Enthusiast Distraught Over Tragedy At SFNE

Local enthusiast Daniel Mekas was described this evening as "severely distraught" over the tragic accident that took place on the Superman: Ride of Steel roller coaster at Six Flags New England. Friends of Mekas describe his emotions as ranging from shock, denial, anger, fear and sadness.

"I was going to that park in two weeks!" cried a distraught Mekas. There is no way Superman is going to be reopened 2 weeks from now. No way in hell! The investigation is probably going to take like, months and then when they finally do reopen the great finale I've read so much about is probably gonna be trim braked to hell. Man, I can't believe this happened to me! I have to be the unluckiest person on earth today!" exclaimed Mekas, apparently unaware that the man flung from the restraints on the ride in question might in fact be less lucky.

When questioned about the ride accident victim, Mekas responded with "Who?" before debating whether there was any way he would be able to get a refund on his Priceline purchased plane tickets.

--MOS

Enthusiast Complains About Single Train Operation On Six Flags New England Flashback

"I know everyone's been complaining about single train operation on Superman," wrote Coastaz4evah on the Coasterbuzz forums recently, "but what about Flashback? They were running single train operation on Flashback too! I had to wait almost 5-10 minutes for a ride that totally should have been a walk on yesterday!"

Coastaz4eveh continued, "this goes to show that Six Flags cares more about penny pinching then the guest's experience."

When asked to comment on this criticism, a distant gaze appeared in the eyes of Six Flags CEO Gary Story. "Yes, I remember we tried to run two train operation on a Vekoma Boomerang once. It was in 1998, opening day at Six Flags Over India. It was rumored the line for the Boomerang would be over eight hours long, so we tried to run a second train," Story stated. "The screams of the dead haunt me to this day."

As of this writing, the penny pinching Six Flags Corp. continues running all Vekoma Boomerangs with single train operation.

--MOS

Flyer in ACE Newsletter Raises Porn Sales

Steve Goldschmitt was excited when he went to the mailbox two weeks ago. This was because his newest edition of Front Seat Thrills, put out by Horse Creek Productions, was due to arrive. He had seen a flyer for the POV video in the latest copy of ACE News and was excited to gather the kids around the fireplace and watch some coaster footage. What he found instead shocked this Pentecostal minister from Dothan, Alabama.

"Apparently I got the name wrong," confided Goldschmitt, "because the people in this video were not coaster enthusiasts. They were, ugh, um, people who practiced very alternative lifestyles. Specifically, getting in some sort of harness and being, um, handled by a line of men." What the pasty Pentecostal had ordered was not Horse Creek Productions' "Front Seat Thrills," but rather, Horse C*ck Productions' latest release, "Front Meat Thrills Vol. 4: Ass Party."

Lance Rodman, C.E.O. of Horse C*ck Productions, spoke exclusively with ARN&R about the mix-up and his refusal to refund Goldschmitt. "Yeah, he bought that DVD from us. Some real freaky sh*t going on there. I don't see what the big deal is. It's the same as a roller coaster, you have to hold on to the bar, there's a lot of going up and down and some screaming is going on." When asked why he wouldn't provide a refund, Rodman said, "The man bought a tape with an ass party and he's going to live with it. What if every closeted religious fanatic wanted to return their porn? I would owe Pat Robertson for the entire thirty-tape series. At $24.95 per tape that's just no way to run a business."

Goldschmitt says he is still recovering from the shock of seeing the tape. "They were doing all of these things I never knew were possible," he lamented. "I have had sex missionary style and, you know, like the dogs do. Lydia, my wife, hates that one. But, I never knew candle wax, an object called the 'King Dong' or 25 people could be involved. That's a bit different than this God-fearing person is used to."

Goldschmitt assured his congregation and the IRS that the tape was burned. However, the preacher fell strangely silent when his mail carrier, a congregation member, asked why on Tuesday the Goldschmitt household received a DVD labeled "The Man Hole Vol. 21: Cleaning the Pipes." The pastor tried to tell churchgoers about Six Flags Over Georgia's new coaster, but this time they didn't appear to be listening.

--FMB

The Return of the Weird-Ass Search String

As usual, we've been getting some really messed-up freaks blundering across ARN&R while looking for highly disturbing- or just plain odd- crap on the web. Just have a gander at how the lunatics and wackos have located our website lately!

