Halloween Horror Nights 35 kicked off at Universal Studios Florida on Friday, August 28. This anniversary brought back icons Jack the Clown and Dr. Oddfellow, plus IPs like Hellraiser, Sinners, and Stranger Things. Below are Tom’s thoughts on new changes to HHN, scare zones (including FORTNITEMARES), and his ranking of all 10 haunted houses.
This review contains mild spoilers for haunted houses.
Halloween Horror Nights 35 ReviewTom’s Honest Review Video
Check back for the review version of this house.
Stay & Scream and Express Pass
I’m going to focus on the houses, but want to address some other critiques first.
There has been negativity about the Stay & Scream updates. If you aren’t familiar with Stay & Scream, read our guide, but it lets guests with daytime admission (like a day ticket, Annual Pass, or Scream Early ticket) stay in the park between the closing of Universal Studios Florida and the opening of Halloween Horror Nights. They get to access three haunted houses starting at 2 p.m., the earliest time ever.
If you have a Scream Early ticket, which is a new add-on this year, there’s a dedicated entrance to the right of the Universal Studios Florida entrance for check-in. If you have another kind of day ticket, you can enter there, or you can head into the park through the normal entrance and get a wristband at one of the dedicated in-park locations.
We got to the park a little late at 2:15 p.m. and immediately got in line for Stranger Things 5, one of the houses that opens early. It had a posted 75 minute wait but we only waited 40 minutes. Then we continued on to Jack & Oddfellow: Chaos & Control and Hellraiser. We were able to do all three before other houses opened at 5:15 p.m. Check out the full list of house opening times.
I think this is a huge improvement. This is so far my favorite iteration of Stay & Scream, especially in recent years with more crowds. When Stay & Scream started, it wasn’t very busy.
With three houses opening at 2 p.m., even if you have to wait an hour for a house, you have 3 hours and 15 minutes before the next wave opens, so you should be able to accomplish those three hours — maybe even do one or two of them twice. I think it’s great and ensures people who don’t buy Express Pass have the opportunity to complete all 10 houses in one night.
Speaking of Express Pass, guests who buy multi-night tickets every year are mad because Universal did away with the Frequent Fear passes that include Express. Universal said this decision was to make the guest experience better for everyone.
Universal, like Disney, is a mega corporation who likes your money. And when they make a change that’s going to upset people, “making the guest experience better” is usually the line they give you.
I didn’t think — and I don’t think most people thought this either — that this decision meant Universal was going to cut down on the number of Express Passes available for HHN on any given night.
And that didn’t happen. Most of our Express waits were 15 minutes or less, which is acceptable. But we waited over a half hour for Express at Sinners and a little over 20 minutes for Ozzy. People are gonna say it’s supposed to be 20% of the wait time but at the price they’re charging, those wait times are not acceptable. Universal knows that and doesn’t care. They collect the money and dive into it like Scrooge McDuck.
So don’t expect, if you buy Express this year, that the lines are going to be shorter. They’re going to be as long as they’ve ever been, if not longer.
Scare Zones and Experiences
The theme of this year is Infernal Carnival of Nightmares. It’s this sort of yin and yang thing between Jack the Clown and Dr. Oddfellow, Jack representing chaos and Oddfellow representing control. Those are the two halves that make the Infernal Carnival.
And the two characters do not get along. They are not friends. But they’ve come to understand they kind of need each other to make this thing work, so that’s what they’re doing. You learn more about that in their house, which we’ll discuss further below.
So the entrance scare zone has a carnival feel with a ticket booth, ushers (including The Usher on stilts), carnies, and of course Jack and Oddfellow.
A recent fixture of the event are photo ops along the main boulevard for the IP houses.
Several of the scare zones are connected to the Infernal Carnival theme. Sideshow of Decay is sort of Oddfellow’s creation. He’s opened a portal into Horror Nights past. Cindy Caine, a former icon who has not quite gotten the love she probably deserves, and her father the Caretaker are presiding over this scare zone, which has a lot of nods and love for past events.
Then for Jack, Downtown Clowntown is basically the history of clowns at Horror Nights. There’s a lot of clowns from the past. Chance and Jack’s brother Eddie are taking over the town and making Jack the mayor. There’s the Killer Klowns From Outer Space, who have their own borough, if you will. Then Art the Clown from Terrifier also has a borough.
And in-between there are new clowns. There other sort of boroughs, like one with old-timey turn-of-the-century clowns. Other has gruesome midway versions.
Elsewhere in the park, Club Horror is back. I think Universal heard the feedback and it’s now mostly a bar. They still have four stages with dancers and a DJ but there is a large bar at the back. I wish there was more seating in the surrounding area because this is a good place for people to go decompress.
But if you want to sit somewhere with a drink, just steps away is an Ozzy Osbourne-themed bar behind Lombard’s Seafood Grille.
