out, basically, and honestly, who am I to say no? Yeah, the 11th. The 11th, okay. I couldn't remember because it was overnight. Yeah. So, yeah, it was the 11th. But, yeah, so that happened. So, yeah, a lot of stress, a lot of things going on. Yeah. I don't really know how else to phrase it. It's been just overwhelming, and I'm glad that we're kind of now, in the final push to opening, that we're all kind of like, ah. Yeah. We're kind of catching a breath. We're taking a deep exhale, and we're trying to, A, enjoy the season some, and B, just calmly finish up the stuff we got in front of us. But since we last spoke to you, we did visit three haunts, and I guess now's the time to move on. Yeah.

[22:44] So, we did two in one night the week after we spoke. So, two weekends ago, we went to the Mortuary Haunted House and New Orleans Nightmare, both functionally here in New Orleans. Ironically, Mortuary is located in New Orleans. New Orleans Nightmare is actually in Jefferson Parish. But, you know. Yeah, so this would have been the 13th. Yeah. Sunday the 13th. Yeah, this is the first time that we've done a lot of Sundays. I don't know that our haunts are usually open on Sundays, but I'm very grateful they are this season. Yeah, I was grateful to be able to go to the haunts. And in both cases, we were in and out fairly quick.

[23:25] Now, we did Mortuary first, and if you recall the previous episodes, we have been very critical of the theme. Yes, it is Hell-ection. election like and it's bad because when they announced the theme i think in like august or something you and i both rolled our eyes and like we're so sick of the election already we're so sick of it yeah and it's like and that's only gotten worse yeah yeah that was not helped um but people even though there was american flags all over the marketing yeah they were swearing that but it didn't have anything to do with the election. Which... But it's an election year, so if that were true, it would have been last year or next year, you know? Well, and the problem is, it's like, you may not intend it to have anything to do with the election, but to us, it is clearly going to. Yeah. I mean, you have to realize that your intention doesn't really matter. Yeah. That's one thing I like. I'm completely against authorial intent, creator intent on things. Well, yeah, and I agree with that. Because, like, with both art and with yarn dyeing, which is its own thing. Own thing. Yeah.

[24:54] I will create things that I'm not happy with, but other people love them and want them. And it's just, I'm not happy with it because it doesn't match the vision that I had in my head. Not that it's bad. Yeah. but it's bad to me because all art gets go is first processed by the creator yeah and is then put out there and is then processed on the other end by the viewer the consumer the whatever yeah and it's that end processing that really truly matters and yeah the artist has very little control over it yeah exactly but it but it's that processing that really matters because that determines where it actually ends up and so saying oh it's not about this year's election it's not about the election at all is a little flat it lands a little flat with me yeah it.

[25:46] It was not a good not a good approach i think especially in one thing i noticed when we got in line and it's maybe because we were early in the night we were there right at opening functioning was that the audience was really young yeah i don't think there were very many adults that were not chaperones yeah some stripe yeah maybe one or two couples and that's it yeah it was all teens and tween young teens and tweens it was i would say it was like 12 11 to like 15 was the majority of that age range and and so that made it very awkward for us is you know 240 something standing in the middle of all these 20s like we're going to the haunted house yeah and of course they're doing their screams and their stuff that they do in line with line actors and then all the ticky-talky and yeah social media stuff that i don't understand yeah and even last night when we were talking to our bartender who's a much younger a university student. She's 21. She was like, yeah, I didn't go this year because I don't want to deal with anything with the election.

[27:01] Yeah, because everyone over the age of 18 is sick of this shit. Yeah. And that's not even a political statement. We're all sick and fucking tired of it. Yeah. It feels like it's been going on three lifetimes. Mm-hmm. I mean, it's, Jesus, and then you made it your marketing. And, look, we have friends who work there and even friends with some higher-up positions, and they were so proud of the theme. And it's like, guys, no. No. It's just bad. And I'm sorry. Well, and it actively makes me angry because I'm going to get into the pieces that were U.S. election themed. Okay, go for it. Outside, they had an Uncle Sam character. Which I want to focus on in a minute, but yes. Yeah. Inside, they had desecrated American flags, and they had one more Uncle Sam character. Yeah. And that was it. But the story, so we'll get into the story a little bit. Was supposed to be about the four horsemen. And that's a better story. That's just, it is. That's just a better story to tell. You could have even made it, like if you wanted to have an election theme, you could have even said, choose your horsemen. And they did on one brief Facebook marketing thing. I saw that once.

[28:26] That's not an election thing. That's just choose your horsemen. It's like when, like in Ghostbusters, choose your destroyer. That's totally different. That doesn't make me think election at all. Oh, I'm down with death. I just want to go quick. I forgot that the other thing that was U.S. election based was you had to choose to go through a blue or a red door. And we'll get back to, we'll circle back on that in a second too. But basically the thing did not carry through the hot, is the point. Yeah, and it didn't need it. Like, it was so, it would have been such a better story without it they really hit it i think they were like really close to a great idea with the four horsemen thing and then just decided that for some reason the hell like you know get more eyeballs or get more interest or whatever and like i said we've heard from target audience people that they skipped it this year because they just can't deal with any bullshit dealing with the election and i don't blame them we wouldn't have gone if we didn't feel like it was our fucking job exactly.

[29:28] Um, so basically, um, this rant here is what we paid for those tickets as far as I'm concerned. Yeah. Is that about right? Yeah. So let's get, let's get back to the things we were talking about. Because the first thing we did encounter was, uh, Uncle Sam. Yeah. Now, Uncle Sam character was actually not bad at first. The front of house one. Front of house one, yeah. He was a very Bernie Baxter-style character to me. He was very funny, or he was making jokes a lot. Yeah. He was, oh, come on, let's take a picture and all this stuff. And he was very engaging, told a lot of jokes, got a lot of laughs, and played with the crowd seemingly pretty well. Yeah, and was also instructing people that they would have to choose a path. Yeah, and he was also conveying some of the story elements. Right.

