Wabewalker

location: Home

mood: contemplative

I take back my original criticism of “The Slaughterhouse” as being weak sauce. Of all the mazes, it's the one that still spooks me over a week later. Why?

It was the first maze that Knott’s Halloween Haunt has done that had a living (well, animatronic) victim.

Almost all of the characters in the mazes can be broken down into two groups: living monsters and dead victims. There are corpses galore and gore aplenty, but you don't see anybody in the process of being murdered. It all happened in the past. Even “Quarantine” showed only the consequences of insanity, not the insanity itself.

“The Slaughterhouse” was different. For the first time in my memory, they had a victim screaming for help as he was barbequed alive. It changed the maze-goers from simple crime-scene voyeurs to callous, indifferent accessories to mayhem. We visitors went from horror-movie patrons to pedestrians who ignore the bleeding man on the curb.

I’m sure it was intentional, possibly an experiment to test the limits of what the public will find acceptable. The big question: will that thrashing victim be a prop next year, or will too many people be as disturbed by it as I was?

location: Home

mood: in mild discomfort

Getting into the park on time made a ton of difference: no lines for the first hour. Next time Paul shows up late, I’m not waiting. Lost my ponytail band on “Ghostrider.” “Silver Bullet” still rocks: barrel rolls for the WIN.

“Lore of the Vampire” is gone, replaced by “The Labyrinth.” No giant Minotaur at the end, which is what I was expecting (there was a boss monster, but he was non-descript). “The Underground” is now “Club Blood,” so the hot cage dancers are now part of a vampire rave. “Blood Bayou” has been converted into “The Slaughterhouse” (serving human B-B-Q) which was lame -- but then, I’ll always remember nearly wetting myself when the guy popped out of the outhouse with the chainsaw. “Clown College,” “The Asylum,” “Axe Murder Manor,” and “Lost Vegas” are still around. So is “Alien Annihilation,” which I still do not understand. Is anyone stupid enough to pay $5 for a Lazer Tag gun? There was also a corn-maze, but it was pathetic; less said of it, the better.

Finally saw what they did with the Calico Mine Ride: “Black Widow’s Cavern.” Not too bad, but nowhere near the complexity of “Lair of the Underworld” with its magnificent dragon sculpture at the end. “Pyromaniax” is still the log ride, but I didn’t expect it to have improved since last year so we skipped it.

In retrospect, I realized that the more interesting mazes are the ones that are enclosed. The open-air mazes — or even those in the south-end warehouses — lack the claustrophobic atmosphere of the others. Part of the appeal of “The Underground” was looking up and seeing light filtering through a manhole cover or a sewer grate. You could almost believe you were in the sewers of a post-apocalyptic radioactive Los Angeles.

“Grudge 2” is gone, but that was expected. The new movie-tie-in maze is for “Quarantine,” which looks like a remake of “Warning Sign”: infection turns people into psychopathic killers, who wipe each other out.

Saw “The Hanging.” Like George W. Bush (eventually) found out, it is impossible to do physical harm to a concept. Seriously, executing higher gas prices? Dumb. They should have killed Paris Hilton, or Bristol Palin, or somebody. Saw “Fangs!” — a vampire comedy revue, of course. Not the best half-hour of my life, but it was at least air-conditioned. Still, the comedy show hasn’t been the same since Elvira left. Missed “The Torture King and Miss Electra,” but that show never changes.

Things notably missing: the half-man who has been there since 2000. He disappeared with “The Underground.” He was great, kept up the patter until the park closed; I would have thought that he would have been moved somewhere else. I didn’t see the witch or the wolfman, either. The wolfman usually prowls outside of Ghostrider and the witch is near the entrance to the swings.

In other news, twisted my ankle unloading the car. I have it packed in ice, and should be back on my feet by the end of the day.