Podcast: The Ride - Cinderella Castle Mystery Tour with Landon Zakheim

Episode Date: October 17, 2025

Tokyo Disney's Cinderella Castle is full of beautiful whimsy, both outside and insi...FROM 1986 TO 2006 A WEIRD SCARY WALKTHROUGH TERRIFIED GUESTS OF ALL AGES!! The exterior signs gave guests no warning!!Landon Zakheim (Overlook Film Festival) helps us unpack this shockingly scary Disney experience!"Ghost Town Alive! with Eva Anderson" episode is up at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon.com/PodcastTheRide⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠FOLLOW PODCAST: THE RIDE:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://twitter.com/PodcastTheRide⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/podcasttheride⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠BUY PODCAST: THE RIDE MERCH:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.teepublic.com/stores/podcast-the-ride⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠PODCAST THE RIDE IS A FOREVER DOG PODCAST⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/podcast-the-ride⁠See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Forever. Dog. Warning. The following hauntcast may contain unpopular caldrons. Bad guys controlling elevators. Las Vegas Horror Museum upcharges. And a look back at the Tokyo Disney attraction, Cinderella Castle Mystery Tour.

Landon Zakhheim joins the ghosts to chat about this deceased attraction and also about various SoCal and Las Vegas haunts, an episode chocked full of horror. It's Hauntcast the Fright. Welcome to Hauntcast the Fright, a podcast, a podcast about screen parks hosted by three guys that before they buy an action figure, whisper in the figure's little ear, can I keep you?

My name is Michael Richmond Myers, joining me as always, the candy man, Jason Sheridan. Jay's, Jason Michael Voorhees. Yeah, was there an adjust in the second gate? Yeah, probably that's what that was.

In the cemetery gate. Yeah, but that's maybe... These things are always evolving, but I love the candy man. The candy man's good. That's Sart the clown talking over here. Yeah. And I don't, yeah, I'm rare in my purchase of action figures, but you better believe every time.

Yeah, well, I gifted you the five Beach Boys Funko Pops and did you probably whispered in their little ears. Maybe not can I keep you? Maybe something different about like. Funko Al Jardine, can I keep you? Or then sometimes, yeah, yeah, Funko Mike Love, wouldn't it be nice if we were older, then we wouldn't have to wait so long? Or, yeah, would you ever like praise them for a very specific thing, like a specific thing? like a specific harmony or a specific, like, I don't know, just something specific that you only you probably feel like you'd notice.

Oh, yeah, yeah. Carl, nobody knows that it's your, you doing the background vocals on David Lee Ross cover of California girls, but I know it's you and Christopher Cross and they're heavenly. It rivals the original, quite frankly, and updates it for the 80s. So thank you, little, Carl. That's just our little secret. Not to keep going on the Funko thing, but did I ever say on the show the thing of, you know, longtime listeners have probably tracked the thing where, you know, the tradition of when I've

had a child that Griffin Newman has bought tons and tons of, in one case it was the character Sprite from, what the hell is it called? The Eternals, yeah. The internals. But initially it was Kingo. This started with Kingo. And my oldest did really like all these Kingoes. He likes playing with Kingoes.

And then, so then when a bunch of new Funko Pops show. up. Oh, right. Due to you, I said, do you know who these guys are? Because I wondered if he'd know it was the Beach Boys. And he said, yeah, who are they? Kingos! So Griffin has warped him where he thinks that all Funko Pops are Kangos.

Wow, that's funny. But these are singing Kingos. These are Kingos close to Daddy's Park. As opposed to Bollywood dance routine. Right. Well, that makes sense. But I mean, they're all Kingos are talented. It's like all cotton swabs are Q-tips to him, basically.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sort of just, he recognizes the shape of a Funko pop. That's the primary of a brand. Right. All right. Well, we got a lot to talk a lot to talk about here. We have to bring our guests in. Too many things, too many tabs, too many things.

Too many tabs, too many things. He's the co-founder of the Overlook Film Festival. He's a programmer at many other festivals, film and otherwise, I assume. He's also a horror, I would call him a horror, barn vivant. Would that be something? Yeah, I like that. We're talking about Landem, Zachheim. He's here.

Yay. Welcome to the show. Hooray. Long time, listener. First time, I realized I could not appear on the show until all three of you had successfully completed haunts. Yay, yeah, yeah, yeah. That was the environment. It was for you. You need to know you were in a room of Big Brave Boys. Right. Now it's happened.

Like some of the haunts have like bonus rooms if you have a special key you buy. Yeah, yeah. We unlocked the room that we were keeping you When you look like hell, sorry about that. Sorry, it took so long. That's all right. The point is I'm finally here. To be on Hauntcast the Fright.

Yeah, I'm so glad. You've been such a, you've been so kindest over the years and such a supporter of the show. And I think you have, like, you know, before being a guest, you, like, pushed us further into the world of immersives instead, you know, because you know, because you're buddies with Eve Anderson. And, like, I think you've, like, just whenever we've caught you over the years, you've, like, pushed us to do things.

things that are a little like outside the bounds or not not even push it not pressure but just like letting us know of the wonderful world of like things like just a tick away from uh rides and theme parks and stuff um yeah i i feel like my my claim to fame whenever i meet podcast the ride listeners in the wild if they're fans of the show is they get to go uh you know i was there for the minotaur that's a big that's a big piece of mythology you can tell when there's a fan they go like oh my god you were he saw me checking out the first brush with the minotter

not when the minotar showed up and interrupted an episode about the situation yes I understand that Mike has developed a much deeper longer relationship with the minotar since then a lot of back and forth yeah yeah no he sat and hung out and he's actually kind of a pretty cool guy is what we've learned but yeah the initial panic attack

causing incident so Landon was one of the people who you were he was a humiliated myself in front of yeah Yeah, and then we went in the room. Well, then we proceeded to humiliate ourselves because I think it was our first, like, escape room style thing since the pandemic in person. And we were very rusty. And there was a point where we realized, like, oh, we're very stupid now.

