What’s that you see, intrepid readers? A bobbing light in the dense fog? Don’t worry, it’s just me. Good thing you checked, though… It could easily have been that sinister Conductor I’ve seen roaming the misty byways. Seems we both have a thing for old oil lamps.
Either way, now that I’ve found you again, I’m happy to welcome you back to the Fog Report! Needless to say the last two years have kept me from truly delving into the Halloween scene as I’d like, and I’m sure many of you would agree we had more, er, widespread issues to deal with. Now with the fog’s return to the SoCal area in force, I’m heading back into the murk and reviving this blog to give my two cents on various eerie presentations October has to offer. And where better to start than with the originator of the theme park haunted event, Knott’s Scary Farm.
The Event
As stated in my last Scary Farm report from 3(!) years hence - which is still a good primer for the uninitiated - Knott’s has been presenting a seasonal Halloween Haunt since 1973, growing from a 3-night experience in that experimental first year to a juggernaut cavalcade from late September to Halloween night, still holding its own in the industry it helped create nearly 50 years later. Even when the pandemic shut things down in 2020, Knott’s found a way to keep the atmosphere going with their Taste of Fall-o-ween, which allowed visitors to wander a decorated park and sample different food fair without the scares, all while safety measures such as mandatory mask-wearing and social distancing were enforced. 2021 saw Scary Farm proper manifest again, its mazes and monsters and fog back for all to see.
This year brings us back to 9 mazes, 5 scare zones, 2 ride overlays, 3 live shows and an art gallery. Not to mention many of the park’s rides and roller coasters are also running. There’s a lot of options! Rarely is it daunting, in my opinion, and as before my advice is to know what you want to do before you go. I’ve found going on a Thursday or Sunday tends to help alleviate the crowds and, if you play your cards right, you should be able to experience most of what the night has to offer with relative ease; if you go on a Friday or Saturday, God help you.
Things have changed a bit since my last report, which is the nature of the beast. I’ll try to keep things brief where I’ve already commented on a maze or scare zone, but there’s some new bits and pieces thrown into the mix that I’ll expound on with greater detail.
Ride Overlays
In years past this was a staple of Haunt, even back in its first year with the “Haunted Mine Ride” and “Satan’s Sawmill” taking over their respective attractions. Gone are the days when these rides would have live actors hiding in the shadows and jumping out at your transport, but they are still given a spooky makeover that work during both the day and night.
The Timber Mountain Log Ride continues to become the Halloween Hootenanny, with its more lighthearted theming of creepy creatures getting together for an All Hallows’ jamboree with the Calico Coffin Creeper band. And starting in 2021, the Calico Mine Ride receives a candy coating as the Calico Candy Mine Ride. This one has an interesting twist in its “daytime” and “nighttime” variations: mostly handled with sound and projections, the more whimsical and cute journey into the candy mine during the day transforms into a much darker and nastier story about a child-eating Pink Fairy luring youngsters to their doom at night.
In my opinion, both attractions are best reserved for later in the evening, if you’ve gone through everything else or want to get a break. I personally prioritize mazes over rides, but these two are worth a trip following everything else.
Scare Zones
It’s hard to beat the roaming monsters and chilling atmosphere of Knott’s scare zones, now increased to five since 2019. In fact, like many things at Knott’s, we have them today because of a happy accident: in 1977, Bob Vernon found himself locked out of one of Ghost Town’s “peek-ins” where the monsters originally lurked. Hiding among the normal static figures in old West tableau scenes like the assay office, barber shop and sheriff’s office, these scareactors were meant to wait for someone to look inside the meshed-in windows and then startle them. For Bob, unable to get into his spot and with team leads unable to get him a key, this meant an unorthodox change of tactics. Bob was instructed to just “wander around and scare people” until someone could open the door; this worked out so well and generated such a surprisingly positive reaction that, by the next night, all of the talent were released from the peek-ins and allowed to stalk, creep and scare any guests that passed through.
Obviously this has since spread to other haunts to great effect, but Ghost Town Streets was where it all began. For many, going down the absolutely fog-choked Main Street for the first time - appropriately named “Fog Alley” by legions of visitors and monsters alike - is something of a rite-of-passage, showcasing the (un)living history of the event as Calico’s cursed ghouls and half-human/half-animal wretches slide and slither at you from every dark corner.
