Halloween Horror Nights Video #4: Halloween & Saw
Our fourth and final video from the 2009 Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios in Hollywood focuses the camera lens upon the horror and degradation lurking within Halloween: The Life and Crimes of Michael Myers and Saw: Game Over. The Halloween maze has one big advantage: it is really the only movie franchise in the HHN presentation that has anything to do with the Halloween season. The Saw maze seemed a bit more iffy to us: despite Lionsgate’s habit of releasing one each October, the films have little to do with the season – and yet, somehow, this turns out to the best maze this year.
Halloween: The Life and Crimes of Michael Myers is situated in the space that housed Friday the 13th maze in 2007 and 2008 – ironic when you consider that Jason Voorhees is basically a Michael Myers rip-off. Typically, Universal reuses left-over set pieces – in this case, some woodsy settings more appropriate for Camp Crystal Lake than than Haddonfield. This one starts off slow but gets better. Our favorite moment is comes courtesy of the actress filling the P.J. Soles role, whose arched-back agony while being strangled is terribly convincing.
Along the way to the Saw maze, you pass the Saw: There Will Be Blood scare zone – which is not that different from how the scare zone looked in previous years (chainsaw-wielding pigs have been a staple since 2006 at Universal). This is situated in the lower end of the park, where the Texas Chainsaw Massacre maze resided in 2007 and 2008. The new Saw: Game Over supplies a similar level of grue, and you can even see the face-removal gag recreated here (this time performed by a surgeon rather than Leatherface). Recycling aside, Jigsaw’s demented traps and torture devices provide a wealth of settings and scenes that are effectively recreated in a live environment, making this the best maze of Halloween Horror Nights 2009, for fans and non-fans alike.