There is one scare zone that has been of particular interest to everybody: FORTNITEMARES.
I remember last year when they announced the house WWE Presents: The Horrors of the Wyatt Sicks. People were very upset, saying, “What does professional wrestling have to do with horror? Why is it at Halloween Horror Nights? It doesn’t belong there.”
Then the house was wonderful and I think most people who had a negative opinion beforehand but saw it and said, “Oh, that’s actually pretty good.”
That’s an example of why it’s important to have an open mind. So I had an open mind about the FORTNITEMARES scare zone.
Our first run through was abysmal. On our second time through, there were a lot more performers and the scareactors on the ground were trying hard to make it work. And I think for most people, it does work. Probably not for hardcore HHN people, but it works well enough for the general guest.
Is it a great scare zone? No. It’s definitely towards the bottom of the list. But I would take it over the year where we were given roaming hordes instead of actual scare zones (due to construction).
My core issue is that space — Central Park — is usually one of the best and most immersive of the year. Universal uses the trees and surrounding natural beauty to enhance the theming. This one doesn’t really do that as much as The Cat Lady of Crooked Lane or others from years past. So it’s disappointed to lose such a great space to something that’s just kind of there to bring kids into the event.
I’m not saying no one put love and care in. Some of the costumes, especially of the stage performers, are very nice. The battle bus is an infinitely cool prop.
But overall, FORTNITEMARES is not one of the best things Universal has done for HHN.
I’m not going to review the shows, Nightmare Fuel: Blood Noir and Stranger Things: Return to Hawkins. I spent the night trying to see all the houses twice and going through the scare zones. But when we go back later in the season, I will review those.
Haunted Houses
As regular Halloween Horror Nights visitors know, things change through the course of the season. So there are probably things in the houses that worked last night or happened last night that will cease happening in the not too distant future. And on the other side of that, there are probably things that maybe aren’t working yet that they’ll get working in the days and weeks ahead. When you return, your experience will alter greatly. I don’t think the beginning or end of the season is better, but it’s important to keep that in mind when reviewing.
I’m going to do what everybody does and rank the houses from my least favorite to favorite.
My number 10 is Sinners. I’m going to preface this by saying the movie is lovely. It’s an excellent motion picture and an incredible piece of art. One of the best films of the last few years. I love it and that’s why myself and I’m sure many of you were very excited about this house. But the run or two we had of this house were not good.
I don’t know how well Sinners translates to a haunted house. A few years ago, there was a house set in a similar region of the U.S. with the same music overtones: The Darkest Deal. What worked so well for that house was the ability to change scenery and really work with the environment of the Mississippi Delta. You got the cornfield, the music venue, etc. It worked really well. It was a fantastic house with a lot of great special effects.
With Sinners, part of what makes the movie fantastic is that the first half is spent on character and story development before it shifts tone to horror. The problem is you can’t make a haunted house out of that first half.
There’s a vignette with the brothers at the start of the house that sets things up and I love that. The way it’s executed, set up, and portrayed by the actors is excellent. The problem then is we really only have two places to go.
I just don’t think the progression of scenes works well as a haunted house.
There are plenty of characters in the movie but it feels like the same characters in the house over and over again. The scares weren’t there.
One scene (Sammie on stage playing guitar) has beautiful staging, wonderful scenic design, and incredible special effects work. It’s the highlight of the house. But the rest fell flat. We hope it gets better.
I think my number nine is going to be a lot of people’s number 10: Stranger Things 5. There have been a lot of Stranger Things houses at Halloween Horror Nights in Orlando and Hollywood. They’re not always great but there have been some good ones and they are often the reason people come to the event.
One of my most memorable Horror Nights scenes of all time is the Stranger Things house that ended at Starcourt Mall. I’m a big fan of puppetry and there was this mega Mind Flayer puppet you kind of walked underneath. It was a big scene and I loved it.
If you haven’t seen Stranger Things season 5, the Mind Flayer comes back and there’s a big battle at the end of the series. I thought when they announced this year’s house, “Oh cool, we’re going to do a big Mind Flayer puppet ending again.”
Then you go through this house and the Mind Flayer is just a projection on a screen.
The way they frame this house is we’re on the journey with the main characters. There are certain moments and characters that I think fans of the show will be excited to see come to life.
But the scares aren’t great and the ending leaves a lot to be desired. I think Universal thought the emotion of the show ending would carry the house but it didn’t work.
There’s a very cool scene towards the middle with great animatronics, big set pieces that move, and special effects. That scene is the one redeeming factor.
There’s also an incredibly silly scene. There’s a title sequence. The Stranger Things 5 logo shows up, the music plays, and Vecna comes out of a boohole, sort of presenting the logo. He did this both times we went through the house. And I didn’t meant to but I just laughed. It was so weird and funny.