By the way, if you were one of the asylum escapees who typed in these searches, by all means welcome to our fun amusement park satire page! You'll find exactly what you were looking for here! Please don't rub your feces on our houses or sodomize our pets!

-Charlize Theron Backward Speech

While at least one member of the ARN&R staff believes the South African actress to be a filthy (and thoroughly untalented) minion of the Antichrist, his views have not gained widespread acceptance. And even he would never have thought you could hear Satanic lyrics when you play her backwards!

-Antonio Sabato Jr Gets Jumped

Well, on second thought, this one isn't all that weird. It's actually a thoroughly admirable thing to hope for, but we're afraid that ARN&R will not be much help in getting it to happen. Best of luck, though. Our prayers are with you in this noble enterprise.

-Pat Robertson tattoos piercings

Presumably because every jackass who hates gays and women needs to be able to locate a parlor willing to permanently carve the pasty, intolerant visage of his fearless leader into his bicep or staple it through his penis.

-Jessica Simpson Camel Toe Rumors

Um. Ew. Well, thankfully no one has found us while searching for "Josh Groban Male Camel Toe," at least. Yet.

--JCK

Work Is Your Nemesis

In what has to be one of the most bizarro website promotions ever designed for a theme park, Alton Towers has created a website, www.ihatework.co.uk, that encourages people to skip work and come to play there instead. Customers are invited to download a discount voucher and sneak out of the office, but not before emailing everyone they know to encourage them to also be lazy bastards.

If your theme park website promotion is tacky enough to be reported on by major media outlets, and also gets forwarded to us as a joke by two different friends of ours who care and know almost nothing about amusement parks, you probably just made the ARN&R Site O' the Weak.

--JCK

Stratosphere Just Starts Throwing People Off Their Tower

In a move designed to "give our guests the ultimate thrill experience," the Stratosphere hotel and casino began randomly throwing guests off the top of their tower this weekend.

"I was just thinking to myself, 'How can we push the bar further here at the Stratosphere? How can we really get on the map as a thrill ride capital?'" reminisced Stratosphere CEO Jim Knipfel. "It so happens I was snorting cocaine with Penn and Teller off a stripper's ass at the time, and Penn, he looks up from the powder on this Grade A perfect ass and says 'Hey Jim? Why not just start throwing the f**kers from the tower?'"

"I said 'Penn, I know you were joking, but that's a good f**king idea!'"

As of last Friday, all tower visitors to the Stratosphere are required to sign a legal document waiving all damages in the event "of random tower expulsion." Guests are chosen to be thrown off the tower at further randomly determined rates, though Knipfel assured ARN&R that the Stratosphere "will be ejecting at least 1-5 customers a day." Those guests who visit and are not murdered will receive a prize in the form of a 10% buffet discount.

--MOS

Halloween Horror Nights Mazes Revealed

One of the most popular of the many Halloween makeovers at the nation's amusement parks is Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Orlando. As has become a recent tradition, Universal has released some limited details about the expected attractions well in advance in order to whet the appetites of eager thrillseekers. Aside from the creepy night theming, scare zones, shows, and a substantial number of rides operating at both Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios, the fall event always features a number of terrifying mazes. Here is the tentative listing of the mazes, provided by Universal rep Kevin Benjo Ikitai, for Halloween Horror Nights in 2004:

-TRON: Ultimate Terror will be what Benjo Ikitai claims "simple but terribly effective." According to Benjo Ikitai, "we're well aware of the utter horror experienced by unfortunate souls who have blundered across Jay Maynard's TRON Costume website, so we thought we could incorporate that terror into a frightening walk-through attraction. The maze will consist of a series of rooms, each of which pretty much just features a fat man wearing an obscenely tight white spandex bodysuit.

"We decided to make it a character from the TRON universe, but not a known character, since we couldn't find anyone in the same shape as Bruce Boxleitner," says Benjo Ikitai. "And, while one drawback of wearing spandex is that it does nothing to hide one's obesity, it will certainly inspire so much fear as to cause a great number of visitors to explosively fill their trousers with their own fecal material."

Although the Universal rep would not divulge this fact, ARN&R has it on good authority from another source that the final room in the maze will be pitch black, allowing the full glory of the glowing stripes on the TRON outfit to mesmerize and stupify the audience into weeping and begging for mercy.