Like this was. Oh, yeah, it had made your brain worse. Yeah, they needed to give us a lot of help. And so we spent a lot of time in there, much of our surprise. You were still there when we got out. I was hanging. Yes, I didn't want to leave. I wanted to be like, I'm okay.

I didn't want people to be like, we were going to go. did he go to like a hospital or something like no he's okay i did find it funny that all of us were like yeah you had to bow out and then all of us were like i mean he'll probably be okay right like like we should we should do this first you just bailed them yeah yeah you scheduled it you paid for it then we'll see if my i'm i said it on the episode but it's so funny because i'm like they're in the other room and they're like yelling and it's like some cheap looking sets in the dark and i'm sitting here like an idiot because i had a weird anxiety attack.

I think pandemic was big time a part of it. I feel like I've caught over the years of the people, like I think appreciate you being so open and honest about it, but panic attack, anxiety attack, whatever you want to call it, kind of situation. It was very minor, too. You did a public good by bowing out of, by not facing the funny cheap. Sure. Do you agree with that assessment, though?

You haven't done it. Well, here's the thing. It's the lights, when the room's going, it's much scarier. Yes, I'm not saying that's scary. I'm just saying that the reality, I'm aware of the reality. that this is. Once they turn the lights on at the end, we did all feel, we're like, oh, this is where we were. This is what this guy looks like. Right, right, right. Well, it's interesting because it has, it has followed me around where I have these brief moments before I do something, which we will, we should talk about because I had a minor version of the thing you and I did this weekend while we were waiting in line. Oh, really? Yeah. So I have weird little, like, flashbacks to it, which is why I haven't done the Minotaur again, which is why we haven't tried it again, because I feel like I'm not ready to not freak out. that's a final boss thing. It really does.

But you will at one point in the life of this show have to face the minute more. I know that. It's for my character development. There has to be some sort of an accomplishment. But it happened when we did the escape room

briefly with Tom, briefly right before. Oh, it did really? Very briefly, yeah. I brought it up. It happened right before Andrew Grissom and I saw a Frank Marshall directed magic show.

Well, I mean, that would give me a panic attack. I was understandable. I was hoping to receive a panic attack right now. Yeah, Frank Marshall. You understand now what it's like to be stuck in a room where Frank Marshall is a major topic. Oh, God, I can't breathe. How do I get out? He was the door.

But I knew he wasn't in the room. I knew he wasn't there to see me, like, have a little panic attack because I knew he was in some other country, like, well, they shot the new Jurassic Park movie. You knew where Frank Marshall was in the world at that time. So I know any DJs out there, like after parties and stuff. So I do, I'm keeping tabs on him to some degree. But only the things he reveals to the public. I'm not, it's not like I have a guy following him. His assistant isn't leaking you information.

But we did something, what is, did we do it last weekend or two weekends? When did we do it? Recently. I can't remember this year. This haunt cast the Fright season. But it's something you've been, you've been hyping up for a long time, something called Rain of Terror. Yes. Which is like 10 haunts, 10 mazes back to back to back.

And we did it And it's next to a Bucca de Bopo in a strip mall It is In Thousand Oaks, California It's kind of like Not a dead mall Because if it has a Bucca de Beppo is Thriving

Well of course It also has a giant trampoline Like place Trampoline Park A place for children to get hurt Oh yeah It looks cool A giant

A giant throwback Like trampoline zip line Indoor thing where you just, every time I've walked past it, going a reign of terror, I just see throngs of children out of control, flying, crashing through the window. It's, I mean, I didn't end up making it. I was thinking about it, but I didn't do it. And I'm excited to hear your report about it. But the big thing luring me to want to do it is the fact that it's in Thousand Oaks, which is a little past where I grew up, and that it is in like

a somewhere between dead and okay mall. But you said that, you said that, you said that it, like, it upgraded spaces, right? Yes, it used to be in an abandoned marshals, and they are now in an abandoned Burlington Coat Factor. I got so excited when they said this used to be a Burlington Coat Factor. I love the idea that I'm like, like, it's not like a burial ground, but it's a dead retail space is now a haunt. And I skipped it last year, because I try to do it a lot, but not every single year,

because I like to forget things in it so that it can feel fresh again. because it's not like it updates a lot, although there were two new rooms this year. So they apparently made this move last year. So when I came in and was like, oh, it's all new. One of the guys was quick to correct me. Like, actually, actually, yeah, we were here last year.

That's a good pace, though, to let a few things reset. Okay, so it's like, this isn't a, you know, Spirit Halloween kind of situation where it, like, floods in there right before. And, like, it's like part of the Thousand Oaks, the Jan's marketplace community. It's a big deal.

And it is, yeah, good name check on the mall. We need to make sure to... I looked up that despite not going which one is it? It can't be, you know, it's not the oaks. I know it's not the oaks.

