Yesterday I finally headed over to Thorpe Park for my last trip of the year to experience Fright Nights 2021! It was such an awesome day with great mazes, zones and I got in one night ride to end the day. Warning: This post does contain spoilers, so if you don't want anything spoilt I'd wait till after your visit to read this review. So let's get into it!
The Crows Of Mawkin Meadow:
I'll just say it straight up: the Crows Scare Zone was amazing. It had a great linear path, INCREDIBLE actors, beautiful theming and a wonderful soundtrack. I think extending the storyline of the crows was a great idea considering how well they went down as roamers last year (speaking of, I haven't seen any roaming crows myself and don't know anyone who has so not sure if they'll be around too much but I might be wrong.) The crows' costumes are great and I love the customised masks of each actor, it really adds personality to each 'character' even when they don't have personal backstories.
Only thing I'd say they could improve on is even more depth to the story and maybe build up the walls between the zone and the back of the Colossus queue as the 2 soundtracks merging didn't sound all that nice. But otherwise, an incredible zone that I really enjoyed!
Amity High vs Lycanthorpe: Love Bites! :
Amity High vs Lycanthorpe is a dance show & scare zone located in the Stealth plaza. It has shows every few hours but when there isn't a dance show it's home to the vampires and werewolves of Thorpe Park. I think I prefer last year's dance shows to this years but both were very fun and enjoyable to watch. The actors themselves were great and better than last year by far. I personally don't think Amity High has that much time left on park, I think one or two years will let it have it's time before it leaves the lineup. I think having the shows together suits them a lot more because I don't think they had the depth to stand out when on their own, especially LycanThorpe. Overall a great show and zone, definitely needed in e lineup being one of the only timed shows.
The Swarm: Invasion:
My favourite scare zone last year, Swarm invasion has been updated this year featuring slightly different characters that were still very clear with the use of defining costumes to show the stark differences between the security and the protesters. The full storyline is just as detailed as last year, if not more through the use of interrogations and the tent they have put up next to the old shop which is used for a scene. The majority of my reasoning for loving this scene is just my general love of Swarm. I have so many happy memories from over the past year or so queuing for Swarm in the dark with the og Swarm song playing in the background while being ambushed by actors behind queue line fences.
Creek Freaks: Unchained:
Being another one of my favourite zones of last year, Creek Freaks: Unchained had a lot to live up to this year and well, it kinda dissapointed. By no means was it not great, I still loved it but I don't think it had the energy it did last year while being right outside the highest energy maze in merlin (actually open this year). I would've been fine if it'd had more actors & chainsaws when we were there but only saw about 4-5 actors and I haven't seen a chainsaw outside of Massacre. Nevertheless, the actors were super friendly and fun and even offered us photos, I'll drop them below:
So that's the Scare Zones. Overall a strong lineup. It's quite similar to last year but I think the changes were still very noticeable. Crows was my favourite by far, but all 4 were good, enjoyable zones.
Platform 15: End Of The Line:
First maze of the Season! Platform 15: End Of The Line is the first maze to be experienced of the terrifying trio this year. Overall, it's my favourite year of Platform I've experiences, but there were still a few things that could've been improved. I don't like how basic and linear the route is but I think that's been greatly improved from what it was originally over the last few years. The storyline of Platform is like nothing I know of in the UK and that's what makes it stand out to me, how important it's been to the UK maze lineup over it's time open. In saying that, I think it's had it's time now and I'm happy this year is it's last as it's gone out on a high note.
The actors were great and I love the detailed signs, small decorations such as Timmy's birthday cake, the play park of dead souls of children and the signs explaining about the signal light and sightings of The Conductor. Another aspect that added to the atmosphere of the maze was the smell pods, along with the announcement in the main house of the village. Probably the most Iconic section of the maze is the 'derailed' train which was actually tipped over this year with a strong fire effect which was amazing to see back. I was just so happy to finally get an awesome run of Platform before it's had it's time at the end of the month.
Creek Freak Massacre:
Oh my.. Creek Freak. What. A. Maze. Unfortunately I never got to experience Creek Freak in 2019 so it was a first this year and it did not disappoint! High energy, great multi-route structure, amazing actors, beautiful theming, exciting and interesting storyline different from anything Thorpe had ever put together before, It's probably my favourite maze I've ever done at the park. I love how the idea of the maze and it's purpose is that you are like a piece of wood being de-barked, sorted, dried and chopped, except you're a human because that's what the Buckwheats do. It's so imaginative but so great. All round just really enjoyable and left me breathless by the end.
Trailers:
The only new maze for this year is Trailers. I think Trailers perfectly fits what the maze lineup was missing without it, although I think there's still some improvements that could have made it better. The idea of 'electricity' powering the cinema (and the staff!) is kinda cool but I think it could've been implemented in a better way that more tied in some of that showed off some old mazes as well as making things go on around you instead if just one actor spazzing out for all of 5 seconds. A common theme with Thorpe's recent mazes is really unique ideas and I think this was shown off to the ma with trailers as I've never heard of a maze themed to a cinema before this.
I personally think if the storyline was explained slightly better with an adapted script in the first scene and if the 'trailers' were old mazes it could've been so much better. The scares were awesome and the hammer runout was great and I'm happy they didn't put in another chainsaw considering Creek Freak Massacre already has 3. (yes, I do prefer Creek Freak).
All in All, this year has been great for the park and I'm glad to see they're slowly improving to their standards of past years. What do you think of Fright Nights? Have you been this year? Thank you so much for reading, I'll see you next time!
Cleo x
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