[30:21] And so that was pretty good, too. He was doing a good job. the two problems i have the two criticisms i have is one is that remember how i said this audience was heavy tween yeah he was telling a lot of jokes that were not appropriate to tell around tweens yeah especially jokes because one of the problems they were having and this is actually i think a design flaw is they um it was impossible to get the photo with him it was also a photo op situation but the photo op did not work without the flash right unless you were like crystal and i and you were doing it super up close um and so he was having to remind people to turn on their flash and he would repeatedly joke i was out there flashing last week yeah to like 12 year old girls and 12 year old guys it's like yeah that was a little cringe it was a lot it was a lot and so that was bad and he had a few other jokes it's like that's dicey around.

[31:18] Clearly underage people yeah and the other thing he did like when he saw us he did make a joke about yeah yeah i know you're tired of this election stuff yeah so so they knew that we were coming and that we weren't going to be happy about the theme but but i liked i did i overall other than the inappropriate jokes and the fact that he didn't have enough jokes and hey i feel you on this one you and i are on the same team here he ended up repeating a lot of jokes while we were in line because it was like 30 minutes through line he didn't have 30 minutes of material you know what i understand that completely i'm in the same boat as you but still i did notice that but the the only real issue was actually the the inappropriate jokes yeah with underage people and that's just it felt slimy otherwise other than that i thought he did a really good job yeah, And so the QLINE experience in general was, I thought, pretty good. I did note, we forgot to mention that when getting in line...

[32:19] Um they still have the issue with signage yeah this is this year it didn't bite us no it didn't um this year it it bit others everyone else yeah because we all got we all but we arrived at the same time as a bunch of other people and we got in line and fortunately they did have a girl that was right there at the entrance yes it's like this is the line to go to if you are having your ticket scanned if you need to buy tickets you need to go you know this way you can do it online or you can got to go around. And apparently everyone else was looking to buy tickets using cash. Yeah. And they had to be directed where to go. And it was not clear and not simple. But for us, this was great because all those people left the line and we got to move up. Yeah. We got to move up like 20 people. We got to move up like almost, you know, almost like a fifth of the line. We were doing great.

[33:11] But that was rough, but I felt very bad for that literal crush of humanity that now had to hang their head and go to the other side of things and get directions on where to go. That was rough. This is definitely a haunt. I would recommend buying the tickets in advance just because of that. It is more expensive, but my God is the getting in line process so much better. So anyways, oh, and the other thing with the Q line was it was really warm in there. They had giant fans, but they were not pointed at the crowd. Not sure why, but they weren't. And so that was a little rough. But other than that, Q line experience was fine. Yeah, and there was another Q line actor going around. Yeah, she was really good. She was. I think she's a friend of ours. I believe so, too. She had a worm of some kind that she was eating and playing with, yeah. It was adorable. It was adorably gross. Is that a thing? Yeah. I think we can make it a thing. Adorably gross is now a thing. It was adorably gross. I actually really liked it, and it was really funny seeing some of the younger crowd freak out.

[34:23] I'm like, oh, that's a neat use of the gummy worm. She's like pulling and drinking it like snot. That's really clever. I'm really impressed. But yeah, so we go inside, and as you mentioned, you have to choose between the good door and the evil door. And the good door was blue, evil door was red. It wasn't clear. Yeah, it wasn't clear. Didn't really matter, though. No. Because we gamed the system. Yes. We are two. And since we are two, we each went through one door. Exactly. And we are hereby going to confirm to you, spoiler alert, there's no fucking difference. Nope. I basically, because the red line was shorter, like the walking path was shorter. As I exited the blue, I saw Jonathan in the distance. And it took me like a room to catch up to him, but that's because I'm slower. Yeah, basically they both just snake around and meet back up. But like you said, the walking path on one of the doors was slightly longer.

[35:30] Probably just because of the shape of the room. Yeah, and it only came into play one other time when an actor asked us which door we went through. And then we said, oh, we each chose a different one. And the actor actually looked at us like, damn it. Yeah, like he didn't know what to do with that. I am surprised that is a less common because we actually heard from several of the people there that people aren't doing that. Yeah, that they just don't want to do that. And I don't know why because well okay so I do know why looking at the crowd because they're all tweens and they want to stay together and they want to stay together yeah.

[36:09] So, but yeah, so we went through and the rest of the haunt was, I mean, it was very standard mortuary fare. I don't really have much comment about the haunt itself. It's kind of weird as that sounds. Yeah, no, there was, um, there were signs for each of the horseman's areas and they did fit with what, you know, the, the visuals fit with the theme of that. Like pestilence, you know, was like infected people. Yeah, you saw, like, pustules and... Yeah, famine was zombies because people eating brains because they were hungry or something. Yeah, I thought that was only... I could stretch it, you know? Yeah, famine's a tough one. I'm going to just give them a break on that one. Famine's tough. Like, I don't know what I would do for famine other than maybe, like, cannibalism. Cannibalism and maybe some really emaciated, like, sculptured bodies.

[37:03] I mean, I'm sure you can do something, but it is the tougher of the toughest, I think. Of the horsemen um so yeah you you had basically you had little sections for all the horsemen, and like you said somebody asked us which door did we go they're like we went through one is well it doesn't matter we're going to punish you anyway and sends us through the rest of the haunt and like i said it was a little bit longer this year but not much not significantly no i mean it It was still, I mean, it's still going to be like an under 15-minute haunt. Right. And part of it is that we're moving slower. Yeah. Like that week especially, we were still recovering from the Kansas trip. Yeah. We were not doing well from the Beast. No.

