The pandemic of 2020 has been particularly hard in California. Then when you add a series of summer fires across the state, it makes one wonder how long will it take California’s economy to recover. Local health departments are not permitting the traditional walk-through haunted house to open this year, therefore many haunt owners have opted to cancel their 2020 seasons in hopes to be open next year. Yet, one family was determined to salvage their haunt season, come hell or high water. Karl Fields, Patty Fields, and Brian Fields, owners of Pirates Of Emerson Haunted Themed Park, decided to change their haunt into a drive-through experience. By keeping their guests in their cars, Pirates Of Emerson would be COVID-19 safe. The next obstacle for the Fields family was receiving full access to the Alameda County Fairgrounds, because the California State Department of Forestry And Fire Prevention (CAL FIRE) used the fairgrounds as a base of operations for dispatching fire trucks to the various fires that plagued the state. Karl Fields told us that the Pirates Of Emerson build crew did not get full access to the 10-acre lot until two weeks before their opening night.
For all of the hurdles that the Fields family had to overcome, we were impressed with the 2020 haunt. We do not feel we can be too critical, because the new rules and regulations of COVID-19 California won’t allow haunts to operate in the same manner as past years.
Pirates Of Emerson had several actors placed throughout the Drive-Thru Haunt. To tell you the truth, many areas could have used more actors, but we understand that even the cast needs to social distance from one another in a working environment. 10 acres is a lot of ground to cover. Most of the actors hid from view and jumped out to the sides of our car. Both driver side and passenger sides were targeted equally.
Only a few actors used dialogue. One of the guests in our car yelled, ‘You made me pee my pants’, and the hillbilly girl replied, ‘I’ll drink your pee.’ Now that was an unexpected response that made us laugh. There were a variety of characters, and they were all relevant to the particular scenes that they were located in.
Variety of Characters – (35% of score)
Complete, Finished Appearance – (30% of score)
Creative, Detailed Costumes – (20% of score)
Creative, Detailed, Realistic Makeup – (15% of score)
The actors of Pirates Of Emerson all had various costumes relating to their respective scenes. Costumes were all finished and complete. There were various uses of makeup, from prosthetics, to clowns, to zombies. We only spotted a few full-head masks. The costuming did help make the actors appear more scary and intimidating.
If Masks, Effective – (25% of score)
Costumes Appropriate for Scenes, Themes – (30% of score)
Easy to Find, Navigate – (25% of score)
Safety – (20% of score)
Pirates Of Emerson is easy to locate, because it resides at the Alameda County Fairgrounds in Pleasanton. There are Fairgrounds employees at the entry gate who’ll tell you where to go, and there are signs directing guests along the pathway.
Pandemic safety was addressed with the policy that guests can roll their car windows down if they are all wearing cloth face masks. Otherwise, all windows must remain rolled up at all times. This year, there was no ticket booth. All ticket sales were available online only to be pandemic compliant. Most of the staff that we could see were in charge of lining up cars for entry into the haunt. They lined up and permitted entry much like an assembly line. Seven rows of cars were lined up in an empty lot from right to left, and as the rows on the left were being filled, the rows on the right were permitted to enter. As the left-hand rows were permitted entry, the rows on the right were filled up with new guests. It was a very efficient system choreographed beautifully by the parking staff. Between each row of cars were security guards walking along the length of each row.
Finding information for Pirates Of Emerson is very easy because they have a very cool website and have a presence on various social media.
Staff Professional, Helpful, Friendly – (25% of score)
Ease of Finding Info Before Arrival – (20% of score)
Obviously a Haunt Before Entering – (40% of score)
Prepared for Experience Inside – (15% of score)
The topic of Atmosphere is difficult to judge this year because the state pandemic health codes are too restrictive to allow a decent haunt atmosphere. The assembly line of cars coming in and out at the empty lot was the atmosphere.
While waiting in line, we could see the archway entrance of the haunt in the distance, along with fire shooting in the air at various intervals. We waited about 20 minutes in our row at the empty lot. So watching the other rows on the right of us be permitted to enter did help build anticipation, especially when we knew our row was next.
Sound Effects Effective – (20% of score)
Creative, Original Scenes, Props – (30% of score)
Detailed Scenes – (30% of score)
Achieve, Maintain Suspension of Disbelief – (20% of score)
At the entrance archway to the haunt, there was a sign that instructed us to turn off our headlights and set our radio to 95.5FM. A soundtrack loop played in our car as we drove through, featuring various sound effects, including crickets, moaning sounds, ‘This Is Halloween’ theme from Nightmare Before Christmas, and the song Dueling Banjos. The soundtrack also had a voiceover say, ‘Please Keep Your Car Moving At All Times,’ which did distract from the flow of everything else heard. Karl Fields explained to us that they had a car stop to take a group picture, so the voiceover was a necessary evil.
The Drive-Thru consisted of various scenes and themes. It’s a 10-acre lot with multiple twists and turns. There were various overhead structures throughout the driving course, and each structure had a curtain of black rubber strips that we had to drive through, reminiscent of a car wash. These curtains blocked our view ahead, which actors took advantage of for startling guests. Despite no headlights, there was still enough ambient light to safely drive. Among the lighting included lasers and strobe lights at various areas. There were also fog machines at multiple points. We have been attending Pirates Of Emerson for multiple years, so we recognized scenery pieces that have been used in their walk-through haunts. Several of them have been made in-house as well as professionally bought. The signature Emerson Pirate Ship had flames shooting in the air. Some areas were a bit sparse, like an open trail, and others were well detailed. There is a sense of driving through a haunted town. The Carn-Evil clown area had a high level of detail, as well as the hillbilly structures and the Emerson Pirate Ship.
An original use of scenery that caught our attention were the bone walls that have been used in crypt themed haunts in previous years were lined up individually, flanking our left and right sides, as a sort of Stonehenge homage. All of these effects did achieve and maintain our suspension of disbelief, and were effective at providing scares and entertainment.
SFX Effective at Scaring, Entertaining – (35% of score)
Could Tell What Theme Was Without Asking – (15% of score)
Theme Well Executed, Believable – (25% of score)
Location Authenticates Theme – (10% of score)
How Scary – (15% of score)
There was no underlining theme for Pirates Of Emerson’s Drive-Thru. It was a series of independent scenes with their own distinctive themes.
Provide Scares to Entire Group – (50% of score)
How Predictable – (25% of score)
Variety of Scares – (25% of score)
Pirates Of Emerson did have some good scares, but with the actors spread sporadically throughout the 10 acre course, the scares are not as consistent as they were in previous years as a walk-through. Historically, Pirates Of Emerson’s actors would get in your face and invade your personal space, so this year the actors would get as close as they could without touching the car. Actors provided scares from both driver side and passenger sides, but our backseat received more scare attention than the front. Some actors tried to stare at us intimidatingly, but it didn’t convey the same feeling in a car as it would in a walk-through.
The most successful scares were jump startles from hidden corners. At the prison scene, we thought we caught an actor resetting into position, but a second actor jumped out and caught us off guard. The end of the haunt had one actor provide a final scare as we left.
4501 Pleasanton Avenue, Alameda County, Pleasanton, California 94566