Now, while this premise sounded intriguing, I was still a bit on the hesitant side. A lot of haunts promise similarly in depth stories and kind of forget about them after a scene or two, and with CreepLA’s previous, inaugural, year being mostly a collection of dreamlike scenes, I was skeptical that they’d be able to pull off something with a story. While the first few scenes are promising and work along those lines, it does unfortunately fall into a trap of random and surreal horrorish scenes, which was disappointing. Combine that with an abrupt ending and, well, the experience was much more imperfect than I think they meant it to be.
Nitpicking on such things aside, however, the event is still a fun, interactive haunt. While the scenes in “the darkness” are a semi-random collection of dreamlike horror standards, they still manage to pull a lot of the standard gags that make interactive haunts great. At various points, the group is split up with people taking their own individual little adventures through nightmares. The performers are intense and good at throwing us around, both mentally and physically, making you feel uncomfortable in nearly every way you could be uncomfortable without ever trying to fully push you over the edge. There was running, and crawling, and hiding, and maybe even a little semi-inappropriate touching (always be sure to read the waivers at the beginning, ladies and gents), or as we call it in LA, a pretty okay Friday night.
Perhaps the highlight of this event was the lounge area right before the event. Lounges are something I’ve found increasingly common in haunts, as they’re often a better alternative to waiting in line, and give the haunt a chance to sell drinks and snacks (which, hey, buy a bottle of water or overpriced cup of wine; haunts are really difficult to make a profit on these days), and often are a good way to hype up the event to come. Wandering actors create a surreal experience as they would often stop to accost us, staring at us strangely or sitting at our table and randomly reading our palms.
So, while the CreepLA experience doesn’t live up to all its promises, it does offer a fun, moderately creepy time during a busy haunt season.
Event Score: 7/10
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-- Matt Carter
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