[37:47] We were not all right. So, yeah, we were moving slower. And also, we were slowed down by the group in front of us, too. Right. Because as slow as we were moving, dragging our barely walking, barely ambulatory asses through this haunt, we still crashed into the group in front of us. Yeah. So there's that too. But I mean, honestly, the problem I've always had with the mortuary, and it's a problem I think is relevant this year, is it's extremely dark.

[38:14] It's very difficult to see where you're going. It's very difficult to see any settings or props. And they often have very, very cool stuff that you just can't see. And see, I thought that they had actually added a little bit of lighting in some of the areas that I hadn't seen before. And I think they did add some lighting. I agree with you. But there were still significant portions that were well underlit. Yeah. I think every year we talk about it, they add a few more lights. And eventually, if we do this for like 20 more years, it'll be a properly lit haunted attraction. That's my theory. Yeah. No, but, I mean, it was extremely dark in places, which is a pity because it's such a great building. Yeah, I wonder if it's on purpose, like if they're hiding something by making it dark, like something that they can't get rid of because of the historical... And that may be, you know, that could be, too. I will say, I think my favorite scene, both visually and actor, as we were going through, was the bar scene.

[39:18] Because you're going through a scene where you're walking in front of this really beautiful ornate bar you always love that bar it's a gorgeous bar it is and i'm i always remember it because a it's one of the better lit scenes yeah and i always you know have the joke about i guess i'm not getting my martini yeah because it seems to be a bar stock solely the martini glasses i have no idea why jesus christ well not even a rocks glass sitting around yeah um but yeah it's a very very good scene and it was also very well done in terms of the layout of it because the way they had to snake through it right and plastic martini glasses are easier to find than plastic rocks glasses that's probably true that's probably true i mean all in all, I really liked the Four Horsemen theme, and where they stuck with that, it was very good. Yeah, and that's why the Hellection thing pisses me off so much, is because if they had just dropped that and gone with the Four Horsemen, it would have been great. It would have been fine. I would have been excited about it, even. Yeah. Because, I mean, that is a thing, because like we've talked about in the past, when the mortuary has a thing that fits well with it, it's often banger. It's often really, really good.

[40:37] And the Four Horsemen theme, I think, could have fit with the mortuary just about perfectly. Yeah. That would have been really good. And it's not a common hog theme for some reason. Right. And I don't know if it's because we were there on a Sunday, but it seemed like they were really struggling for actors. The ones that they had were great. Don't get me wrong. But it did seem like there were lots of areas we walked through that were just animatronics and no people. Yeah, I'd agree with that. And it may be because it was Sunday. I know that haunts locally have been struggling for actors. I've been seeing ads for actors even after seasons began. Yeah. So my personal think is that there's a struggle there. I also think, though, that maybe some of the actors they did have were not used strategically. Because there were a few spaces where actors were stepping on each other. Yeah. And then you go into the next scene and there was an obvious place for an actor and no actor.

[41:35] So stuff like that would happen, too. But all in all, I mean... Other than the Hell Action theme, making this scene, making this draining to go to. Yeah. It was a pretty average mortuary year. Yeah, it was fine. Maybe even a little bit good if you ignore the Hell Action thing and go with the Four Horsemen thing. It might even be a good mortuary year. Yeah. But going with the Hell Action theme, going that route, and then the drain that produces. And then it playing so little with the rest of it because like that's what the marketing is go look at the ads it's all hell election and red white and blue and here's uncle sam and all that stuff it's all about that and then four horsemen are like in the background yeah and and then you go there and it's kind of the opposite the election is in the background and the four horsemen are presented more forward and i think the four horsemen thing is better but for all aspects Yeah. I agree. So, yeah.

[42:44] So after that, we had wonderful burgers at Beach Corner Grill right across the street from the mortuary. And Ellie was kind enough to join us for this part. Yeah. So that was wonderful. It's great because during haunt season, we don't get to see each other a lot. Yeah, there's a reason why she was a founding member of the Haunt Widows. yeah so yeah we ended up having great burgers and then sliding over to New Orleans Nightmare and New Orleans Nightmares theme this year was New Orleans Nightmare yeah but that's not a bad thing a bad thing no I don't think it is um we actually had a lot of fun there and it feels like they're coming into their own underneath the new name, Now, I will say, since the owners are probably listening, yes, I didn't spot any new pentagrams, but I did spot your Leviathan crosses and your sigils of Lucifer.

[43:40] I don't just know about pentagrams. Nope. So, yeah, basically, it started to feel like they were coming to their end. One of the things I loved, and I've been bitching about this for so long, to see it finally addressed made my haunt heart happy. Yeah. And that was the fact that ever since it was built, back in the House of Shop days. Ever since they added the second building. Yeah, the second building. That was under the House of Shop. Yeah. Back when it was that. They added a second building and what they would do is they'd have you go through that building and then there'd be this force break and recue, before you went into the quote-unquote main house properly right and it always felt so forced so contrived and it was also kind of weirdly placed because you could you were like right next to the actual queue line yeah and so you're sitting there just waving at the people in the actual queue line they're waving at you it was always kind of weird they finally rerouted everything do away with that yes thank you, because that was annoying oh my god and it artificially slowed the haunt down, usually for no reason and it takes you out of it because if you're sitting there waving at other people and they're waving at you you're not thinking about what you just went through.