There's a cold oaks. There's a lot. I wanted more time even to explore the mall. We got hot dogs. We went to an axe throwing place and got ales afterwards because if you did reign of terror,

you get a nice hefty discount. Wow. You threw an axe? No, I didn't throw a, I don't think they do discounts on the axes, just the beers. I was trying to get to Jimmy Angel by 10 p.m. So I didn't have a time to throw an axe. It just happened to be on the same night.

We moved nights, so I was just... Yeah, but we still had a nice drink. It was still nice. And I appreciate it. I learned all about Jimmy Angel, who I was not aware of in any context until the time. You're not up in the 91-year-old music scene? Well, now I know his entire history.

Thanks to 10 minutes of drinking. Thanks to future best friend. And then happened to be in a room. room with him mere days later at the L.A. Breakfast Club. I got a text from Eva and from you about Jimmy Angel being in the room in the breakfast club on a Wednesday morning at what, 7 a.m.? Yeah. Shockingly, Eva Anderson and I were doing some crazy Halloween immersive thing at an ungodly hour. On LA early morning interests as Jimmy Angel. And Jimmy was there with a friend of the show, Trevor Zamet, who was the one who told me about Jimmy Angel initially. So I just, I do like

all these different like people threads coming together Jimmy Angel's here now now I'm getting texts about Jimmy Angel he wasn't even doing anything he was just hanging out but he was in the same costume or get up out guy I feel like I disrespect

his his his normal killing clothes set of clothes that's right yeah so yeah we we did reign of terror and it was great but I was a little bit anxious before and I felt like I was being like I was I feel like

Oh, my God, they can tell. This is breaking news to me. Okay, I was not going to say it at the time. The hot dog didn't calm me down. I didn't have a hot dog and it was a mistake. Mike. You two had a hot dog and I was like, I don't need a hot dog. Let's get some more about this hot dog.

Like, what do we talk? Was it pop up, what's it in normal? Where did the hot dog come from? They had hot dogs before. Wait, did you say that or did you just know this? No, he said it. Yeah, he said it. I like the idea that.

Did I just sense it? Wait, wait, wait. You had hot dogs before. I got confused. Well, Jason is a hot dog detective. Yeah. So I could see a scenario where Scott didn't catch the U. 8 hot dogs, but Jason just went, hmm.

That's exactly what I am. It's like a Christopher Walkin and Dead Zone. You touched me and were like, you've had hot dogs. Yeah. I sent a fully intact, not sliced down the middle, mustard relish, not ketchup. Jason predict the toppings. Yours had sourcrow.

Your companion had Chicago style. Oh, it wasn't a flat top. It was boiled. God, I've been sitting there a little while, but not super long. That's right. The dog zone. The dog zone. So you regretted not having a hot dog?

Yes, because we were standing in line, and I hadn't really thought about it. And then I let my intrusive thoughts started going, and I was like, I'm a little lightheaded. I haven't had dinner. I haven't had dinner. Oh, no. I haven't had dinner. Why didn't I have a hot dog? I should have had a hot dog because now I'm feeling a little woozy.

And then I started like asking questions about things. And I'm like, you're asking too many questions. Don't ask you? Why are you asking all these questions? And you know what the deal is. This is just a haunt. You've been through these before. Buddy, I hate to see it in distress, but the listeners are probably love it.

Like, finally, we've heard enough about Jason's anxiety, a new flavor of anxiety. Yeah, I think my anxiety's been featured on the show. Yeah, I think there are. I don't know. I don't think I've called this. I guess that's fair. I guess that's fair. No, but, yeah, this is all, this is all news.

You covered it. You covered it. You covered it on the show, year after year. But yeah. No, usually if I, if I, if I, if I. I'm at an event you're at, and then I hear about your anxiety when I listen to the podcast later, I'm taken by surprise. Okay, because I've talked to the job. I feel like you covered it well.

I was going through my own crisis because with the new line and everything, I was a little, you know, for years I've been trying to get you to go to this. Yes. And I was just worried it wasn't going to have the effect, because this haunt means a lot to me. I actually think it was the finest haunts in Southern California. It is the one that makes, like, L.A. as a metropolis, actually, feel like a small hometown kind of vibe. I grew up in L.A., so it's like I didn't have the, like, the small town fairground thing. Sure, sure.

And this has a lot of that, and it's usually right there at the line. So when it was suddenly, like, in a new place with not the usual stuff, I was like, oh, God, no. Like, this is going to be a letdown. Because, yeah, I've, I would say, bullied perhaps you guys into trying to cover this haunt for a long time. I've sent emails about it. I've brought it up. I've heard other guests talk around it or about it, but sometimes forget where it is or forget the name and I'll be screaming at the show in my car. Like, it's rate of terror. They need to do rate of terror. I know we've gotten that wrong too, where I've confused that Buena Park haunt. Yeah, which is a very different

haunt. That's 17th door and that place is crazy. That you guys, I've done it. I've done 17th door and not in a long time. That's, that's what is known as an extreme haunt. That's not, you guys are not ready for that. That's good that you know. That's good that you've got, yeah, yeah. Before we get high on our horse, so we did Halloween or Nights one. They will touch you.

Zero hot talks for sale. They, like, they will, like, give you a little jolt of electricity. There were, I've been there with people who do a lot of extreme haunts, who have said, like, I will never go back to there. I heard they started cutting people's hair since I've last been.

Oh, okay. They really, a lot of A lot of the stuff with extreme haunts, though, is going to be hype. Like, there'll be a lot of, the stories are not actually what happens, but they want you to believe them so that you'll be wordied about what might happen to you. That's a big secret in the, in the haunt trade. Oh, yeah, you're giving a love. They do their own hype.

