Trepidations Haunted AttractionFull Review
101 E Commercial St, Exeter, MO 65647(View Full Attraction Info)
Features:
✓-Free Parking✓-Restrooms/Porta Potties On-Site✓-Gift Shop/Souvenirs✓-Special Events✓-You will NOT be touched✓-Original Characters✓-Covered Outdoor Waiting Line✓-Indoor/Outdoor Attraction✓-Family Friendly
Review Team/Author Info:
This attraction was reviewed by Team Graveyard Shift on October 15, 2022.Team Since: July 20, 2022 | Experience: Apprentice TeamEditor: Team Zombillies (Master Team).
Final Score: 8.25
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Summary:
Trepidations Haunted Attraction in Seligman, MO, is celebrating 3 years of operation, and for our first time visiting, we can’t believe we haven’t visited sooner! With heavy attention to detail and a talented, hardworking cast, they packed in many creative and innovative scares even with the shorter walk-through time! Everyone takes great joy in what they do, and it shows from inside and out of the attraction.
Trepidations offers unique immersive moments that make it stand out amongst other haunts, and it’s a must-visit! Want to learn more? Keep reading to find out!
Cast Score: 7.63
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Cast Review:
Despite the smaller cast, they offered a ton of scares and entertainment throughout our walkthrough! With well-executed scares and immersive dialogue, this cast worked to take this attraction to the next level!
We were brought into a jailhouse and were told to line up against the wall to be measured out. The inmate now in charge let us know we were the two newest inmates and asked who was feeling brave, and my teammate stepped up to the X presented in front of her. He directed us into a cage where he took a pipe pouring out with “gas” to “calm us down” before we went inside. With a loud horn, there came a chorus of screams that echoed throughout the attraction, building tension of who we were about to encounter.
The inmate followed us in and said he wanted to show us something. As we walked down the dirty halls of the Oasis Penitentiary, he seemingly appeared and disappeared from thin air as he guided us. Appearing from in front and behind, his presence slowly became more and more sinister as we descended. He took us into a surgery room where a clown was standing. Suddenly, the lights turned off and everything went silent. When the lights turned back on, the clown was gone, where the inmate promptly said “that’s not good.”
We went outside where the clown from before was waiting for us. They went back and forth between a friendly demeanor to an aggressive one. They bent backward and crawled towards us, and after a shriek or two they stood up and claimed they didn’t know what got into them. We talked back and forth between sudden behavior changes that kept luring us into false security before keeping us in check.
After being chased back inside the building by a chainsaw, we ran into a little girl in her doll room, who quietly stared at us as we admired her collection. She gave off an intimidating aura that gave us the vibe that we should try our best to keep her happy.
We went into grandma’s house, where she seemingly lived, and traversed through the walls, and with the number of wedding dresses we saw, we got a pretty good impression that we shouldn’t mess with her.
There were a few really incredible cast members who pretended to be prop corpses, only to come alive with a jolt, or blended in perfectly with the funeral party before getting up when we weren’t looking and stalking us out of the room! We did not see them coming at all and could not tell who was fake or real!
The clown from the beginning returned for one last hurrah, chasing us back to the start of the attraction with a chainsaw! While we saw this moment coming from seeing the other guests before us running away in terror, it was a great way to end this scary fun experience!
Costuming Score: 7.96
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Costuming Review:
Trepidations had plenty of great costuming throughout the cast that made each member distinct and memorable. Clothes were layered, torn, bloody, and overall had plenty of detail to make them believable. They went in heavy on the blood! We would like to see what more they can add to their costumes in terms of accessories or unique pieces to truly elevate their look!
Masks were well-fitted and high-quality, though makeup could have been used to better conceal the skin around some of the actors’ eyes for a more realistic look. The actors who did not wear any sort of mask had grungy makeup or very realistic gore special effects makeup that was expertly applied.
The clown we saw the most throughout the attraction was a stand-out that we have to highlight. Their mask and prosthetics were very high quality that moved with their mouths and covered the area around their eyes to make it look extremely realistic!
Customer Service Score: 9.59
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Customer Service Review:
Trepidations can be easily spotted from the road, and there are plenty of signs and lights indicating that this is indeed a haunted attraction! Besides a sign down the road that confused us for a moment about where to turn while driving at night, it was fairly easy to locate. There were plenty of signs to direct us where to park, buy tickets, and get in line! The staff working are very friendly and we enjoyed talking to them about the attraction and they even shared a bit of history with us! It’s clear that they want to make the attraction the best it can be and want us to have an awesome time!
In terms of safety, there were no hazards that made us feel unsafe at any point. The cast let us know where stairs or steps were so we wouldn’t trip, especially when they were sudden or when it was dark!