[45:07] There was so much more they could have and should have done without, and they didn't do. So I think just getting rid of it rather than trying to reconfigure it was probably the best move. And I'm so grateful for it. And the other thing about it was, ever since they redid the first building, which is the new building, as you noted, um thematically there's no real break between the first building and the second right that's just a natural flow well and for some of the end years there at house of shock it was promoted as three attractions but one ticket yeah because you would go through like the graveyard scene and then you would go into the clowns yeah it was the uh new orleans morgue scene yeah yeah and then the clowns yeah don't ask me how the fuck that makes any sense yeah yeah and they still have the clowns in the middle yeah and the clown space is like one of my my favorite clown spaces that i've been in because there's a lot of places for the actors to play and pop out of and and they built a very good actor playground there i have to exactly um i don't think it has to be clowns though because we saw with like statesville you can have that style of actor playground and it could be anything Yeah.

[46:26] But regardless, it is very, very cool to see what the actors do with it. I can take or leave the clown thing. Like I said, I'm just kind of nonplussed by clowns.

[46:35] But I do like seeing the way the actors hang on these things, stand on these things, come from behind this. It's a very cool, it's almost like a jungle gym for the actors that they can do all kinds of interesting things with. And I really do enjoy that aspect of it. um as far as the rest of the the house it was a solid year it was a solid year it felt like they had changed a lot um before you got to the clowns and some after yeah so i noticed that it felt like they had made a lot of changes and improvements to it yeah especially toward the uh like i want to say like the the the three quarters mark of the big house yeah um after about the halfway point because after like the new orleans sequence right new orleans street sequence which i hope they never make significant changes to because that's just one of my favorite scenes in a haunted attraction period well and it makes sense for it to be in new orleans yeah it's like the only thing that really pegs it as new orleans nightmare yeah so they they have to they keep it that's also where the secret bar and also as we've established that's what they can reroute so many ways through it yeah that i don't think they need to change or get rid of it this sort of yeah flow through it a different way it'll be like a completely different scene anyway yep so but yeah they did make a lot of changes it felt very solid um.

[48:00] It definitely seemed like they had a lot more actors than some of the earlier years. Right. And again, we were there on a Sunday. So we don't know if that was the... It felt full of actors. It felt full or at least more full of actors. Yeah. I didn't... Like with Mortuary, I was going through saying, well, this room clearly was supposed to have someone. I wasn't doing that a lot. No. In No One's Nightmare. And also with Mortuary, I was saying, where do we go? Yeah. A fair amount. I was never saying that in New Orleans Nightmare. The path forward was always clear. Well, okay, so the people in front of us did have a couple of issues, and we had to point out where to go because we knew what was up, but they didn't. Yeah, but I guess that's kind of the thing, right?

[48:47] Any haunt is going to have people that don't know where to go. We have that issue sometimes. Yeah. Well, the main place that they got really stuck was where do we go around the table? because there was a scare actor on a table. Yeah. And you had to go around the table to get to the exit. Do like a hairpin turnaround. Yes. And they were scared of the scare actor because they were scaring people. Yeah. And hairpin turns are great from a prop-based layout standpoint and a use of the space layout, but they can be very difficult to achieve the scare forward on. Right. And I think that was the problem that was happening there. Yeah. that and the scare actor whenever we first entered the room was blocking the the visual sight line to the doorway and i don't think he realized he was doing it no i don't think he actually realized he was doing it i think if he uh or the day that's true i have no idea no.

[49:45] They, would get on the other end of the table. Yeah. I think, A, that they would be more visible. Yeah. And, B, they would improve the flow of that room. That is a relatively minor thing. That's a nitpick, to put it mildly. I know. That feels like we're just being petty at this point. I don't intend to be. Overall, I thought it was a good year, though. Like I said, I really actually enjoyed New Orleans Nightmare. it was solid it was a little bit longer again once again some of that is that we're older so we're probably going through slower but once again even though we're feeling barely ambulatory well and the people in front of us were like setting the pace yeah and and that girl in the group in front of us i you know in those no one like old video games when i care when your character gets hit they go flying backwards yeah and it's like every little like a little bird nicks them and they go flying backwards or whatever. That's what she was like. Well, the guy, I thought he was going to have a heart attack because in the clown area, one of the clowns got him really good with a drop panel right by him. And he clutched his chest and went halfway to the ground. And I'm like, oh, shit, are we going to have to get security?

[51:00] That's what my brain goes to. And then I also had to watch out for the assholes behind us. Oh, that group. I'd forgotten about them. Well, okay. This is the only time that we have had a group this scared that would not play through. Like, they wouldn't go past us. They wanted to stay behind us. And they wound up at one point getting so scared, they jumped up and kicked me in the ass.

[51:28] The group behind us, to put some context on it. Okay, remember how we said at mortuary, the group is mostly tweens. Yeah. And that is true. Um, New Orleans Nightmare, the group got decidedly older for the most part. Um, and some of that was later in the night, but also I think it's just the nature of the attraction here. Um, so most people there were actually adults or late teens. Right. And we know that we can't, like, haunts have no control over who goes to them. Like, this is not a knock on New Orleans Nightmare. No. This is, we just have to talk about this group. Yeah. Yeah, but this was the one group of younger teens I think I saw there. Mid-teens, the younger... Oh, I thought they were, like, college age, like 19, 20. You know, the way they were acting, who the fuck knows? Yeah, like idiots. You know, who the fuck actually knows? And they were wearing...

