It’s an unspoken tradition for Florida teenagers to go and experience all that is Universal Orlando’s Halloween Horror Nights. Yet all these years, I never went, whether due to the busy nature of the fall months or, more realistically, being nervous about going somewhere created just for jump-scares. However, I am a senior this year, and I most likely won’t get another chance to go and experience the hype surrounding Universal in the dark, so I sucked it up and visited. Here is my honest review of the event as a first-time attendee who walked (more like ran) through all ten mazes and five scare zones created in celebration of the 32nd anniversary of Halloween Horror Nights.

My friends and I started off strong with “The Exorcist: Believer.” As soon as I entered the foyer, I knew I wasn’t going to leave the hallway without screaming, and I was right. It might have been because it was my first ever maze, but the scare actors, with their long black hair and white nightgowns, were terrifying, and I had to look at the floor most of the time to avoid making eye contact with the possessed creatures waiting to jump out at every corner. After “The Exorcist,” we walked through “Chucky: Ultimate Kill Count.” Being a first-timer, I still wasn’t used to the idea of constant jump-scares, so I definitely ran for my life a couple of times throughout the course of the house. There was also a false ending, which I think added to the scare factor. We all walked out into the open air, talking about how the house was slightly underwhelming, without knowing we were walking right back into the trap of the second half of the maze and the six-foot Chucky doll that burst out of the wall. After these first two mazes, we started to get the hang of it and could sense when the jump-scares were going to happen. The actors come out of the corners they hide in for every few people that pass, so we adopted a strategy of holding hands and running by each low-lit area as fast as possible. 

After “Chucky,” we decided to make it a goal to visit every house. “The Last of Us™” and “Stranger Things 4” houses were both based on popular TV shows and video games. “Stranger Things 4” was more of an ode to the show’s characters than a true jump-scare house, featuring Eddie Munson’s guitar scene in the middle of the maze, but entertaining nonetheless. “The Last of Us™” was much like the typical zombie apocalypse house. The makeup and costumes of the actors were very true to how they looked in the show, and the set was very immersive, with spores falling from the ceiling.

“Universal Monsters: Unmasked” wasn’t particularly memorable, as it was like any other haunted house, but one thing that stuck with me was that the scare actor at the end interacted with me specifically by pointing and telling me that I was “coming with him,” which was more frightening than some of the other houses in which the characters didn’t speak directly to those walking through. “Dr. Oddfellow’s Twisted Origins” was relatively scary but didn’t last particularly long. More memorable, however, was the line to go into the house because there were colorful circus tents and somewhat of a set surrounding the queue, unlike most of the other mazes.

By one in the morning, we were dragging through each maze and found that the two mazes we visited on the later half of the night, “Yeti: Campground Kills” and “Dueling Dragons: Choose Your Own Fate” didn’t spark much of a reaction. It may have been the sleep deprivation or the fact that we had been through seven others prior to these, but I only jumped a few times and very rarely let out a scream. However, “Yeti: Campground Kills” was unique in the fact that there was a noticeable temperature drop when entering the house, and it was the only house that had a character that chased us for a few seconds. “Dueling Dragons: Choose Your Own Fate” wasn’t scary at all, but the idea of a house with two pathways was something that Halloween Horror Nights should definitely include every year.

My group’s favorite two houses were “The Darkest Deal” and “Bloodmoon: Dark Offerings” because they were so terrifying that we wanted to turn and run out while in them. “The Darkest Deal,” which was about a blues musician who “traded his soul” for musical fame, took place inside a corn maze, which was horrifying because jump-scares were practically coming from the walls around us, and the whole maze was eerie. “Bloodmoon: Dark Offerings” was the last house we entered during our visit, at around 1:30 in the morning, and we definitely ended our night on a scary note. The house was based around the witchlike practices in colonial villages, and there was one room in particular that caught us off guard. This room was set up like church in service, with hooded figures in the pews, yet only some of these people were real, and we only knew that once they screamed at us. 

“Halloween Horror Nights was so exciting this year; each house was a different experience and included different types of scares,” Karen Awaida ‘25, said about her experience.

Halloween Horror Nights also has scare zones, which are areas in the park that have scare actors there to chase passersby. Our favorite scare zone was “VAMP ‘69: Summer of Blood”, which was a zombie play on the hippie, summer of love vibes of the late sixties. Most of the scare actors in that zone were cool and stylish more than scary, and it was fun to look at the Woodstock-based set and costumes.

Eva Weiner ‘25 said, “Going to Halloween Horror Nights is always so much fun, especially when you’re surrounded by friends! I’ve made many memories there and always look forward to going back.”

All in all, if you ever have the chance to visit Universal’s Halloween Horror Nights, you definitely should give it a shot. Yes, you may scream so much that you can’t speak the next day, but you’ll make hilarious memories in the process.