Current Events > One night, ten haunted houses... (Halloween Horror Nights)

(+) Yeah! (+)

I just got back from a vacation in Orlando, Florida. I capped things off last night with Universal's Halloween Horror Nights and managed to hit all ten houses. My personal preferences from favorite to least favorite:

Top Tier
Universal Monsters
Ghostbusters

High Tier
Yeti: Terror of the Yukon
Killer Klowns from Outer Space
Jordan Peele's Us

Mid Tier
Stranger Things*
Depths of Fear

Low Tier
House of 1,000 Corpses
Nightingales: Bloody Horror
Graveyard Games

The first night I went, I had Ghostbusters as my favorite. Revisiting the Universal Monsters house, and catching some of the scares that I'd missed, was enough for it to eke out Ghostbusters upon further examination. If you can only do one house twice, I'd recommend Universal Monsters. There's no way you're going to catch everything going on in just one trip. And it's equally enjoyable for those who have seen the movies and those who have not. (But do catch Ghostbusters. And Us.)

None of the houses were really "bad," but the lowest three are worth skipping if the wait time is half an hour or more. I'd say catch them at the end of the night rather than the start. Ghostbusters and Killer Klowns take the "kid in a candy store" approach and deliver a bunch of fan service to 80s kids and 80s-kids-at-heart. Don't expect too many legit scares out of them, but do expect to have a good time if you've seen either film.

*It's worth noting that I have not seen Stranger Things. That's probably a requirement for enjoying the house to the fullest as it focuses more on scenery and character cameos than it does jump scares. The creature effects though are a blast. I have a feeling that anyone who has watched Stranger Things will rank it higher than I did.