Over in Camp Snoopy, The Hollow brings one last year of Colonial American terror as it prepares to fade into the shadows. This is your final chance to meet the witches, scarecrows and shades that lurk in this gloomy woodland, and is a zone I will miss dearly. Whatever replaces this next year will have a tough act to follow.
Forsaken Lake isn’t going anywhere anytime soon thankfully, and remains a standout zone in its footprint along the banks of Reflection Lake. The regularly-occurring funeral procession is a show beat that I take time out of my night’s schedule to watch every year, and I recommend you do the same if you’re a sucker for immersion like I am.
The second-longest running scare zone in Haunt history, CarnEvil populates the Boardwalk with its cavalcade of cantakerous clowns. These might be some of the hardest-working clowns in showbiz, considering their conditions of no fog and bright lights, and I still stand by my conviction that their antics are way funnier than you would expect.
2021 saw the premiere of the last scare zone. Located in the Roaring 20s area, the Gore-ing 20s is a welcome addition to the lineup. Prohibition-era undead call this place home, including mobsters, flappers, newsies, teatotalers and Temperance movement missionaries. Spend enough time here and you’ll find that many of these lost souls are chattier than usual (though they still aim to frighten and intimidate), revealing that both sides of the alcohol ban are obsessed with an eponymous “Devil’s Elixir.” in some way. Best of all? Throughout the night, a live jazz band appears on the balcony of the Walter Knott Theatre and serenades the street below, accompanied by ghostly dancers. I wouldn’t say it is as traditionally scary some of the other zones, but the tone and vibe are excellent in their own right. Well worth a sojourn.
The Into the Fog art gallery is here as well, in the Factory Store. Great original pieces inspired by Haunt and created by people involved in the event, be they designers or talent themselves. Check it out if you like!
Oh. And one final note: keep an eye out for the mysterious Conductor. He wanders freely through every scare scare zone during the night, his lantern in hand, chuckling quietly to himself as he observes what’s going on. There’s been a recent push to make him a central character, and leading into the 50th anniversary of Scary Farm, he’s going to have a much bigger role in tying the whole thing together. This nice little touch of atmosphere is hint at things to come.
The Mazes
Not to much has changed since 2019’s report on the maze front, apart from a slight shuffling of my maze preference hierarchy. Quality remains a high point for the mazes, with their presentation and their craft constantly improving to match (and, in some cases, outdo) the rest of the industry. Knott’s has a reputation to maintain at this point, being the progenitor of Halloween haunts, and while fondly-loved old mazes like Shadowlands and Paranormal Inc. have since retired, new mazes appear to fill their shoes and continue to experiment.
Keep in mind the list below represents my own personal opinion. Everyone is going to have different favorites, and if yours differ that’s absolutely fine. There is not a bad one to be found, and I like all the mazes for different reasons.
9 - Pumpkin Eater
This year is Pumpkin Eater’s swan song, as Peter and his ghoulish minions pack up with the Hollow at the end of the season. Now feels like the right time, as while I do thoroughly enjoy the creepy factor of this maze, it is getting a little long in the tooth. Still, its Halloween vibes and grotesque pumpkin imagery win me over, and it remains one of the most genuinely unsettling mazes for its great use of darkness and disturbing sounds, all enhancing the talent that hide in the shadows waiting for you.
8 - Dark Entities
This one has grown on me during its run. I’m still not big on sci-fi during haunts, but the way the story of the maze is showcased makes it an exception. The creativity here lies in its conceit of being less about aliens and more about body horror - and this is easily one of the grossest examples of that. Every year it gets a little messier, with more guts , goop and viscera coating the surfaces of this doomed spaceship. Sadly, every year it also seems like it gets less attention, partly due to its location tucked way backstage from the rest. I have a feeling Dark Entities is next on the list to retire, but I’m happy to get a couple more years out of it.
