Originally Posted By tashajilek I remember Candy Corn Acres a few years back and it was quite gun. That's a shame that they don't do anything with the TOT anymore I never got to see it. I did find it weird that the TOT was always listed in the Halloween offerings along with Ghost Galaxy and HM Overlay, but never saw any changes.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros Before Ghost Galaxy was added, they also considered Snow White's Scary Adventures to be part of HalloweenTime (because it's 'scary' I guess?) even though there weren't any changes. The first few years, they were doing anything they could to drum up excitement; now they're just reducing what they have and continuing to pull in huge crowds Another long-lost element was the fun little Main Street Pumpkin Festival show that they had. It was just a couple CMs in period costumes with a cart that turned into a small stage, but it was a cute diversion; it seems like these sorts of experiences are constantly being cut from the park in favor of more high-profile things like character meet and greets or parades
Originally Posted By DBitz2 I hope they change out the backdrop in the load area. With the exception of adding some video projections, that hasn't changed much in many years. And, yes, maybe they'll think of something new for the attic. The best part of the attic is looking for the hidden mini bride figure.
Originally Posted By doombuggy "hitchhiking ghosts were used the first few years until Oogie Boogie was added" They were taken out and a cheap plywood cut out of Shock, Lock and Barrel were used.
Originally Posted By 9oldmen >>I just have this feeling that the stained glass effect will be the same as before, and the article just called in "new" because of a possible miscommunication, and a person writing the copy who's maybe never been on HMH. I said MAYBE. Then again, we're in an era now where a "Mara" face can transform and open his(her?) eyes through projections, and where the Queen from Snow White can transform into a hag, along with her whole throne room transforming in a similar fashion, so maybe I'll be proven wrong. Projected breaking stained glass might be doable and maybe that's what we're going to see.<< I just saw an "iphone" type video on YouTube of the new HMH, and the stretching room does indeed have something different involving projected breaking stained glass, and Jack's intitial appearance, but I think it's different than anything we'd anticipated. I'm sure others here have seen it, some in person, but I won't spoil it!
Originally Posted By Jim in Merced CA Fun fact: the music box music they play in the queue came from DLP's Phantom Manor queue. It's actually a counter melody to Grim Grinning Ghosts This is fun <(and completely mindnumbing after about 2 minutes)> That's how I feel about most Danny Elfman scores.
Originally Posted By mele We were one of the first few to ride Friday morning. The new ceiling effect is awesome! Everybody cheered at the end. The line to get in was down past POTC for a short while. Also, they're not doing fastpasses to see if they're necessary anymore.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros It sounds like the line to POTC was temporary, on the first day right around the time it opened. That hardly justifies using FP the entire time. Realisitically, FP does nothing to increase the attraction's hourly capacity, so there's little benefit to adding it. The attraction does fine the rest of the year without it, so I see no real need for it during the holiday version Since HM is located near a dead end, having FP there creates a lot of extra congestion that would be relatively easy to mitigate with an overflow queue. Instead of having people visit that area twice (to pick up FPs and to ride), and eliminating the crowds waiting for their time to come up, people would just visit once and get right in line. Just look at it's a small world holiday, which can have very long lines, yet that area is relatively easy to navigate since there's not a lot of extra foot traffic or people just standing around; iaswh had FP for a year or two but they realized that it really didn't help much I thought I read somewhere that in recent years they've switched to only using FP during the weeks closest to Halloween and Christmas, when the crowds are the highest. I'm not sure if that's true or not though
Originally Posted By Baxter Manor I was also there Friday and was one of the first to ride. This was my first time experiencing the overlay after hearing so much about it over the years. I viewed it open minded, and having no previous years experience to compare it with i enjoyed it at face value. Overally impression - I liked it, but overall i felt that the inside attraction itself was far too *Christmasy* and not enough Halloween-ish. The balance was leaning more towards X-mas. The outside of the Mansion looked awesome, exspecially at night. Loved the candle lights and glowing pumpkins. Very moody and spooky. Nice to hear that DLP queue music too! As far as the interior attraction overlay, while i am grateful to finally been able to experience it was i was not overly wowed. I guess i was expecting more spookiness..or something. I came away from it feeling it had just experienced a new black-light, dark ride in Fantasyland. So as much as i enjoyed seeing it, i rode only once. It just did not have a real re-ride-ability to me.
Originally Posted By Baxter Manor Oh..and yes, the standby line for Mansion on Friday night was insane long. I was amazed to see it reach all the way to POTC. The biggest crush came post-Fantasmic, when you had the audience for that trying to leave and the people still waiting in the long Mansion queue line trying to stay in line and hold their ground before the masses. Chaotic...but interesting to see. The M&G line for Jack and Sally next door was equally long, but that was snaked around in a different layout and did not spill out too badly into the main walkways like Mansion*s line did. A fun night....just glad o rode Mansion in the morning before the masses decended in the late afternoon.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>I liked it, but overall i felt that the inside attraction itself was far too *Christmasy* and not enough Halloween-ish.<< I've always felt that the focus was more on Christmas; it works nicely in December but it definitely feels weird to ride it in early September. I know that the focus is supposed to be on Christmas with a Halloween twist, but in the real-world theme park it might make more sense to get a little more Halloween stuff mixed in >>Is Fast Pass available for the Skellington overlay?<< From what I've read, FP is not currently available; who knows if that will change at some point, as crowds in the park fluctuate greatly over the next 4 months
Originally Posted By myinnerpeterpan My husband and I had out of town family in for a weekend visit and they had never seen the holiday overlay...they loved it. My hubby and I really like the new additions and the gingerbread house is really...unique this year. Personally, I think last years was better but we love it no matter what. I won't spoil what they've added, only to say that they did a really fantastic job!! It's always nice to see when they do something new!!
