^ That's a great recap of every year.
I went last night for the third time this year. It was originally not a scheduled event night and I suspected it would be a relatively quiet night, and I was correct. No house reached over an hour wait and for most of the night their wait times were only an average of 25 minutes. It was also the calmest HHN night I've ever been to, everyone was laid back and quiet and nobody was loud or belligerent - a very welcome change from my typical HHN experience. I noticed many houses were missing several scareactors, but again since this night was added only a few weeks ago, it's not surprising.
There are a few more days of the event, but I won't be going again, so here are my closing thoughts on this year.
Scarezones: Over the last few years, it seems they have evolved the scare zones from being areas people who are scared might want to avoid walking through to glorified meet & greets and photo ops. It makes sense with current social media-obsessed culture, but it does detract from the overall feel of the event. I used to describe HHN as feeling like "a theme park has descended into hell", but I don't get that feeling walking around anymore. I miss the extremely atmospheric scare zones of the past that were actually intense to walk through as opposed to everyone just taking selfies with the monsters now.
I'm probably in the minority here but I really strongly dislike Vamp '85 - it's as loud as an actual rock concert and drowns out everything else from Louie's all the way to Fallon, and the announcer/DJ drones on endlessly trying to get the crowd to "MAKE SOME NOIIIIISEEE" - it never ever relents. It's also essentially pre-packaged to cater to theme park entertainment types to inflate their own sense of unwarranted self-importance. Every time I walked through this zone, every performer, if not on stage, was clearly just chatting it up with friends and coworkers of theirs.
Final house ranking:
1. Slaughter Sinema - Just completely dripping with detail and creativity and I would say the most energetic and fun house to walk through.
2. Poltergeist - In my opinion, this year's most intense house (although the "clown" scene is a little lazy and too long).
3. Dead Exposure: Patient Zero - Makes the top of the list for also being very intense, but 3rd for being a bit short and bare bones.
4. Carnival Graveyard: Rust in Pieces - Not very intense, but insane detail throughout. In my opinion, would have benefited from having the overall ambient light level reduced a bit.
5. Trick 'r' Treat - Also low on scares and intensity but has a really cool, nostalgic Halloween-y vibe that I really like.
6. Stranger Things - Almost no scares, but again cool to see a creation of a beloved current hot property. Unfortunately, it's pretty obvious that Netflix had a tight grip on what they could do and didn't allow for any creative liberties whatsoever, which I think would have improved the experience.
7. Seeds of Extinction - Felt a bit dull to me, but props for a very creative concept and again, detailed sets.
8. Scary Tales - I originally ranked this much higher, but changed my opinion - it's somewhat short and "what if fairy tales but the most obvious dark twist" is kind of lame, honestly.
9. Halloween 4 - Other than the cool electrocution scene, really lacking in energy and intensity. Half the time Michael is already standing in the room awkwardly.
10. Blumhouse - the almost unanimously ranked worse house of the year. If you haven't seen "Happy Death Day", the first half makes no sense. The rest feels like they're just going through the motions.
I do agree with the sentiments that this year is somewhat tamer than normal. I can't really think of a single moment in any house that was as gory or disturbing as stuff they used to do. Serious PG-13 vibes this year whereas it used to be an obvious "R". I guess I'm okay with it. I doubt it will ever be a truly family friendly event like the rumor mill is suggesting.
One last note - I think Universal should work on placing the house attendants more strategically. I understand their necessity, but when they're standing in the center of key scenes, it does kill the vibe a bit. If I walk into a room and Michael Meyers is standing there just three feet from a house attendant, any psychological sense of threat is stifled. The attendants should be kept to scene transition areas.