7 - Bloodline 1842
One of the two new mazes this year, Bloodline 1842 drops you into the Steampunk-inspired city of Valdonia while it is under siege. Long thought eradicated, the vampires of the Valhymphri clan have emerged from the shadows and prey on the city’s mortals. Your family, the Bellatorians, have been called on by their fellow Daybreakers to bring this menace to heel and seek out the vampire king at the dark heart of this menace.
Bloodline is a marked improvement over its predecessor Special Ops: Infected in significant ways: better story, better sets, talent that absolutely kills it as both enemy vampires and allied Daybreakers and, most importantly, big pacing fixes. Gone are the constant military shouts to keep moving, and in are portions where you and those nearby are creeping through foggy streets or archaic steam tunnels at your own volition. The natural impetus to keep moving comes from the need to avoid getting “bitten” and allowing the hidden bloodsuckers to get too close, less it effect your score. That helps a lot… and yet it’s still a shooting gallery, which is not my thing. Redressed as it is, I still feel like I can’t take the time to really absorb the maze and its atmosphere because I’m too busy trying to play this real-life FPS. It doesn’t allow me to feel properly immersed. I would much rather walk through this without a gun and get scared the old-fashioned way, because frankly the design of this maze is really really good.
I’m definitely the odd man out here, as this will inevitably be one of the most popular mazes this year. Like I stated before, your mileage may very. I also allow it room to grow once it passes into future years.
6 - Wax Works
Dr. Scratch’s demented gallery of sculpted art is easily one of the most gross and disturbing mazes of the bunch - a hallmark of designer Daniel Miller’s work. Normally, overt and gratuitous displays of gore turn me off to a maze. Yet Wax Works impressed me with not only making the carnage make sense in context, but making it actually seem like someone’s twisted art in a disturbingly believable way. I suppose my aversion to gore is cheap gore, slapped up on most haunts because “blood and guts are scary.;” its all about intention, and Wax Works delivers.
5 - The Depths
Everything about this ocean-based nightmare is as strong as ever. Like Dark Entities, this feels like its getting near the end of its Haunt shelf life, though unlike Entities it seems to be holding up a little better to the wear and tear of repeat seasons. The larger-than-life vibe of many of these scenes makes it a winner, with segments like the “laser lake” of the Temple Courtyard and the rocking pirate ship near the end sufficiently keeping this a fan-favorite.
4 - Dark Ride
It’s time for one last ride, as sadly this delightful concept is about to retire. I’m seriously gonna miss it, its simple premise of walking around and through what seems like a once-functional carnival spookhouse executed stunningly. Getting the thing to feel both cheesy and well put together is a feat, and it’s obvious more effort was put into this dark ride than the ones you might see pop up at other county fairs, even with the intention to make it feel dated. Do not miss this one. Seriously. Final chance.
3 - The Grimoire
The second of the two new mazes. What starts as a peaceful summer camp out in the 1980s turns into pandemonium when three teenagers find an ancient book in an old tree house and make the mistake of reading it aloud. Now you’re stumbling back through time as echoes of the book’s corruption throughout history manifest as chapters, revealed in black and white. When (or if) you make it back to the present, can you escape the campground before your own soul becomes ensnared in the Grimoire’s pages?
The Grimoire might be one of Knott’s most ambitious mazes in terms of storytelling. Unlike other mazes where what its themes and stories are can be neatly summed up or conveyed through understood tropes, Grimoire is trying to spin a much more complicated yarn. The more nitty-gritty bits are told through queue-line videos and a show beat near the beginning not unlike Paranormal Inc. in seasons past, while the rest is done through color, visual and audio cues. While I personally think the conveyance works, and works very well, I understand that many guests have gone through this maze and come out the other side saying “I don’t get it.”
The tricky thing to figure out is twofold: pacing, as conveying the story requires a little bit of a stopgap, which leads to long wait times for this maze; and presentation, as sometimes missing or passing a specific beat in the maze will mean not grasping a certain through-line. Without spoiling anything major, it took a few trips for even me to realize how one thing near the end was connected to some beats earlier, which again was very exciting but took those repeated walkthroughs.
Time will tell how well this maze is received. So far, it seems to be right up there with Bloodline as one of the most popular, but that might simply be on account of its newness. I myself applaud the designers and build team for making something with this level of care, and hope this experiment continues. I want them to keep pushing the envelope in terms of immersion and seeing how to best execute high concepts like this.