[52:27] Religious outfits. But basically, every time a scare would happen, they would TikTok react to it, is what I'm calling it. Yeah. Because they would flail about and fly around. This one guy had the most annoying scream. Yeah. I don't even know how to describe it. Okay, if you're a fan of Clue, the moment in the movie in which Miss Peacock thinks she was poisoned and starts, that's the scream. Yeah. That's as close as I can get you to it, using any kind of reference. The Mrs. Peacock screened from Clue before Mr. Green slapped her. Mm-hmm. And if you haven't seen Clue, pause this video and go watch Clue right now and improve your life, goddammit. You'll be better for it. Except this isn't a video. But that's okay. It feels like one. Go watch Clue right now. It will improve your life. Just trust me. Yeah.

[53:22] Greatest written comedy ever. Yeah. Yeah, but no, they were, and there were so many times where, like, they would just start chanting whenever they were scared that, I'm only scared of God. Like, you're literally screaming. From a clown. And saying that you're only scared of God. Like, what is in your mind? Rocks, that's what it is. My brothers in Christ, go make a hell house. It's just, it's clearly your calling, right? Yeah. Yeah, it was, oh my God. You don't need to be here. And it, but yeah, they were like really annoying. And once again, that's not a knock on the one's name. That's just a vent. Yeah. But, like I said, it felt overall like a good year. I'm still a little frustrated with it because they do have such large gaps in groups when the line is relatively short like it was. Yeah. And that we still got smushed in like that. But, once again.

[54:28] You know, haunts have limited control over these things. I acknowledge that. Yeah. Well, and one of the things that I noticed was that they did have a scare cam crew inside the haunt. There was one scare and it got the group in front of us. We were all one big group now. Big mesh, mishmash. And the group behind us. And as soon as they saw the camera, they like started acting out even more. Yeah, they were TikTok reacting. Yeah. Even though they weren't filming themselves. Yeah. At least that I could tell. Yeah. Yeah, I think that they were really into getting on camera. I think they were just really into the overreact. And I think that this may be something like the YouTube and TikTok react culture has changed that I don't understand. And they know what? That's fine. I'll tolerate that. We'll be old. I'm old. You know, whatever. I don't give a shit. I was never one of the cool kids. Exactly. So what the fuck do I care? It's not like I lost anything. Yeah. All right. And that takes us to our third haunt, which is three attractions, which was Rise. And we went on another Sunday. Yay! And I've got to say, if you're going to go to Rise, go Sunday. Yeah. Because we talked with the owners. We talked with the people that worked there. Apparently, Saturday, it was assholes and elbows. And it was Sunday. All the lines were... Reasonable. Very reasonable.

[55:54] We didn't even feel the... We used our VIP. Haunted House VIP. We had a VIP access through Haunted House VIP, which is a collab between some of the major haunts. Yeah. And we used it for the big house. But not for any of the others. Any of the others, yeah. In fact, we were worried we might have to go on a hayride alone. Yeah. That would have been awkward. Awkward.

[56:15] But anyways, the big house, right off the bat, love the new lobby. Yes.

[56:24] Oh my god it's so great it it looks amazing and they learned all of the correct lessons from the 13th gate because the 13th gate has always had one of my best uh waiting areas my favorite waiting areas too um they learned the correct lessons from it the first one being the use of the shoots where you go in you go through the photo op area and you're put into like these shortcut like you're being loaded in for like the road like the shoot like right before you go out on the rodeo or something yeah the bull goes into the rodeo and that way they can just take one shoot at a time one two three four one two three four go back up and down the line and let people in that's much more organized much more streamlined um and they also had air cannons and various other things to entertain people right but i do like the fact it was brighter and incredibly detailed Yeah, it was beautiful. It was just a beautiful room to look at. And I've got to be honest, I never thought their previous one was bad. No. Never didn't like it. But it was also never like the highlight of the podcast, you know? Right. No, we saw the Infinity Mirror at the top of the stairs, and that was really cool looking. It was a really well done Infinity Mirror, too. Yeah, it was. But it also left a lot for, you know, basically it created one long line instead of multiple short lines. Yeah, and you felt like...

[57:54] And there just wasn't, like, much there to look at, to be honest, other than the infinity mirror and the staircase and a few other things. There just wasn't a lot to look at or engage with. Now there is. Right. And, you know, they actually, like, poured the slab and built this building with all the stuff in it this year. Yeah. It was not there last year. Yeah, this amount of work was nuts for one year. Yeah. I'm genuinely very impressed they got it done and that it looks as good as it did. Yeah. And they said they may make more improvements next year, so we'll see. Yeah, and that wasn't all. Like, that, for a normal haunt, would be a year's worth. But, Rise, y'all are crazy. Yeah. In the best way possible. Yeah, they made major upgrades inside the haunt, too. Yes, they did. And one thing I'm enjoying about Rise, is as we go through year after year after year, as you can see, they're doing the thing that I can tell they did at Netherworld. Which is they're keeping the shit that works and getting rid of the stuff that works less well or not at all. Right? Yeah. And it's, you know, honestly, it's nice to know that something works and, and as someone who's been going to it since almost their first year, I don't know if it was their first or second year. I think it was. They've been there going there 14 years now. Yeah.

[59:19] I'd have to go back and look at the old reviews. I'm going to check out our tickets too. Yeah, but I like getting to one of those areas and going, ooh, I love this room, you know? It feels familiar. Like when we go to 13th Gate and we get to the Pumpkin Tunnel.

