Sunday, April 25, 2004

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