2 - Mesmer: Sideshow of the Mind
A Dust Bowl-era carnival sideshow has laid stakes near the Boardwalk, and its mysterious ringmaster, Phineas Mesmer, invites you to explore a hypnotic realm between life and death. See, Mesmer has learned a disturbing secret with his technique: putting his subjects in a trance just before their lives end, keeping their souls trapped between their bodies and the afterlife. You’ll pass through the purgatories of the other carnies that have fallen prey to Mesmer’s control, all while trying to keep your own mind from shattering.
Mesmer kicked off last year and came out swinging. Beautifully surreal, the whole thing is a circus-themed trip through abstract environments and dreamlike realms inspired by freak show acts. I’ve never seen a maze quite like this, so committed to the notion that you are in a hypnotic trance, the constant whisper of Mesmer’s voice nearby as surprise after surprise looms: the simplest way I can describe this maze is like walking through a nightmare, albeit a gorgeous one. It never feels as intense as some of the other mazes, which makes sense in that it occupies the same footprint Shadowlands once had. And that’s not a bad thing.
1 - Origins: The Curse of Calico
Still unshaken from its perch as my favorite maze, Origins is my perfect maze. It tells a story with heavy, heavy atmosphere, it’s full of winks and nods to the rich history of Ghost Town and Scary Farm, and it ties everything together into one immersive package. I didn’t even have to do much soul-searching to keep this one on the top of my list either. It just rules! I hope we get to keep Origins for as long as possible - after all, Sarah Marshall needs a home.
The Shows
As mentioned before, shows have never been at the top of my list of things to do at Haunt, but I am glad they are available. The much-loved (or loathed, depending on who you are) annual presentation of The Hanging came to an end in 2019, and it seems doubtful the screwball skewering of popular figures and trends will ever return. Shows like Puppet Up: Uncensored keep the raunchy and ludicrous puppet improv going at the Walter Knott, and Conjurers - Dark Magic continues to showcase acts of prestidigitation in the Birdcage Theater with some spooky and funny atmosphere. But the newest show is what has taken up residence on the Calico Mine Stage where The Hanging used to take place.
Carnaval du Grotesque is a genuinely entertaining collection of dancing and circus acts, similar to the spirit of Elvira’s many shows done at Scary Farm in the past. While the pair of MCs for the circus throw some humorous banter and charming wit in between acts, this show is all about genuine spectacle, watching things like a hair-ialist, a fire eater, an expert balancer on stacked chairs and even an acrobat inside a spinning “Wheel of Horror.” The show’s outdoor venue means it can be viewed for a moment in passing and from a distance, or joined and stuck with for as long as there’s room in the throng of onlookers. It’s a sight to see, for sure. I’m glad I stopped to take it all in, and am glad to see these talented individuals getting the spotlight out in the open.
Final Thoughts & Beyond the Fog
If there’s any sign that the Haunt industry is recovering, look to the progenitor. Knott’s Scary Farm appears to be bouncing back well from losing a year in 2020, and shows no signs of slowing as it picks up where it left off. They continue to create and maintain one of the best haunted attractions I’ve ever been to, and as of yet nothing else holds candle to it. I’ll come back every year I can, and am excited to see what is in store to commemorate Scary Farm’s 50th in 2023.
But… Speaking of innovations, Knott’s does have one more eerie event this year. For the first time, a behind-the-screams daytime tour is being offered with Beyond the Fog, a 3-hour tour into the history of Scary Farm and a detailed walk through of 3 mazes with the lights on, letting you see every little detail and get all the cool hidden gems and stories without being interrupted by monster jumpscares. I’m happy to announce that I am one of the many tour guides for Beyond the Fog this year, and it is easily one of the best jobs I’ve ever had. While I can’t necessarily guarantee you’ll end up on my tour if you book, I am part of a really excellent team who I am proud to work with.
Shameless plug aside - and I only offer that last bit because I know people who read this blog might skew toward liking it - I’ve got a few more stops to make around the area this season, if all goes well. Thanks for joining me again. And hey, if you do end up getting into one of my tours, maybe I really will see you in the fog for a change!