-Jeff Goldblum is Watching You Poop: The Decimation is fully expected, says Benjo Ikitai, "to send just about every visitor home crying for Mommy." In each and every nightmarish room of this maze, Jeff Goldblum may or may not be staring in a menacing fashion at guests. "Particularly if they are pooping," says Benjo Ikitai. "Wouldn't it be amazingly scary if you were walking through a haunted house and you innocently sat down to take a dump, and then all of a sudden you noticed Jeff Goldblum staring at you?" The Universal rep also noted that fans of comprehensible spelling and grammar would be particularly revolted and disturbed by this particular maze, though he offered no specific information related to this fact.

-The World's Largest 40oz Collection: the Extreme Experience, described by Benjo Ikitai as "pretty f**king scary," sends visitors on a jaunt through various eye-popping rooms, including the Detailed Reviews of Schlitz Malt Liquor Bull, the 40oz Bitches, the 40oz Crew, and the terrifying monsters and nightmare creatures of the Drunk'n Public.

-My Little Pony: The Damnation will be "the last word in the realm of extreme thrills," according to Benjo Ikitai. According to the Universal rep, "the unearthly shrieks of the damned and the wails of unspeakable agony of tortured lost souls will emanate all night from within the My Little Pony attraction."

Designed by the webmaster of the violently cloying Melody's My Little Pony Site, My Little Pony: The Damnation will feature several frightening chambers where visitors witness teenage morons devoting endless hours to babbling about and making websites about their toy horses. The terror level is ramped up with the Gauntlet of Revulsion, where hell-beasts offer the guests "huggles." Then comes the agony of Lancer's Corner, where a particularly fiendish Minion of the Antichrist, Lancer the Pony, awaits. After the guests enter this chamber, the lights darken and Lancer appears; he then speaks, informing the newcomers that "my parents are very rich and we have a mansion. I'm here to show you the ten prettiest My Little Ponies." After the guests escape Lancer's tour of the Fiery Underworld of Satan, there comes the final "assault on the very sanity of the guests," according to Benjo Ikitai. Apparently, this final chamber will consist entirely of some lunatic giving exhaustively detailed instructions on how to give My Little Pony sausage curls in its hair.

Visitors to Halloween Horror Nights will be required to sign a waiver in order to witness My Little Pony: The Damnation; it is anticipated that the maze will make as many as half of all visitors "vomit so hard their eyes go bloodshot," according Benjo Ikitai.

Benjo Ikitai also added that there would be one more maze, but its theme was still being fine-tuned and would be announced soon. However, he denied that guests entering this final maze would either face the evil ministrations of The Subservient Chicken, or simply be tied down and forced to watch Reign of Fire in its entirely, saying that "both of those really might be a little too horrifying for most of our guests to endure."

--JCK

Paramount's Canada's Wonderland Announces New Footloose Coaster

At a press conference today, representatives of Paramount's Canada's Wonderland made the official announcement of a long-rumored ride to debut at the park early in the 2005 season. Footloose: The Ride, set to open in May of next year, will be a Bolliger & Mabillard-designed floorless coaster themed to the thrilling and critically-acclaimed Kevin Bacon dance film.

"Huh," said Screamscape webmaster Lance Hart. "I heard rumors of this ride ages ago, and I've had it listed at Screamscape for months, but I always was sort of thinking it was some sort of joke or something. Guess the joke's on me."

"Getting a B&M coaster themed to Footloose makes so much sense for Paramount's Canada's Wonderland," said park rep Willie O' Keefe. "Everything just fits together perfectly. For instance, think about this: We will have a ride called Footloose: The Ride here next season. B&M will build Footloose: The Ride for us. That company also built Medusa at Six Flags Great Adventure. Six Flags Great Adventure is of course run by Six Flags, Inc., which also runs Six Flags Magic Mountain. Six Flags Magic Mountain has a ride called the Revolution. Well, Revolution is a coaster that Kevin Bacon rode four years ago during a free weekend he had between filming Hollow Man and Novocaine. Just six degrees of separation! Isn't that incredible?"

"It is incredible," said another PCW rep, Ray Duquette. "I was just talking about it the other day with two of our managers, Valentine McKee and David Labraccio, and we came up with this astounding tidbit: We are building Footloose: The Ride. That ride will be located next to another ride called Top Gun. Top Gun was designed by Vekoma, and Vekoma also created the Rock 'N' Roller Coaster at Disney/MGM Studios. Disney/MGM is a theme park in the same large Disney World complex, where the Magic Kingdom also resides, and Kevin Bacon visited the Magic Kingdom with his family when he was twelve years old! Isn't that just jaw-dropping?"