[59:35] Exactly which we haven't done 13th gate this year we got plenty we'll talk about that in a minute yeah but i love the like the library sequence in oh yeah in rise i do too um one of my favorites and this is because it's such an actor playground is the car room where you walk around the car yeah and to find out that car was in perfect working order when they parked it yeah it ain't now but yeah the actors uh went a little nuts on that right off the bat you're only one hell of a tow truck to get that out now yeah that that that car is not not that car's seen better days yeah and those are just they're some of our old favorites from there yeah but i also i've also grown to really like the micro bus scene or the the mini but the hippie bus scene, the first few years they had i was kind of on it but it's grown on me yeah i i didn't like it the first few years yeah it may just be that oh that's i think it's because they didn't do it as a hippie thing they did as a witch doctor thing they did it as a voodoo room yeah that's right i remember that now yeah yeah it was more in but now it's a hippie thing it's actually kind of a it's apropos and b because literally it's a volkswagen microbus jesus christ why is it not hippie yeah exactly jesus people um it was standard hang the whole time um.

[1:00:58] But, no, I mean, they've made a lot of major improvements to it. I think of the, if we compare just the Big House of Rise to New Orleans Nightmare and Mortuary, I definitely think I enjoyed Rise the most. It was the longest haunt. The acting in it is holy shit. Yeah. I mean, acting overall was good all around. I don't think I really had much in the way of bad actors. No. In fact, even like at The Beast, where the actors were struggling because they didn't have shit to do. The actors themselves were trying and working their asses off. And so even though the acting ended up being bad, I don't blame the actors. Right, exactly. But here at Rise, man, you can tell that this is an actor-oriented attraction. The acting was amazing throughout all three haunts, in particular. But oddly enough, the big house is where the acting stood out the most to me. Yeah, and they have an actor manager who was working with the Asylum crew.

[1:02:01] We found this out last year, who last year started working with the big house actors. And that was a great move, because now all of the acting across all of the fields are at the same level. They feel about the same level, which is incredible, because if you go back to our earlier reviews, either here or on Garbage Horror when we talked about The Asylum The Asylum has always been like probably the best acted haunt I think I've been to anywhere, because it feels like an actual theatrical or like Broadway or you know Hollywood production as far as the acting quality it feels on that level I mean Hell's Gate I think Hell's Gate competes, but you know what I mean but even the fact I'm thinking like that tells you how good it is Yeah, and it's a smaller attraction. Yeah, it only has about a couple dozen actors' jobs. Yeah.

[1:02:56] But they're all amazing. And that's just it. If one person in that were weak... It was show. Yeah, and it's a touch haunt. Yeah. We'll get to this. We'll do the Borough of the Assault in a second. But yeah, all in all, Rise the Big House was great. Then we went to the trail haunt, though. Yes. Then we weren't sure if we were going to be able to do all three things before leaving because we got there a little later than we intended. One complaint about Rise is they are open from 7 to 9 on Sunday. And even though we got there like at 7.30, we were held up a little bit. There was a bad accident somewhere. where traffic was wonky, so we got there about 15, 20 minutes later than we intended.

[1:03:38] But, yeah, that 7 to 9, and we found out later the attractions don't close until 10, but that's still a very tight time frame to do all the queue lines and all the attractions. Yeah. So if you're going on a Sunday, get there at 7. Get there within the first few minutes, or you may not have time, especially if you don't have VIP. Right. So anyways, we were debating what we couldn't do. Yeah so we decided we had already talked to one of the owners and he said that um they had made some major changes to the hayride so we decided okay we'll do that next because it doesn't sound like there are a lot of changes to the asylum um and that's what we did and when we got to the hay we were the only people in line yeah like oh wow okay and so we scan our tickets and we sit on the hay bales and it's like we're gonna have to go alone because this would that be really fucking awkward yeah i cannot begin to express how awkward that would be um so we started like uh but then a group came and actually filled out the cart pretty nicely and so yay we get to go and everyone's gonna yeah and for that if you think that this is a hayride a cheesy little hayride for little bitty kids.

[1:04:57] Change your thinking now. Yeah. Because there was a little girl with her mom and dad sitting on the hay bale next to us. We were sitting where the actors come into the trailer. Yeah, the halfway point where there's a gap in the rail and the actors can enter and exit the trailer. Yeah. Yeah, they chose to sit there. And this little girl was so scared all the way through. Luckily, they had a blanket and they put it over her head and just held her the whole time. But they weren't able to enjoy the show either because it was too scary for their kid and they were worried about her you know i've heard other haunters be very critical of this hayride yeah and i i do understand it's not the style and it's not like other hayrides right and it's also not something that you see in this area yeah i mean we've talked about it before i don't know why, I mean, this has been a rough year for Hayrides in general, but we're saving that for a news episode. Yeah. Whenever we do the next news episode, which will probably be 464, we'll come back on this. Yeah.

[1:06:06] But it's been a rough year for hayrides. But, yeah, I forgot what I was about to say. I just told my mind. Oh, it's okay. It's hot season. We understand. Yeah, my mind just told me, Yeah, but no, I think people aren't used to it. Oh, I remember. And the ones who are used. Okay. Yeah. Why isn't Louisiana or the southern states in general, like, the center for hayrides? Because we have tons of agriculture. We really do. Yeah. We have flat land and great weather for hayriding. Fairly dry Octobers usually and fairly cool, but not cold. Yeah. Now, I do wonder if the hayrides up north are because it is so cold that, you know, you don't want to walk that trail. Oh, you definitely don't want to walk that trail. We don't have a lot of trail haunts either. No, we don't. We don't have a lot of outdoor attractions full stop. We've got Fright Trail in Lafayette.

[1:07:06] Uh we have the hunt the hayride at rise the natchitoches um we've got, oh i'm trying to remember i know we don't yeah winkler's bottoms closed, no i know this is this is a big one okay oh dark woods yes thank you i've got dark woods is what you're thinking of and i'm running out of trail haunts there's one in lake charles that said that freight trail oh wait you're talking about when like charles nut lafayette yeah uh yeah you're right i've yeah but basically there's none um in new orleans not southeast louisiana there's not a trail on yeah no so between like the the triangle of um of uh new orleans baton rouge and like um hammond and all that yeah and north shore you don't have one and it's always been kind of weird to me. We have great terrain for it and great weather, but it doesn't seem to happen. But regardless, I actually really enjoyed it. Now, the big new scene was a sawmill. Mm-hmm.