Trepidations Haunted House does not yet have a website, but their Facebook is regularly updated with ticket costs, open dates, locations, contact information, and more!
Immersion Score: 8.87
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Immersion Review:
Walking towards the haunted house, you come across lots of spooky décor sets and photo ops that add to the ambiance before going through the attraction. The staff told us that the building the haunt takes place in used to be a convenience store, and let us tell you, we could hardly believe that once we got inside! The beginning scene alone, when you go through the door, with the police line up and the jail cell, we could not tell AT ALL what the building used to be.
Trepidations took us through many different areas and themes that, while they don’t follow any sort of storyline, allowed us to see all the creative kinds of scares and horrors they could conquer! While there were a couple of jarring transitions, we were able to stay immersed within each area we found ourselves in and adapt to some of the more sudden transitions quickly without getting confused. Each area stayed consistent in terms of quality and detail for an immersive experience from beginning to end!
We were brought right back to the front of the attraction when it was over, so we could easily pick up some merchandise from the ticket booth, utilize the fun photo-ops, and head back to our vehicle with no problem! Makes it easy to jump back in line as well if you want to go more than once!!
Special FX Score: 8.25
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Special FX Review:
Trepidations wowed us with the amount of detail that was poured into the set design! For being a smaller haunt, we found that the set design is on par with some of the biggest names in the industry with movie-quality designs! They had décor and props around every corner, especially in the children’s playroom! There was so much to see that we took so much time just admiring everything included! They used the décor to say so much about the characters inhabiting them as well, especially with the character we were calling Grandma, with her several different wedding dresses hanging on the walls as we traversed through her unkempt house.
One of the more impressive areas was at the beginning with the Oasis Penitentiary Hospital, with eerie flickering lights, distorted creepy music, disheveled medical areas, and an absolutely disgusting bathroom; we felt unnerved and on edge the entire time. The amount of detail poured into this area as well with medical posters on the walls, medicine cabinets filled with bottles of various types, medical tools, and more, made it all extremely believable. This amount of consideration can be seen throughout the rest of the attraction, and its very clear they took their time with everything. The only areas that felt more empty were the outside areas, but they acted more as a transition area, and had some décor and props for us to see as we were running back inside from being chased by a chainsaw!
By far, our favorite area was the haunted cornfield. It was screaming Halloween, quite literally, with the music that was playing, but also with pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns seen around every corner. It felt like we were walking into a small town festival gone horribly wrong, especially when the killer rabbit animatronic sprung out at us! Being from Indiana, walking through the corn stalks and hay barrels gave me a strange mix of horror and nostalgia, and capturing that all made it the most memorable area of our walkthrough.
On a final note about the special effects, they really know how to use light effectively for a great build up and good scares. We completely lost it when they turned off the lights in a once bright room, and walking down some of the hallways with the lights flickering was so freaky!!
Scare Factor Score: 7.55
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Scare Factor Review:
To put it simply, Trepidations is loaded with tons of great terrifying moments! They do an excellent job building tension and never let us down with the scares! Jump scares were effective, and the cast had dialogue throughout that made us lower our guard for more intense frights when they turned from friendly to scary!! They really wanted to get us to lower our guard and keep us guessing throughout, especially when they would scatter bodies around and catch us by surprise when they came to life! They were plenty aggressive too; even the jump scarers would linger around and talk to us or make disturbing noises our way instead of retreating right away. Also, the whole beginning set up with lining us up against the wall, spraying our faces with fog, and later turning off the lights in a room for an actor to disappear is something we have not seen at any other haunts! We really were freaked out in moments like those and loved every second of it! We hope to continue seeing how Trepidations uses innovative ways to scare future guests!
This year they are hosting two “No Scare Nights” where anyone who might be a little too scared to visit on regular nights, or anyone who just wants to admire the haunt itself can visit without actors or any scares!
Entertainment & Value Score: 8.91
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E&V Review:
Our team got through the attraction in 13 minutes, with individual tickets costing $15 per person! Although a shorter haunt, with the level of quality seen here, it’s most certainly worth checking out! It’s also a very easy haunt to go through multiple times and see what you missed the first time around!
The best advice to avoid long lines is to always visit early season when possible. We didn’t have to wait very long at all, and we can only see this haunt getting more and more popular! Trepidations Haunted House has amazing set design, a talented cast, and plenty of scares that are worth every penny! We hope to be back very soon, and we look forward to seeing how they continue to grow! From what we saw, it’s only going to keep getting more and more incredible, so go visit Trepidations Haunted House!
They also offer No Scare Nights: $10 Admission to go through the attraction with no actors and no scares Trick or Treat at Trepidations: Free Admission for a kid-friendly portion of the haunted house and candy!
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Awards:
2022
Punky
Awards:
2022
Punky