But, like, that one just seems like it's for people who want things to be a little more unpleasant. And it also feels a little bit like a hellhouse. Like, the message is always, like, there's an ongoing storyline every year about, a teenager who gets into trouble and it always feels like she's being punished and it feels like it has like inadvertently weird right wing values too surprisingly in Orange County

was that the one of your partner Carrie said she can't do anymore because she doesn't want to get shocked she will never go back to that hunt yes voluntary tasing that one if I recall has a safe word in each room There's 17 rooms, hence 17 doors, the 17th door. And you can always call the safe word in each room. But it's different words?

No, it's the same word. Okay, few. I was going to say it. Oh, yeah, I thought it was 17. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're free to say it, but just have all 17 memorized in order. Oh, sorry, that's the door five, oh, you're in door seven. Pancake.

Zamp. No. That's room seven? No, pancake. Back overhead. Some haunts use electricity. I've never been a fan of that. But there's even some.

really good haunts that will use it sparingly and you just power through a little. But no, not any of the theme park haunts, not something like Rain of Terror. Yeah, Rain of Terror is really a classic haunt. I mean, there's some really interesting, innovative stuff, I feel like in there. Yeah. And but also what I love the most about it is starting from the line, you will see a bunch of parents taking their kids to their first haunt and they're pretending not to be scared. you have people out of sleepover all in like the same outfits or pajamas you have like

teenagers taking siblings and like it just feels very homey they have haunters out and about who are like kind of being more fun and playful while you're waiting in line because the line gets out of control at a certain point we went early yeah because I've learned you don't have to pay for the upgraded price if you go at the very beginning but at a certain point you you have to do immediate access because the line will get to be like three hours. Now that's some of the high

because on the website it's like you think you're not going to get scared in line, you're going to get scared in line. Nice. Yeah. No, they'll usually have three different haunters who are all very different coming out and around and kind of messing with you in line.

But again, in like a not or universal type way. Nobody's touching you. It is like yeah, it's a classic haunt. Yeah, they're tasing children who came from the sleepover. Yeah, or the trampoline park. But they'll pose for photos. Like, they will be, like, when families want to get photos, they'll just sort of, like, do a bit and then, like, get in there with you.

Like, the spirit outside is great. And you could, I mean, you can enjoy this, too, from your meal at Bucca DeBepo. Yeah, that's true. So you could get a little horror. Now with the new location. Year round, really. Well, not year round. There's always year-round horror when you eat.

eat it. Yeah. That's a good point. Did they debone the meatballs? But yeah, but you wait, you just basically wait in this one long line and then once you're in, you're

in, it's basically the equivalent of doing every haunt at once. So there are now 12 rooms. The guy who started it, who I meant to look up and completely forgot, has just has had this space in

Jansmark. marketplace forever. Every time an indie haunt goes under, he takes the set and adds it to his collection. And it just stays there in the off season. They'll occasionally do like Christmas events or halfway to Halloween events or like a summer event. But it's otherwise it's just dark. And then from end of September through Halloween, like mostly Friday, Saturdays, then they'll start adding in some Sundays. They they do this. I've been to a couple of the haunts that the sets are now in in there that no longer is. Yeah, there was a Pasadena haunt that was really delightful called Ward 13 that was like family run and had their kids involved and they'd like run you around on wheelchairs and it was like really amazing and Ward 13 became part of their asylum set and I think a few of the hallows dead brothers. Yeah, it is a haunt of fallen brothers. And so it yeah, resurrects them to a degree and there are scare actors positioned throughout a little more than you'd think for how far it is, but not nearly as much.

as like a theme park haunt would have because they have a ton of animatronics I think that's the special sauce of this place wow like so many animatronic of the month contenders for you guys for when I know you're bringing that back any day now yeah yeah yeah just giving it a seven-year break but yeah you'll have so much to choose from there there was I did make a stop at one point for my favorite one which I feel like I don't want to spoil because I really want everybody to go do it Fly out to Los Angeles and drive an hour to Thousand Oaks. Can I ask, just to understand this a little better, how long does it take to do the experience?

Because the website brags about 142 plus rooms. It's about, I think that's technically accurate. It's about 12 houses. And so you'll see when you get out of the end of one, there'll be like the entryway of the next one. And it's about 30 to 40. minutes depending on how fast you're walking. I feel like it took us a half hour, right?

I think so. And they separate what I like about them too is like it's like they understand haunted like what people want out of haunts, right? And they will separate. They're not conga lining you like at theme parks. You're they separate your groups out. There are certain actors in the haunt itself positioned like halfway through or at strategic points who clearly exists to hold you for a bit to make

sure their spacing stays because they'll bring you in with your group or because we were with a small group that night like they combined two groups but like you're just with your group um they don't want you catching up to other people because a lot of these scares like they'll reset um and they want you to experience them and some of them are more kind of the charm of the house is that um they're doing more intricate special effects work than you would believe them to be capable of so there's constant surprises that feel very like theme park level like they really care about it or else it won't

have the same right exactly yeah it feels like nuts I said this I was like oh I'm surprised it's like feels like knots level yeah like production quality basically like it wasn't you think of strip mall haunts maybe you would think maybe this isn't going to be quite so impressive but it is

yeah they also yeah they use yes it's homie as well they also use a thing that is still the scariest thing to me is are these mannequins alive are these figures alive and there's I'll do it a million times and I still my brain doesn't like when I don't know which ones are humans yeah ones are not no that's that's a trigger for me too all after all these haunts that's still gonna get me I'm like oh shit one of these four is probably alive right but then if they're not I just had the same fear it didn't it didn't even change