Sinners and Stranger Things 5 are the only two houses I don’t like. I enjoyed all the houses from this point on.
For number eight, I have MADLANDS: Caged Cannibals. This is an original story set in a dystopian future where animals are gone. So people are eating each other now and we’re getting towards the end of civilization. An encampment of cannibals in a zoo have survived and taken on the personals of animals.
This is a fun story and a great setting for a house. I like a lot about it and I’m excited to go through it more times, see more, learn more, and get more of the scares. It could easily move up on this list.
It’s very creative. The costuming is magnificent. The actors were going all in. I’m excited to see it on the Unmasking the Horror tour. It’s just a fun premise.
We weren’t excited for Evil Dead Burn. I don’t remember the last time I saw an Evil Dead movie and I’m kind of tired of them at Halloween Horror Nights. A lot of them bleed together at this point, if I’m being honest. But this one is good and lands number seven in the ranking.
The scareactors were really into it. A couple of them really went for it and were doing crazy things that worked. You could see they were making people uneasy and scared. They really nailed it.
There’s some good use of blacklight and projection technology. There’s an animatronic that is one of the freakiest things I’ve ever seen at HHN. It might be the thing that legitimately scared me the most because it took a moment to figure out it was an animatronic.
This has a lot of good things about it. It’s a good traditional HHN house. The scares are good. It works really well even if you don’t know the IP.
Number six is INVASION: Alien Abduction. This is inspired by the scare zone Invasion! from Halloween Horror Nights 27 (2017). It’s kind of a kitschy concept with 1960s-style alien Grays.
This version is set in the southwest rather than the traditional American South or Midwest, so you’ll notice certain things about the farmhouse you’re going through when it comes to architecture and style that reflect that region.
In concept, it seems basic: an invasion of an American home by aliens. They’re trying to abduct the people and the animals. But it turns out they’re not very good at it or they don’t really care.
So there are just arms coming down and grabbing stuff but they don’t really care if the humans, the livestock, etc. get hurt on the way up. That’s the interesting wrinkle to this take.
I could see why this house was in development hell for years. According to HHN creatives, they’ve pitched it for a number of years and it kept getting shot down, probably because it is a simple premise. And in these later years of HHN, basic premises aren’t the thing anymore. The original stories of HHN are usually pretty wacky and creative (like cannibals taking over a zoo).
They found a good wrinkle here and it’s that the aliens are ripping people apart. It has a goriness. But I also love it for the campier and funnier elements.
The scares are still very good. People behind us were screaming their heads off. There is one particular scare that is in an unexpected place around this house and it’s getting everybody.
If it had a little more originality, it would be higher on this list.
Send your hate mail, I’ve never seen any of the Hellraiser movies. They’ve never interested me. I like horror, just particular types and nothing about Hellraiser has ever spoken to me. And even after this house, I don’t know that I feel the urge to watch it. But they did a wonderful job, so Hellraiser is number five on this list.
The house is gorgeous. There’s a lot of detail. The costuming, makeup, and masks are insanely detailed. The blue light that continuously flows through slats and holes in the wall are really well done. From top to bottom, it’s beautiful.
It has a maze like design that makes the scares creative. There are all sorts of ways they can scare you and you can see all the places where they can scare you. I think it’s going to keep people on edge throughout the entire experience.
Whether you’ve seen this franchise or not, you’re going to have a really good time here. There’s nothing not to like.
If I was left to my own devices, H.R. Bloodengutz Presents: A Halloween Fright-Tacular! would be number one. But I try to rank things objectively on some sort of quality so it’s going at number four.
For backstory: H.R. Bloodengutz debuted at Halloween Horror Nights 21 (2011), hosting H.R. Bloodengutz Presents: Holidays of Horror. The character of H.R. Bloodengutz, a.k.a. Larry Kurtzberg, was the Creature Feature host for the WKNB Midnight Horror Show. As Bloodengutz, he presented various horror movies and original episodes.
Ratings began to drop as the show became disturbing and it was canceled. Kurtzberg didn’t take that lightly. He kidnapped the producer and crew members, broadcasting their torture as holiday-themed episodes. The house featured twisted versions of Valentine’s Day, Presidents Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, Arbor Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.
Kurtzberg was arrested and placed in the Carey Penitentiary for life. But in classic HHN fashion, he has escaped, returning to the WKNB TV station for a final Halloween special.
The original H.R. Bloodengutz house inspired Slaughter Sinema, which we’ve now had two of. You can see the cyclical inspiration of Slaughter Sinema on this version of Bloodengutz.
I love the interstitials between each “movie” of him introducing it on a TV. The movies ideas are hilarious. The first one had me rolling. This is one of the best comedy houses they have ever done.
And there are great nods to HHN offerings of the past with familiar props and characters.