[1:08:12] And since this is Haunt Weekly and not Garbage Horror, we can talk about the actual big scare, which I thought was awesome. It was. It was really good. I think everybody jumped at it a little bit. Yeah, it was a rack of spinning saw blades, quote unquote saw blades, obviously, that swooped down over the car. Yeah. And once again, this is like what Freaks of Fear, when they had the swooping bird. They mastered getting that height just perfect where you have that little inkling in your brain goes wait that's way too low yeah but it's clearly high enough that you're not going to get hit right and it's you know it is massive yeah like i think i think baby said it was like 225 pounds each or something there's like 10 blades on it yeah it's gigantic it's gigantic and this build, I know for a fact, I know from talking to him, that it was a monster build in more ways than one.

[1:09:13] And apparently we can expect, well, we won't get into that actually, but there's more changes coming to the trail ride in the future years too. Yeah. They are still very dedicated to the trail ride. Yeah. Which is something I was worried about because it seemed like the trail ride had gotten a little, you know, stagnant. And they were spending all their time and attention on the big house. Rightfully so. It's the biggest draw. Yeah. But I was kind of worried that maybe the trail ride wasn't going to get the love. That's not the case, and it's not going to be the case. Right. That's the main thing I'm trying to get across. Yeah, and, you know, he said that people have been hearing more about the trail ride, so he expects attendance to go up. And I hope that's the case. I think it's, I actually really enjoy the trail. Yeah.

[1:09:58] I admit it's not the scariest haunted attraction. It's more theatrical. It reminds me more of, like, the great movie ride at Universal Studios. And things like that than it does a haunted attraction. But I'm all for a little spectacle, man. Yeah. I mean, there's nothing wrong with spectacle.

[1:10:16] So, yeah, I thought the sawmill was a great addition. Oh, and the thing I really did love this year, and we haven't talked about it yet, but it's worth hitting on now, is they finally really nailed down tying the three attraction stories together. Yes. Yes, I noticed this, because it was really, really good. Because when we were going through the trail ride, one of the things they added was a video from Dr. Morgan, who was over at the asylum. Right. And when we left that ride to go to the asylum, we got to meet Dr. Morgan in the flesh, so to speak. Right. And there's also talk of both the trail and the asylum in the entrance video, which is also new in the big house. Yeah, they tied it all together with these videos, these pre-recorded videos that were actually very well done, I thought, in all cases. Yeah. Very well done.

[1:11:11] And honestly, it was really nice to finally get all three of those stories truly tied together. Yeah. Because it had always kind of been like, well, each attraction has its own story and it's sort of self-contained universe. Right. With some overlap, but now you really get to understand how they all come together and what the hell, and how what's happening here impacts here, and how that impacts, you know what I mean? It's much better. Yeah. That was probably the, that was the biggest improvement from, like, the experience overall for me, was seeing them tied together like that. Yeah, and I also noticed that, at least I think I noticed, I'm trying to make sure, they took out the asylum scenes that used to be in the big house. Yes, they did. Which is nice, because I always wondered why they were there if there was a separate attraction. I think they turned them into more traditional hospital ones. Yeah. But it's still a little confusing, because it's medical, but yeah, I do believe they took out the actual asylum sequences. which once again makes total sense um.

[1:12:24] Um one thing they did do in the big house we didn't discuss was they put us in a cage us with the group we kind of accidentally run into yeah we were all put into a cage and mind you.

[1:12:35] That honestly this is like the third or fourth time this haunt season i've been stuffed in a cage so yeah and this was one in a prison sequence and it's not made sense we were locked in there, and they actually what they were doing was they were letting groups passed and but they didn't take this opportunity. See, this is how you recue a line. You know what I mean? If you're going to recue a line halfway into an attraction, this is your opportunity. You stick them in a cage, give them an actor to mess with them, and then when the separation's right again, you let them into the world. Yeah. Now, we asked them about this specifically. They say that this occurs too early in the haunt to really use it that way. Yeah, and I get that, But it is an idea to go forward. If you're going to do a recue, something like this is what I'd recommend. Not just standing around in a bunch of cattle gates like they used to do at New Orleans Nightmare. Right. That's how you don't do it. So even though they did not use it to recue, this could be a great way to recue. Yeah. And keep the flow of the haunt going, you know. I think it was a great way to do that. So that sets us up to go to the asylum. And we were the last paying customer group of the night. Yeah. With three other people. Two who had never been. And one who had...

[1:14:00] And right off the bat, the Asylum was the Asylum. Go back to our review last year of it. Not a lot is different or changed that I could tell. Yeah, the focus was much more on the big house and the hayride, which is honestly a good move. Yeah, I don't disagree with that. The acting was once again great. the main issue i had and this is specific to this group was the group we were with it was me and crystal it was two guys and a girl and one of the guys was dating the girl or was the emotional support human as it was called yeah that's that's how he identified so i i don't know if they're actually dating or not but they're emotional support human anyways we get in the opening scene in which you're supposed to confront the evil nurse the head nurse character right not the Dr. Hedner's character. An escaped patient, too. Yeah, an escaped patient. And the girl in the group gets way over scared. Yeah. Like, way over scared. Like, seriously, she's collapsing on the ground. I'm worried she's having a panic attack, genuinely. And I'm about to go into, you know, my haunt instinct mode is to get down on my knee and go, it's okay. No one hears. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Be reassuring.