still got on edge yeah so they do that a lot a lot of genre filmmakers and like this is a popular Hawn among people who like Halloween stuff or make horror movies. People like to come in groups. I've gone with a lot of people who have had work at my film festival. One year that my favorite year though, which we explained to you beforehand, because I think we use this quote in my house to this day, is we got paired with a kid who was like, I would say maybe ninth or tenth grade, was trying to talk his way through the house, like clearly because he was scared trying to pretend he wasn't scared

and so he was just doing a running commentary which normally would have annoyed us but we found it so much part of the flavor and charm of it that it added to it and my favorite thing he said that still has become a phrase now that we used that we talked to you Mike is there is at one point

a dog animatronic that comes out at you and he just turns to it and goes that dog has issues because that was like the level of his like he was anytime someone to haunt like oh I saw you there I saw you there and it was like oh you're trying to pretend you're not scared like we've all been there like we know what you're doing

and it was just such a part of like yeah that's what we came out here for that feeling of like what I had always wanted the haunted hayride to be but but sort of has kind of become something else is I think you can find it reign of terror. It's a theme park level haunt with a bunch of care, authenticity, huge sweep, but it also feels like, you know, you're, it's, you fall in Salem, Massachusetts. Geez, wow, wow. By the way, before, when you were, when you were, when you were, when you were, when you were eating before the, that you didn't like take a bite of, of your meal that tasted a little funky and then say, that hot dog has issues. Oh, man. All right.

I'll have to next year. That dog has issues, feels like a lateral move, too. Like, what's that new slap chop? Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, my favorite thing I heard. What's that new slap chop? I was using that phrase a lot when I was in the maze, too. Yes.

About all things. Because you got disoriented, right, during one of the... I did. So, yeah. So we went in the first room or two, and then I was like, I'm like a little lightheaded, but like, what's wrong with you? Like, just calm down. And I was like, all right, I think I'm fine.

And then we went in a room with the big spinning, like the end of the old tram tour. Oh, yeah, yeah. A big centerfuge or whatever. And I got very dizzy. Uh-huh. I went, oh, shit, not now. Like, later, later, like in room eight or something, please. Oh, no.

So then, like, for, like, another couple rooms, I was like, come on, come on. And then I think something scared me, and I could feel the adrenaline surge, and then that fixed it. Yeah, okay. It was interesting. You level down. I think, for me, yeah, it always, I, I, I, I, feel like they do have a few effective jump scares but I for me I always feel more like I'm just impressed as I go through like it's more extensive than you think the sets are so great

the scare actors are really well positioned so it's like oh wow like that was really clever and the animatronics like a lot of them are there's some of the better animatronics I've seen to be honest like not all of them because there's a lot but like the the ones that really hit like they look fantastic can I say the one I mean I spoiler thing Oh, fine. Can I say it? Sure. I'm sorry. Well, fast forward if you're going to go do it.

Didn't hit that 30 button a couple times. There's a point where there's a couple bridges you're going on and the second bridge collapses while you're walking on it. Oh, God. More Tram Tour stuff. Yeah, so you've got a tram tour a little moment there. So anyway, that's the big spoiler. That's a big one.

That's in the mine. Oh, that's the thing, too. What I love about Nods more than Universal is I always feel like Universal is like kind of the Rob Zombie heavy metal. flavor of Halloween across the board whereas Knott's is kind of all sorts of

different stuff like old Celtic mythology and like weird 20th century set like it just hits a lot of different subgenres more and Reign of Terror

has all those rooms like you start in an asylum and then you're in a fun house and then you're in the woods and then you're in the mines and then it's just like it's hitting a number of different premises right yeah so

it's there through Halloween or does it extend past? It, I would assume it does like another week. I feel like a lot of haunts always do a post-Hallowing like blackout experience. So it's like, now go through with the lights out or something. Because I do think attendance tends to dip post-Hawloven. I know a lot of friends who like haunt stuff who will wait until after Halloween and just do a bunch of stuff November 1st, 2nd when when people have lost interest and you're not waiting in multi-hour lines. Right. Because yeah, I feel like being interested in this stuff means can be very costly. And so, yeah, it's like, I feel like we're all always hunting to like, how do we not buy the express pass?

Yeah, I mean, that's what we even did at Rain of Terror. We're like, so if we get there at an hour early, then we can get in within 30 minutes and we don't have to do the upgrade. The upgrade's like 20 extra dollars. Oh, I was still not insane. Yeah, yeah, no, you're right. And that's a good thing to talk about within this season is, yeah, like I would not break the bank doing these things. They got an escapeology there, too. Do?

Wait, that Jan's? Apparently, really. You need to do a better quality of a escape room than an escape room. What? What do you mean? I feel like we... I've heard of the Minotaur. I was just, I was on the, I'm looking at the map of Jan's Marketplace just to see if we, like,

do we think there's any chance that the DSW, the DSW and the Nordstrom Rack both close, thus opening up an even bigger space? I'm seeing if this thing can expand. I bet it could. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I did ask because I was worth, I thought it was a, originally just a new entrance and that we were going to get the haunts in different order, but they apparently

moved all of their sets from the Marshall's location to the Burlington Coat factory. They're fully in the there used to be a hearse out at the front. Now luckily it's at the end. So I did, I feel like we got there and my first thing was like, the horse isn't here. Oh, you were on edge.

