What They Liked Most: First off, before we got there, we purchased a ticket package at $200 a ticket that came with fast passes and premium haunt line entry. Basically inst... ant access to everything. The first problem we encountered with the haunt stuff specifically was that some houses were advertised to open at 6 and some at 6:30 so we queued up outside of one of the 6 openers at 5:50 and then waited until 6:40 with no opening yet.... but people were talking about wristbands so we left (where the joker ride is) to go talk to the fastpass office (back to the front of the park and walk to the middle) where they tell us we need to go to guest services (back to the front) where we waited in line for 30 min to be told that the the premium passes are at the flag shop (next door) and they need to be shown your park receipt before they'll give you the pass. If all this sounds exhausting.... it was.
If you dont buy that... you still have to pay $40 on top of ticket price to attend the haunts.
I'm going to focus mostly on acting. All the attractions were 4x8 panels screwed together to form rooms and then decorated from there. It was obviously a temporary build and we expected this going in.
The Conjuring. We get placed in a group of about 15 ish people. The first room the lady is obviously reading from a memorized script that SHOULD have been read with emotion and not what she was doing. With us in the back of our conga line we caught the very end of every scripted scene and saw every scare well in advance. We did this house later in a group of 3 at the very end of the night and it was much better when we could actually experience the script. However it was still 6/10 on the better walk through. Highlight was the contortionist girl.
Texas Chainsaw Massacre. First annoyance was the fastpass line put us at the back of a 100 person line behind the standard users. I'm not upset at lines but we paid for instant access. There were some other premium ticket holders in the line discussing this too. The house started good with 2 rooms of no actors or... anything. Then we hit a hillbilly with decent acting. The gore in the rooms was actually very entertaining but besides the one hillbilly we found that could act, everything was predictable and the only surprises were when you thought there was going to be an actor and there wasn't. 4/10
Big Top Terror. There were clowns... in red and white striped rooms... with black lights... and a vortex tunnel... and somehow... none of it was entertaining. There was one point there was an obvious animatronic that I was curious about. The 4 of us stood there for a second... then we walked out of the room and when 2 of us were left in the room, it triggered. 4/10
Saw. This is where we hit a house that we giggled all the way through and I got some major bones to pick with this whole attraction. First off, to go from one room to another you walk through a black PLASTIC curtain, the areas that are off limits and for actors only are through black FABRIC curtains. I see no way anyone could get lost with this arrangement....... anyways. We are again at the back of a conga line 15ish people deep. A big group of teenage girls and us at the back. Mostly what I saw was actors running back through curtains to reset and then walking through empty rooms. There was a "choose your path" area, the girls went right, I went left. There was no actors so I went through the next door and exited right in front of the gaggle of girls and accidently scared the crap out of them. I smiled and waved then turned around and the actor that was going to come out and scare them was behind me. He SHRUGGED and then walked back into his curtain. By the time I processed this and turned back around the girls were gone... still don't know where they went. We walk into the next room and the guy is sitting in the saw trap with his head in the eyeball sucky thingie.... just chilling.... literally just relaxing in the chair. We stand there for about 5 seconds in silence before he reaches up to scratch his face, lifts the goggles, jumps at the sight of us, and then starts acting like he's being tortured. We could not stop laughing. Sorry guy. Then I go in the next room, no actor but a left and a right choice of black curtains. I choose right. Open the FABRIC curtain to an actor behind it scrolling on his phone whom I scared the crap out of. We laughed all the way out of the house. 3/10
The Estate at Wretched Meadows. If this guy is reading this review. Bald Hillbilly at the front of the house sorting the line with the long beard... You were the best thing I saw all night. You adlibbed in a scary unsettling way that was hilarious at the same time. YOU BY YOURSELF get at 9/10
This house was entertaining. The guy at the front was sending in smaller groups of 8-10ish and the inhabitants of the house were doing a great job. The big downside was the lack of actors. Walking into a well decorated room with no actor is just a let down and at one point, the actor doorway to the lit backstage was just wide open with no one manning it. 6/10Read More
1 Great America Parkway, Gurnee, Illinois 60031