Schock Manor 2000

   I decided that as I progressed the TOTs through the maze up the steps, I would zigzag them in a confusing manner. So the ceiling cross beams were placed in the corresponding locations so the plastic sheeting could be hung from them to achieve this. By about the 25 to 30 foot mark building the walls and ceiling framework I think it began to set in just what I had decided to bite off for haunt 2000. And when my one-day frame and walls were on their 4th day (I took off work to dedicate to this full time), I think I began to really have a much clearer idea about the size of my ambitions. The rope you see strung across the tops of the columns back and forth were needed to hang strobe lights, black lights from and more, so I must have used 300 feet to suffice.

   Of course then there was the connection of the wood wall system to the columns. I had imagined a pretty simple two-rope connection from my maze to the porch pillars. Then, I would simply toss some plastic over the ropes and once again, viola'. Right. The pic here gives you an idea of how easy this turned out to be. The suspension for the plastic sheeting would not only need wood support under the middle but since now the weather man was starting to talk rain, it would have to be peaked as well. That meant the ceiling now had to be trussed from the entrance to the porch. My original battery of wood resources and plastic had become completely depleted within 1/3rd of the way through and now there were trips to make into town for more of everything. By around day 8 I was feeling pretty good about eventually getting to put my scenes inside the new haunt. Of course that would be the same day the wind and rain would pick up to 35 and 45 miles an hour and the entrance and the front section of the haunt crashes to the ground in a saturated crumpled mess..... Above is a couple of photos after I had already set the entrance back upright and repaired some of the damage sustained in the crash.

   I decided that the stability of my haunt needed improvement. I repaired the haunt for this year with the same wood & plastic materials as I had begun with, but I knew I would never use this construction again. You can see what I discovered for a much more reliable construction for the following year here. It only took about another day to repair the damage to the shell of the haunt, but now there were only some 4 days until Halloween night and I hadn't so much had one string of fishing line hung up in what was now 3 times more maze than I had imagined having. I had placed a zigzag to the maze on each step at least once, as the steps were 4 1/2' deep each. And at 7' wide this included 100 running feet of plastic sheeting. I had spiderwebs hanging from the rafters throughout the maze, as well as some sort of strobe light in each cavity. By "cavity", I mean that each zigzag had one end or the other had an opening in it of some sort. Each were different. Some were slits in the sheeting, some were simply not attached to the wall at that end, but all of the escape openings were overlapped with two or more layers of plastic sheeting so you couldn't tell where they were without using your hands to find them. And they were all low to the ground, so you were forced to bend down to move from one cavity to the next. 

   I was out of time by the time Halloween night fell on us, so I was not able to get photos of the inside of the maze, but it was by far the best feature I feel I have had so far in my haunts. It was disorienting in the floor's untimely ascension as well as the course. But most of all 3/4 of the way through I placed my werewolf backed up in one corner of the pie shaped cavity and placed a white strobe on him with his arms outstretched as if reaching out for you. And the most amazing effect happened when the egg strobe was adjust just right; he moved forward toward you in the very small space you were both in! It was such an effect that by the time I had the haunt set up and had traversed the entire length of the maze with all the strobes on and lights flickering at least 20 times, every time I entered that cavity, even in the daytime, I would nearly jump through the wall. Funny thing was too, that you could tell exactly where each new group coming up through the maze was because they would shriek at exactly the same spot each time. ;)

   The hanging skeleton above is the first thing you see on the left as emerging from the maze into the main portion of the haunt on the porch. On the right side you see a pile of of rotting corpses and skulls. I must admit here, that since the haunt had taken vastly more time to set up than I had budgeted, H night caught me more off guard than normal and the displays reflect that. But of course, nothing is without it's challenges.

We had such a great response from the TOTs over the previous two years using the interactive approach to the haunt that we chose to go that way again this year. The left scene was the static executioner again and then next to him would be the Death Lord. Both the static Executioner and the Death Lord have a very similar look about them and the Death Lord would stand perfectly still next to him to appear completely static as well. He was holding up a severed head in one hand and a bloody sword again in the other. On the far right of the scene the Crypt Keeper sits chatting to all who enter, fog pouring out from behind him every few moments. He speaks with the actual voice of the CK from late night TV as his mouth is slowly moving open and closed. His face is continuously moving slowly from side to side and his left hand is actually moving the pointer on a Ouija board. So with this animation, the TOTs would quickly move to their right and take a closer look. As soon as they began moving to their left the Death Lord would come to life holding up the sword and the severed head with its mouth moving as he would address the brave TOT with a guttural satanic voice booming from a large speaker that stood immediately beside him, disguised as an end table holding a flickering light candelabra. The startle was always significant. Thunder crashed every 10 seconds as the lightning illuminated the top of the porch along with the other sounds that came from other places, but the sound that came from the Death Lord could be heard from a block away even at the whisper that he used. Above you can see the "talking" head crying out to the startled victims. The only downside to this set was that once the Death Lord addressed the TOT, they would typically run to the exit and often miss the trash can.

   Waiting to the left of the executioner, the trash can trauma was positioned right next to the exit, beyond a partition I had set up so people outside the haunt wouldn't be able to see inside without braving the maze. So it did look like just an exit area and a trash can could easily be there. If the TOT wasn't on a dead run, the trauma would get them after they thought all the scares were over. On the other side of the exit stood an evil clown with a cauldron of candy for the poor victims that had made it all the way through. However, when they reached in and felt a warm person's hand grabbing at their wrist, usually they fled without the candy. It seems to save on the candy costs for the night. We put through about 300 in our first Halloween haunt in this neighborhood. As a funny side note, this is a gated community that is used to getting on average 20 TOTs per year and some of our neighbors have been hading out dollar sized Snickers bars for years. After the first couple of hundred they had to turn away this year I'm thinking that they will be investing in multi packs for 2001..... 
 
   You never know what will happen when you set out to try something new for Halloween and this year did come with it's challenges and surprises. But in retrospect, although I do not intend to attempt this same configuration again next year, I am so glad I had the chance to build this maze and learn some interesting things that I can take into future years.

Rest In Pieces

Death Lord