You thought all your favorite stuff was going to but then we got out and was like, oh, the hearse. Yeah, you get so excited about the hurt. A final treat. I want to know if we could get like a tour of it with lights on and they could tell us like, okay, this room is where the shoe department was at Burlington. Oh, yeah. This is where the

ladies, whatever, ladies' pants were. It should be like when a Disney ride replaces something and they put a little reference to it. Yeah, they put a little... Yeah, yeah. There should be the type of shoe. Right, that would be good. This is the coat. It looks like an old

torture device, but it's just a shoe, it's just a shoe size measuring machine. This vampire is wearing. Yeah, because I don't know if people know this, but Burlington, Tin Coat Factory is more than just coats. Yeah. Like the Jingles say. I get sick of people thinking that it is just great coats. And it is that.

It makes that, but it's furious when people think it's just coats. It's an ignorant thing to think. We now know it has mines and fun houses and bayous. So many options. The Bayou is new this year. Oh, that's great. Yes, the bayou was great.

Hey there, Forever Dog listeners. This is Tom Sharpling, the host of the best show. And if you're looking for something fun to do this October and you live in New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, or Chicago, boy, I've got good news for you. That's because the best show is going on tour to celebrate our 25th anniversary, and we are coming to your town. That's right, we're planning a live show for the ages featuring friends and characters from the last 25 years of the best show, plus plenty of mirth, music, and mayhem. Trust me, you don't want to miss this. We've got special guests, John Worcester, is going to be. there. So much cool stuff is happening. You do not want to miss these shows. You can find

ticket dates and links on our website at thebestshow.net. That's the best show.net. Thank you so much and I'll see you there. So anyway, we're going to talk about what you're seeing as the title of this episode, Cinderella Castle Mystery Tour, but we still have, there's still so much other stuff to at least touch upon, I feel like. You were just in Vegas. I was just in Vegas to do some spooky things. Doing spooky things. Are there any highlights, low lights?

What do you think? Yes, I finally went to Zach. Is it Zach Began? Zach Beganz? I think it. Baggan? This is someone Eva brought up, Evaneson brought up on our Las Vegas episode. We talked about it in that live show.

He was on the wheel of guys. Right. Yeah. And we haven't talked about him since, but you experienced something that he created. Yes, we finally went to his haunted museum, which I have been seeing ads for for years and years and years. Okay. Yes. And tried to go to once on another trip, but we hadn't bought tickets in advance.

And they were like, oh, no, you have to buy a time slot and it's a tour. It'll be three hours until you get. Anyways. Oh, yeah. So I was with Eva and Jason Waller and I wriggled out. I was like, cab back to the hotel. Thank you. Well, and you know what?

I think you probably did the smart thing for you because this is. it took an hour to get in there even with our allotted time and the tour itself they said was two hours on the website then the tour got itself told us it was two and a half hours and then when we got out because they make you turn off your phones entirely oh um it was it had been three hours oh jeez oh where i got i got a fantastic nap in my shit-ass valley's room well you could have spent four you could have spent four hours in total from entering the zach began's um haunted museum, uh, to leaving. And no, I mean, it, it actually was, I'm very conflicted about this place. Okay, okay. I'm torn because I had an extraordinary time. Um, we definitely got spooked. Like, they do a good job of telling their stories.

It was really fun vibes like in there. Um, but also, this place is clearly a grift. And I, I, I, I, Zach Bagan's does not seem like a swell guy. A lot of his videos I'm trying to remember Why he should be a guy A lot of his videos He managed to throw in

various celebrity relationships Like he's very one of his Attraction specifically Because the tour guy will always cut to a video of Zach being like Here is how we got this I will never look at this again But I've left it here for you

Remember you signed a waiver saying We're not responsible If any forces follow you home And like one of the One of the rooms has him being like, one night, I actually took the glass case and protection spell off of this, like, magical box when I was in here with my good friend, Post Malone. And he, he's like, and then Post Malone's wife, life was ruined after this. Oh, this sounds good. Oh, yeah, he had to go country, post Malone in a row.

Yes, and he's like, here's him talking about it on my other good friend, Joe Rogan's podcast. This sounds, oh, I should. There's a lot of that. I don't want to do this now. Yeah, yeah. No, it's, I think everybody should do it once. And they do like, first, we, we paid for like the basic ticket. And then we get there.

And after you've been waiting for an hour, you go into the first room and you think, oh, is the tour starting? And they're like, no, you're literally in here to upsell you. And they go, oh, this is your last chance to actually get the BIP package, which comes with a free shirt. And we're like, oh, no, I don't, I don't necessarily need that. And they're like, but it also comes with the 10 extra rooms that you can't see without it. The tour, and they go, the tour is not longer by the,

way. It's just that anybody who doesn't have this pass will have to wait while everyone else in the group with the pass goes into the other rooms. So last chance, are you sure you want to buy that? And then I watched as everybody, including us, went like, all right, here's the get to the other $30. It's a true trick. Because I was just like, well, we're only coming here once. Right. And I was like, and the tour's not longer. We're just going to sat outside. And I also know myself well enough to be like, oh, man, I wish I could see whatever was in that room. It's where you have to pay the insurance to need. To be fair, those rooms are better if you are going to do it, which I'm not necessarily recommending.

