REVIEW: l.a. haunted hayride

OCTOBER 21, 2022

review: l.a. haunted hayride

We will be honest - we’ve always had a complicated relationship with the LA Haunted Hayride. Throughout the years we’ve experienced some of our most memorable and most forgettable Halloween moments there - sometimes all within one visit. While this year we had high hopes for a better experience, we left somewhat disappointed and not in much of a Halloween mood.

The hayride itself has always been what makes this event unique. It's the heart of the attraction and functions as the roots from which the branches of the event will grow. Years ago being crammed in a dusty tractor bed shoulder to shoulder with strangers was a memorable and fun Halloween experience. During this year’s visit we reminisced about our favorite moments of past Hayrides, like the tenebrous woman who creeped slowly through the cemetery with her dead baby, or the year the Devil had a Satanic ritual that went awry. We know that the Haunted Hayride is capable of creating an incredible experience, which is why we were so frustrated with this current version which felt somewhat incomplete.

We aren’t certain what happened this year because the hayride felt uninspired and didn’t have many sets or actors and had a lot of dead air. It was honestly strange to experience. The scare actors were few and far between and this created many challenges in creating desired effects on the ride. This is not the actors’ fault since it seemed apparent that there should have been a bigger crew. At the end of the hayride we heard some other visitors confusingly ask, “Oh, is this the end?”.

We therefore suggest that if you visit to focus instead on the three mazes onsite, especially “Midnight Mortuary”. This maze, created by Plague Productions, leads you through various paths and is confusing in the most entertaining way. Like our friend Albert at the Westcoaster pointed out, the more crowded the maze is the better - since the actors feed off of the chaos and create a more intense experience. If you like set and character designs in haunts, then you will particularly enjoy Midnight Mortuary. We really loved the opening scene with the fantastic hatchet man character. The other two mazes, Trick or Treat and Laughterhouse (the latter’s description only says “Full Details Coming Soon” on the website) were enjoyable as well, but Midnight Mortuary has the strongest characters, sets, and pacing.

While we tip our hats off to the Hayride for their more cohesive theming with having the event now take place in “Midnight Falls”, which contains great original characters like Herschel the Ice Cream Clown and Monte Revolta, things this year overall were not clicking. To start it feels like such a waste having the infamous Scary-Go-Round, built by artist Albert Cuellar (RIP) who worked closely with Slayer and Tim Burton, sitting there inoperable and barely acknowledged. The Scary-Go-Round deserves greater recognition and should at the very least be operational. In addition, the Haunted Hayride’s new space in Griffith Park feels too spread out and would feel better in the more appropriate, cozier and creepier space of their previous location at the Old Zoo. We also (still) wish that local food trucks were on site instead of corporate entities like Cinnabon. We really miss the Halloween themed food that Doomie's vegan food truck offered.

The Haunted Hayride has achieved some fantastic world-building with Midnight Falls. We just hope that next year the hayride itself will ascend back to the level of imagination and quality that we enjoy in the Midnight Mortuary maze. Here's hoping…

VC

October 21, 2022

Hauntsofla.com

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