When asked for comment, Kevin Bacon politely asked that people leave him alone.

--JCK

Imagineers Stumped by Mr. Toad Concept

Disney Imagineers are reportedly at what one inside source calls "a total dead end" in their attempt to create an exciting theme park attraction based on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride.

"With the DVD release of the movie called Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, Disney has the rare opportunity to tie in a successful property by creating a ride at the Magic Kingdom based on Mr. Toad," says the source. "Disney already owns the U.S. film and ride rights to The Wind in the Willows due to their older animated film deal involving the book, but this newer movie really gives a kick-start to the idea of producing a fun attraction based on Mr. Toad and pals. Unfortunately, no one has the slightest idea of how to create a ride based on this book or on the movies based upon it!" The source then slapped his head crisply for emphasis.

One ride concept, discarded by Disney, would have featured themed cars that zipped speedily and wildly turned through scenes from The Wind in the Willows. The working title for this concept was "Mr. Toad's Wild Ride." The source was unable to decipher why this idea was scrapped.

"The only thing certain about the new ride is that it will involve Mr. Toad in some way, and it will replace that Pooh ride at Magic Kingdom," said the source. "Everyone knows that thing blows, so we won't be getting any nasty hate mail about removing a popular classic attraction or anything."

--JCK

Ebert, Scott, Mitchell Abandon Careers

Three influential film critics -- Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, A.O. Scott of the New York Times, and Elvis Mitchell of the L.A. Times -- today simultaneously announced that they were retiring, effective immediately, citing the presence of a new group of critics who "just blew us away."

The new group, a consortium of critics posting their musings at CoasterForce, rose to international prominence with their collective thoughts on The Girl Next Door.

Chach45, who is reportedly being interviewed for a position with Film Threat, opened the Algonquin Table-like discussion with "Ok ok ok... for those who don't know, a new movie named 'The Girl Next Door' is coming out on April 9th. Personally, I can't wait, mostly because Elisha Cuthbert is in it, and she is the hottest woman on planet Earth! What do you guys think about Elisha/the movie?"

After pondering Chach45's meditative and insightful posting, ioainme held forth on the underlying themes of the film: "cant wait to see it looks good." After learning that noted thespian Elisha Cuthbert portrays an adult film actress, future New York Times critic PreppieBoy9489 gave his highest review, previously reserved for The English Patient: "Does she really? *writes on hand to GO SEE THAT MOVIE!!!*"

Chach45, hoping to facilitate the continued insightful development of the discussion, rejoined the conversation: "Yes, yes it is true. My buddy saw the sneak preview... she plays an ex porn star who meets an up tight guy and turns him crazy and stuff.. and you see her butt in small underwear CANT WAIT!"

But Chach45 was not to have the last word. Instead, coolcat13 set forth what is likely to be the last word not only on the film, but also on film criticism, introducing the revolutionary concept of relying on Canadian provincial film ratings boards for the determination of a film's quality: "It does look like a shit film but with lots of T&A. lol I also heard on the radio that Ontario is one of the only provinces rating the movie 14A, everywhere else it's going to be 18A or mature..so then you know it's going to be good."

The intellectual back-and-forth continued with Chach45's rapier-like response: "It does not look like shite movie! It looks great! What's better then the hottest woman on the planet playing a porn star? NOTHING!"

Then, out of nowhere, dannybark cut to the heart of the matter: "lets be realistic, will elisha cuthbert actually get proper naked in this film or even show sumthin?.. its doubtful." Not since Janet Maslin's early advocacy for key art films has a writer had such an insight. And while the conversation continued for a period, all the following postings are clearly mere afterthoughts to dannybark's brilliance.

Ebert, Scott and Mitchell collectively sighed upon reading the thread. "Our careers are done," said Ebert, the first film critic to receive a Pulitzer Prize. "Indeed," said A.O. Scott, who many believe has filled Janet Maslin's position at the Times with great success. And Mitchell -- widely considered the most promising young critic in America -- simply curled up into the fetal position, weeping.

At press time, CoasterForce was reportedly determining if it could assert copyright on the postings. Experts estimate that simply the Girl Next Door postings could result in the site owners becoming millionaires if published in book form.