Know your own taste. The way that Jason and I recoiled at everything you just said, and then Mike was like, oh, now I want to go. As soon as he's being dropped post-molo and I got excited. The casino owners are going to be mad at Zach, keeping people off the gaming floors for that long. That amount of time. But my favorite is there's one room where he talks about how the curses that – he'll always talk about the curses that befell the people that handled the object that has now come to rest in the room. And at one point he talks about he's like, and then he's like this happened, this other thing happened. He's like, and then my ghost hunting partner, his like right after we – he touched this object found out that his wife had hired a hitman to put a contract out.

on his life and I'm just like I feel like that has nothing to do with the object I feel like there's other stuff going on the wheels might have been turning on that before yeah I feel like the object there is coincidental like it didn't go all the way from loving marriage to hit man I feel like that more speaks to the caliber of your company like the ghost hunters hey before we go to the next secret room can we talk about the hit man um is there a dummy room I see a dummy room he's a be posing in front of? There is, I mean, they change a lot. There's a bunch of oddities rooms

which are cool. There's a marionette room that is actually really nice. I like it as like a collection of hoarding, but also as an excuse to populate the room, they're like, some of these objects are haunted, some are not. We don't touch anything because we won't always tell you which ones are.

And I'm like, oh, so you just filled a room full of collectibles. This is just crap you collected over the years. Did they try to upcharge you into purchasing his music of his album of electronic music necro fusion which they had which is framed as

the artist is listed as Zach Baggins versus Praga Khan Praga Khan is of course a legendary pioneer of post industrial electronic dance music so this is a rare versus not a collaboration but the opposite

I mean that feels like Zach Baggins's style always confrontational fighting So Scott is not doing the VIP tour, but he is trying to figure out how to just buy the electronic album.

You can do that separately on shop. dot the hauntedmuseum.com. It's only $10. That seems like an undervalue of this incredible music, this incredible necro fusion music. You can listen to it on your way to Kiblipp,

which we did not go to. I did throw it out on our itinerary. It's a big old have you done it? No, I've never done it. I have heard all the stories. I hear it's getting It's getting even worse I heard Oh also and it's currently breaking

I think they're like Speaking of the hit man And there seems to be some trouble in paradise As far as the Chris Angel Maybe Chris Angel visited the museum And touched on an object That has to have been it Oh right

Zach tricked him I did I did suggest we go check out Kaplip and my partner immediately said no And I said well no Let me explain what it is And she just goes I know who your friends are I know what it is

We're not going to that. I think my wife any time I bring it up, it's like we're here for my birthday. We're not. We're not going. I want to improve your birthday. Yeah.

Fresh Italian ice. Oh, you said you were hot events from Italian ice would cool you down. A three-hour car ride in some Italian ice. We can listen to this necro fusion act. I want to hear that album. You're who wins the Battle of Zach versus Praga.

But yeah, I think everybody should go to this museum once or never at all. But, uh, hmm, that's, that's, that's the final verdict. So Mike has already bought any number of, uh, tickets and had on. I bought an annual pass to it. I should have brought you the shirt that we begrudgingly took because again, well, you'd like this, Jason. They, uh, uh, they were like, look, you get for the extra $30. You get these rooms plus the shirt.

the shirt on its own is just 40 and I'm like oh you do get the shirt well you get the shirt otherwise I'd have to pay $40 for the shirt I wasn't going to get to be around my favorite justification oh it could be around the house shirt I'm so many fucking around the house shirts nothing but around the house shirt and at the end they were like oh do you want your shirt

and I was like I'm taking the shirt I paid for the shirt I'm getting a shirt like I'm not don't I earned this shirt We only have extra smaller for X-L, so choose why. Yeah, I'm like, I'm late to the rest of our... We have tickets to stuff. You made us turn off our phone. I had no concept of time.

I did not know how long I've been a prisoner in this house. Beatles' love is not staying forever. There's a... TMZ has multiple articles about him. Yeah, TMZ, they occasionally feature some of the stuff on TMZ. There's a lot of videos in the room. There isn't, maybe it's new. I don't know.

The thing that Eve, had mentioned is not there anymore because I know they rotate the exhibits but they had a room about Natalie Wood which really creeped me out like not in a good way and they also had as you walked out in the last rooms they had sunglasses they said

they recovered from the Paul Walker crash site and I was like this is not supernatural like what is happening now? This is just like a class collection I feel like that's everything you need to know about Zach Oh, boy. About Mr. Bagan's. I'm also reading a lot into this TMZ update,

which is that he added Saddam Hussein's sweater to the museum. What? Oh, I didn't, I don't think I saw Saddam Hussein's sweater. Which he got from some Iraq character whose nickname is Shrek. The Sheriff of Baghdad, Shrek McPhee, who is a mutual friend of Zach and Joe Rogan. A new name to drop. Yeah, I think I've heard of that before. You've heard of Sheriff Shrek who all.

He owns Sheriff Shrek, who owns Saddam's sweater. Ooh, do you have a new guy? He's pretty promising. Sheriff Shrik, you're going outside. Well, wait, did he wear the sweater in the Heidi hole? I don't. Remember the Heidi hole? It might have just, it was just an around-the-hole sweater.

Oh, yeah, okay. But he has so many of those already. Maybe Zach will buy the body and Clyde cart when the desert eventually squallows Prim hole, as it seems to be having some real tough times. Prim basically doesn't exist anymore. Yeah, it's down from three casinos and an outlet ball to one casino. Yeah. I can't believe Bonnie and Clyde's car was there the whole time. But I also feel like there's like 40 Bonnie and Clyde's cars.