At number three, we have Jack & Oddfellow: Chaos & Control. Quick Jack and Oddfellow crash course: The pair were introduced at Halloween Horror Nights X in 2000. Jack Schmidt a.k.a. Jack the Clown was a carnival performer who worked under Dr. Rich Oddfellow. After killing some children, Jack confessed his crimes to Oddfellow. Wanting to avoid police attention because of his own past killings, Oddfellow killed Jack and stuffed his body into a Jack in the Box. Halloween Horror Nights 32 (2023) explored the origins of Oddfellow, introducing his sorcerer abilities.
This house retells the origin story from Oddfellow’s POV, then picks up with what happens after Jack is stuffed in the Jack in the Box and enters the Oddverse.
Without the help of a podcast, YouTube video, or behind-the-scenes tour, even the most knowledgable HHN fan might be a little confused to what’s going on, even though Oddfellow is narrating a decent portion of it.
I was quite confused. Afterwards, I heard a little more and understand more but there are still some loose ends that need to be tied up. That said, there’s a lot of HHN lore and callbacks that big fans will enjoy.
Regardless, by the end of it, you get the idea that they don’t like each other but they’ve decided to deal with it because of this Infernal Carnival of Nightmares they have created.
There are some tremendous puppets and really fun scenes. Some are based in realism while others are total fantasy. There is some great projection use and beautiful scenic design. More fun costuming.
I like this house very much. This is another one that could move to the top over time, maybe as I understand more of what’s happening.
My number two is going to be Ozzy Osbourne: Prince of Darkness. This is in the same vein as El Artista: A Spanish Haunting and other elaborate houses of the last few years. There are big giant scenes with detailed and dynamic set design.
It’s a beautiful love letter to Ozzy Osbourne and what he gave to the world. Creatively, the way they took the art from his albums, as well as his lore and character, and turned it all into a house is spectacular work.
The house has a little bit of everything that has made HHN so special the last few years. Animatronics and puppetry on a big scale. Scenes that make you look up and you can’t believe how massive and complete they are. The moon and sky and towering structures are around you. It’s very impressive.
It’s not spoiling anything to say the Crazy Train is there. It may be one of the most fun sequence of scenes in any HHN house ever. The song kicks in and the train itself is gorgeous. Once you get inside, there’s so much fun to be had. With Ozzy’s music playing, how could you not be having a good time rocking along as characters come out to scare you?
Just like the Wyatt Sicks house being a tribute to Bray Wyatt, who passed away a few years earlier, this has an emotional farewell to Ozzy. At the end, he thanks you for all the love and support. It’s a nice emotional bow at the end.
It’s so well done and it gives me goosebumps.
And now for number one. Cybergoria.
If you had asked me before the season started, I thought this would have been either middle of the pack or the absolute last. The logo didn’t give me fun vibes. It didn’t feel like a strong concept.
But we did this one multiple times and it held up every time.
The backstory focuses on the fictional corporation Bio Immortal Bionic Intelligent Systems, who offers customers immortality. Bio Immortal puts their customers through a cryo freezing process to preserve them until technology catches up to their ambitions. Value Members are preserved in bags while Premium Members who pay more get luxurious cryogenic chambers.
Guests take the place of Value Members, waking up from their freeze in a disturbing future. It turns out Bio Immortal never managed to develop their immortality tech and the AI caretakers ultimately chose to keep humans alive by combining them with robots, turning them into gruesome cyborgs.
This house is at Fast & Furious: Supercharged. Despite it being one of the worst rides of all time, it has brought some of the best HHN houses of all time. There’s something about the layout and the claustrophobia that is brilliant.
Cybergoria is this maze of hallways. It’s beautiful and immersive. The lighting is great. The costuming is so good. These robots have such fun designs. Each one is a different creative idea or gag.
There are places where you can see through corridors and walls, giving you interesting perspectives of the characters. It’s so different from other Horror Nights houses.
This has some of the best scares ever. The music score works really well, too. It’s such a fun house and so well done.
This is the sleeper hit. I said that some of the other houses could move to the top of this list but it would be really hard to knock Cybergoria down.
Based on online feedback, I’m not alone in this. There’s a consensus that Cybergoria is wonderful.
We got a lot more Horror Nights to go and we will revisit all of this later in the season. There’s never been one year where all my top 10 remained in place from the beginning to the end of the event. They inevitably change and move.
Full Halloween Horror Nights House Ranking
If you need a more basic breakdown:
Cybergoria
Ozzy Osbourne: Prince of Darkness
Jack & Oddfellow: Chaos & Control
H.R. Bloodengutz Presents: A Halloween Fright-Tacular!
Hellraiser
INVASION: Alien Abduction
Evil Dead Burn
MADLANDS: Caged Cannibals
Stranger Things 5
Sinners
Full YouTube Review:
Halloween Horror Nights 35 is August 28 through November 1, 2026. Let us know what you’re most looking forward to on social media!
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