Next on our tour of holiday frights is a project from 2016's So, You Want To Be An Imagineer Season 13 competition. The task as hand was to design Disney's version of 'scare mazes' around the Magic Kingdom, with several PG and PG-13 mazes that wouldn't have the same level of gore that Universal can muster, but would give horror fans something more than Not So Scary.
With that - we have The Wormhole - a psychological thrill maze based in Tomorrowland. Enjoy!
The Wormhole
Location - Galaxy Palace Theater
The Wormhole will be a thrilling Halloween seasonal maze located at the old Galaxy Palace Theater between Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin and the Carousel of Progress.
The maze will be inside a new all-purpose building in Tomorrowland at the Magic Kingdom, which will be home to special events throughout the year and easily accessible to an eclectic variety of overlays depending on the season.
Premise
In the Mickey Monitor and on the Disney website in anticipation for the Halloween season, WDI unveils a list of walk-through mazes throughout the parks, and in this section, it delves into a new kind of psychological thriller maze in Tomorrowland, called Deep Space.
Bringing a bit of spice to Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party, this more intense walk-through attraction harkons back to the days of the Magic Kingdom that saw attractions such as Alien Encounter. A science fiction psychological horror set in the land of Tomorrow, venturing out into something that mankind fears the most, the unknown of deep space.
Tomorrowland is a land of the future, and in the future, we have inter-dimensional travel, abilities to extract through wormholes in deep space, and teleportation methods. This liberal ability to travel the universe has peaked the interest of some of Tomorrowland's most accomplished astronauts and scientists, who have set up the XX Dark Voyage...a space station with the capacity to venture through a wormhole, through a connection in space, and out onto another portion of our universe. This knowledge has taken years to accomplish, and in 2168, you will be among the first to venture into the unknown.
Robotic teams have established a base camp hub on various planets through the wormhole, and the job of the Dark Voyage is to visit these planets in search for more life in the universe.
Nevertheless, while these missions can sound exciting for the avid traveler, they are not all success stories. Some robotic teams have been destroyed either in the wormhole itself or in route. Planets have been too dangerous for humans to travel onto. And most recently, the first mission through the wormhole resulted in a catastrophic calamity, where an astronaut lost his life.
However, the Dark Voyager Space Station has re-built from previous loses, and had some successful missions, now seeking to bring in new opportunity for avid explorers to venture to deep space.
Health and Warning Sign
Due to the claustrophobic nature of walk-through mazes, a warning sign will be placed out in front of the queue, emphasizing the nature of the attraction, and that parents should take caution, as some of the elements could frighten young children.
Some elements may also be seizure inducing, so if you are prone to those, or don't do well in tight, dark spaces, you should skip this adventure.
If you accept the terms, you may enter into Deep Space...
Queue
Join the XX Dark Voyage in Tomorrowland as a team of explorers trek through a Wormhole on the outer rim of the Milky Way to explore worlds beyond. The year is 2168, and you're on a space station traveling through a wormhole into another pocket of outer space. You see out the window as colors and jet streams of light roar by you.
While presenting as a calm and scenic walk-through in deep space on another planet, you will soon be trapped in a horror story as your space station bursts in hyperspeed inside the wormhole as you are queued in the hallways. The blast sets off emergency alarms throughout the vessel as computerized voices encourage the crew to eject...into deep space.
With no reasonable alternative, as you approach a large hole in the station (the entrance to the maze), the vacuum of space sucks a group of 20 guests into the maze and the adventure begins.
You walk into a room with black light walls and projections of colorful lights all around you in a mesmerizing fashion.
An eerie chorus begins to play as you walk towards a beam of light in the distance.
Bright flashes. Blue and green streaks of color wiz by on all sides. Bam. A large eyeball flashes on to the wall and blinks. Then disappears. The ominous chorus begins to rise, as goosebumps begin to rise on your arms.
Where are you? What is this place? Who is with you?
As you continue to walk forward, the light turns into a shadowy figure...as you approach the figure, that looks like a man...the shadow's face lights up and it's an astronaut with a shattered helmet, floating through the wormhole.
How is this happening? Is this all a dream?