[1:15:17] And the actors kept going. and got more aggressive even with her well i don't know that they got more aggressive they did let her go into the side where you push the button yeah they did not separate her from her emotional support human which is when the panic attack really began when they tried to do that yeah um which i mean this is a odd thing to celebrate but that means for the first time in all of these years of going to the asylum yeah i got to be decontaminated yay i mean literally Literally every year I've gone, I've been on the side that pushes the button, not the side in a decontamination chamber. Yeah. I've never been in that room. And I got to do that. Have you ever been on the other side? Nope. So they're usually separated boys and girls. Yes. They were going to have... That's when she started freaking out was because they were going to have her and me go into the decontamination side. Yeah. Guys, find a different way to do that. Different metric.

[1:16:18] Odds and evens. Yeah. Rock, paper, scissors. Duck, duck, goose would be really fun in there. Oh, yeah. Have the crazy man go, duck, duck, duck. Exactly. Did he say you're the goose getting decontamination? Exactly. That would be fucking hilarious. Yeah. That is nice. And that would fit with the light hunch theme of the Hawn, too. Exactly. Oh, my God. That's beautiful. Duck, duck, goose. That's what I propose. We're doing duck, duck, goose. I'm all in on duck, duck, goose. A sentence I never thought I would say. Yeah. We're all in on duck, duck, goose here. Duck, duck, goose for 50. To the moon.

[1:16:54] Yeah. Oh, God. But she did seem to get better. And I kept an eye on her the whole time. She got better. And the end result was she made it through the attraction pretty much fine. And the attraction was the same story, largely. The same actor, same scenes. But once again, the acting is great and the use of touch. And the thing I like about the assignment, I realized this as we were going through, is they do touch you. They brush your hair, touch your shoulders, do things like that. Stroke your cheek. Stroke your cheek. Pinch your nose a little. You know, things like that. But they use it not necessarily, like, the touch is the scare. They use it as a way to invade your personal space. Yeah. It's all about getting close to you. And so, like, the reason they're, like, getting right up on your shoulder is so they can, like, you know, kind of almost cuddle you. Yeah. And make you uncomfortable. Like, ugh, this is a creepy person trying to snuggle me. It's weird. Yeah.

[1:17:52] One of the things that I, because it's an interactive haunt, and you're supposed to play back with the actors. Mm-hmm. I think that if there were any way that they could learn a lesson from Exiled, that that would be really good. And I think that that comes from when we went to Exiled and in the tent, specifically when we were being hazed to get into the group, they would ask us to do certain tasks and questions directly. And i think that that would make it a more interactive experience at the asylum if we were asked to do certain things or ask questions directly yeah or answer certain questions you know um like it could be as simple as what's your name yeah that that forces you to respond that forces you to engage but saying does anyone here have anything to say yeah, No one's going to respond. Yeah. I mean, some of y'all never, never were in elementary school.

[1:18:52] Yeah. And I know that some of it's just, you know, it's timings and trying to get people through and all that. And also it didn't help that it was late on a Sunday after a hard weekend. Yeah. All that. I mean, believe me, I sympathize with the actors. They were just wanting their goddamn Monday all from acting. Yeah, but I'm trying to think of why I was so interactive at Exiled versus the level of interactivity I give to the asylum. And I think that that's it. Yeah, I would agree that there needs to be more direct questioning, more direct having people do things. Instructions, yeah. And because there's an old like psychological theory about how if you see a person collapse on the sidewalk and you say, someone call 911. Exactly. No one's going to call 911. Right. That person's dead. But if you go, you, you in the big hat or whatever, call 911, that person will call 911. It's the difference between that. Exactly. And that's exactly it. Yeah. And there's actually been like tons of psychological papers about that. It's a true thing. And in fact, that one woman, there was one woman who...

[1:20:05] Literally was re-kidnapped she had escaped a kidnapper yeah and was re-kidnapped because she ran out and banged on the door like a townhouse or something had like eight people in it said someone call 9-1-1 blah blah blah and all this was and it was screaming and no one called and i said why didn't they all ask everyone why didn't you call said i assume someone else did now me i'm a crazy motherfucker i'll call 9-1-1 i don't care if someone else has yeah exactly i don't assume other people have i assume other people are shit you see that's my problem i have no faith in humanity so i'll call 9-1-1 but i'm also the outlier here so yeah i think that would be a good improvement is more direct questioning more direct and more direction right stop and i think that that would make it feel very different from inside the big house yeah because now that the big house acting has come up so far oh yeah it it's on the same level like it feels very much Yeah, the only distinction is the self-touch and the greater personal space intrusion that comes with it. Yeah.

[1:21:08] But we're still being acted at, not being asked to act. Exactly. I think, yeah. You know what? That's it. You're done. We're done here. Well, I think that's about everything. We've got about another 120 minutes again. Yeah. One hour, 20 minutes. Not 120 minutes. Jesus Christ. It's two hours. That'd be a long time. But it's haunt season, man. We're tired. I know. But on that note, everyone, thank you very much for joining us for this episode. This, I guess, sort of double-linked episode. So even though we missed a week between this and last week, we kind of got another full episode in there. Yeah. But please do check out all the other episodes of Haunt Weekly. We're at hauntweekly.com, hauntweekly.x slash Twitter, hauntweekly on Facebook, and YouTube.com slash hauntweekly, as well as wherever you get your podcasts from. Drop us an email, send us a line, like, share, subscribe, all the stuff I'm supposed to say. Did I get all the words out? I think I did. I think so. But until next time, I'm Jonathan I'm Crystal And we will see you all next week.