You realize you are walking through the wormhole. The answer to how can wait...you just want to escape this nightmare. You hear a voice call out to you and it points the flashing lights on the projection walls in a guiding direction. You follow its lead and the music suddenly stops. You walk into a pitch black room in dead silence.
Suddenly, the walls are illuminated...you are on an alien moon, looking at the back-end of a blackhole. The picturesque backdrop of deep space is almost surreal. And you hear communications come online. The Deep Space team back on earth informs you that you need to get to a teleportation hub, located on the moon, at base camp. On the projection screen as you walk forward, you can see it off in the distance.
As you turn the corner...you see a black, shadowy figure waiting for you on the horizon. You hesitate to move forward...then you hear the communications from earth demand that you get to the teleportation hub as quickly as possible, as other beings may inhabit this territory.
A short cut through a maze hallway leads you into a canyon on the alien world, and it is soon illuminated with a variety of colors. A blast of cold air hits you and you press forward, until...
You feel hot air breathing on your necks..the sudden change in temperature is noticeable, and then the lights go black in the canyon momentarily.
When they are turned back on a black shadowy figure is standing right in front of you (a static animatronic) and growls! You shriek, and chase off to find the exit of the canyon. You hear more grumbling and the music escalates and swells where your heart is pounding very fast.
You hear the creature move around the canyon and another breath of hot air, this time right above you, but now you can feel the drooling saliva of the creature from above.
The sensation freaks you out as you exit the canyon, and see the teleportation hub in the distance. Again in a picturesque landscape, the stars shine on the walls and the black-hole is seen off in the distance. You venture towards the teleportation hub...as you enter into a tunnel that will bring you to the teleportation chamber.
Lighting and sonic booms crash all around you as you enter the chamber, the door slams shut and you are trapped in a vortex of flashing lights, synchronizing your beam back to earth.
Dark shadowy figures now totally surround you, and multiply, almost as if you're hallucinating. Cackles are heard around you as well. Roars are shouted and the music swelling to a high pitch as suddenly the lights go black and everything is silent.
The walls around, in the dark close in towards the center where the guests are standing in the chamber. A mechanical pulley brings them closer together.
Suddenly, the walls that were once the walls of the chamber are now distorted mirrors right on top of you. Naturally, your instincts tell you to turn towards the mirror and bam
You see yourself in a distorted view, which freaks you out. Now your mind is confused. Something is distorting space time, distorting you. Maybe you're hallucinating, maybe not. The lights go black again and then...a light in front of you...you walk towards the light.
Now the room is bright white, surreal, and cubical in shape. You hear the Tomorrowland area music, a more uplifting soundtrack, thinking that...perhaps is it over? Is the deep space nightmare over?
However this music is a false sense of security and another illusion...yet you still walk towards the music...and it gets louder.
Louder and louder as you walk down the white tunnel then it stops. No radio communication is heard. Have you been beamed to another planet? Another dimension?
The silence is deafening, but you trek forward, until...
The lights go dark
They turn back on you again see flashes of a dark shadow for a split second. As you walk further through the tunnel the shadow gets larger and larger and the tunnel begins to rattle and the rattling becomes louder and louder. Music peaks again. The lights flicker and you hear communications telling you, you're almost there...you're almost there. As you reach the end, a large, winged like creature pops out of the ceiling.
You freak out and scream, hear a loud bang almost like you broke a space barrier or something, and then.....
You walk back onto the Dark Voyage Space Station...but this time it doesn't looks as realistic as the queue...Monitors of people working at the command center, and everything going as if nothing went wrong.
So you're left to ask yourself...what was this? Was this all a dream? Was this just a simulation test?
As you ponder the question a man on the teleprompter, congratulates you on a job well done..you passed the test and are ready for another mission. You can exit to Tomorrowland now.
Ah...you think to yourself...so this was all just a drill. However when the man in the telepromptor turns away...you can see the shadowy figure looming in the Command Center, staring at you...
As you exit into Tomorrowland...are you still dreaming? Will this inter-dimensional figure travel with you throughout the day? What really happened? A mystery of deep space travel and an experience you'll never forget.