Yeah, that's like when the Simpsons would joke about Hitler's car. Yeah, yeah, a lot of other deathmobiles too. Yeah. But are there a lot of Saddam sweaters that I don't know. Or do I trust Sheriff Shrek? I don't know. I couldn't begin to tell you. If you can trust Sheriff Shrek, who can you trust in this crazy world?

Sheriff Shrek McPhee That's a name you can trust So is there okay You did a couple of things real quick Vegas Oh yeah yeah I also finally made it to horror Unleashed

Okay we haven't done it So don't go wild with spoilers But maybe a little bit of the universal I ask only because that name is completely unmemorable And I've ever clocked it as the name of that thing Right Universal's horror unleashed

Don't worry Because the second you get into Vegas your algorithm will constantly throw ads about it you saying the name just now so clearly will do to all our listeners' phones or unleashed all the time now because it operates seven days

a week like from morning to night which seems like a business model that will not succeed for long well you don't think Area 15 phase two like you don't think all these businesses area 15 drives me

insane They're getting a, I saw a video about it, they're getting a dolls kill, which is apparently like a more upscale hot topic slash Victoria's seat. What is it called? Dolls kill? Yeah, there was a sign for it. Coming soon. Gauphi, Victoria's Secret.

Mike, again, incredibly interested. Hot topic. Victoria's secret, uh-oh, interest plummeting. Yeah. Wait, there's lingerie there? Never mind. Close this place down. Never mind.

We even Nevada has to have some rules and standards. There was a lot. Those aren't dolls and toys at all. I just want Funko Pops. There were giant dolls kills coming soon sign. And we were intrigued like, oh, what is that? What's Dolls Kills? It's coming soon.

Whatever will that be? And then completely forgot, lost any interest in looking it up. And I now know what it is thanks to you. But yes, that's coming soon. A museum of ice cream is coming soon. Dolls Kill collab with insane clown posse coming up soon. Like I said, upskirts. Yeah, only the best of the best.

You'll cover it with the area 15 ordeal. Joe, it will be an ordeal. There's one of these on Fairfax. Mike, get down there. Fairfax. I go to Tall to kill right now. A bunch of people in leather and pink hair waiting in line. You should be there.

That's cool stuff like you. Oh, my God, it is like me. I like the three My Chemical Romance songs. I have a distinct memory as a teenager of being at CityWalk at Hot Topic where there was like a grunge guy greeter. And he was, we were in there when he got off shift and was replaced by a got off, like, a guy who was just like, hi, hi. After the like, hey, hey. And I was suddenly like, it was like that, it was a real turning point in my brain where I was like, wait a minute, I'm being marketed to.

Like, that wasn't an authentic grunge guy. This store isn't like for real. These are characters. Like, this, if I buy things here, it's not saying something about myself. I don't need this snake's on a plane shirt at all. Don't hire a goth as a greeter. You know what you know the energy you're going to get. But it was just to see the shift change was like watching a veil lifted.

I was like, oh, I can never go back. The magic is gone. This place is dirty to me now. They have no more nightmare before Christmas merchandise from this particular location. Doll's Kill has a pop punk nurse costume, which is of course the, I assume the nurse on the cover of Blink 1282's Enema of the state. So I'm conflicted because the costume is sexy,

but it's from one of my favorite albums of all time. You could just, you could put it on a mannequin that you clothe underneath the sexy nurse costume. Right. Yeah, give it a full cloak and then the nurse costume on top and then no actual human body is being sexualized.

Thank God. And then the model looks like she's very like upset or being held against her will or something. Oh, yeah. It's a weird looking photo. Anyway, doll is she trying to replicate the pose from the album cover? No, I think the album cover. But it's like a wide shot.

I don't think so. Okay. I don't think so. No, she's excited because she's snapping on the glove. Right. Because she's going to put her fingers up your glove. Right. She's going to do the prostate exam.

Sure. Every woman's dream. Yeah. The one thing I'll say about Horror Unleashed is it is, it was surprisingly, the haunts themselves, the four haunts were surprisingly better than I expected them to be. And they are versions of like, past haunts. I do think it's a cool idea that haunts that only exists seasonally from years ago are now now exist in a place. I don't know how they would switch out easily, but like it is four

haunts from horror nights past that you can now experience. And they were all pretty good and there were scarecrow the reaping as opposed to scarecrow music by slash. Right. Yes, the earlier incarnation of scarecrow. There was no slash music. I like that. That's their one original haunt. Their universal monster's haunt was a delight. Their Texas chainsaw massacre haunt was was very solid. And then I remember doing the Exorcist Believer Hunt. That's a weird choice to be the sort of already forgotten David Gordon Green exorcist entry.

I thought that was so funny when I heard that was one of the ones because I think they gambled on that before the movie came out. Oh, man. And the first Omen was a big head. But Exorcist Believer I think made money because people know the name, but not great reviews on that well it was an original haunt at horror nights the year it came out so i wonder if it was just easy to pour it over yeah that's true yeah because i don't know what they do with these when they're done um i think repurpose repaint this is very interesting for these houses being in an

air-conditioned warehouse yeah would you have to do in Vegas well yes but it's like oh i thought part of the the creepiness of the houses at Harnight's Hollywood was this is quickly built and painted. Yeah. Like paint it plywood cooks in the sun at the end and during the L.A. summer. And then like- You think that's part? You want that? I think it added to the mystique a little because I was like, oh, this smells bad, this

felt bad. I'm like, I mostly smell musty, dirty paint, I think. I like your take on Hans because I was listening to the episode where you talked about how you were calmed by the idea that, oh, well, we're invading their home. Yeah, we're invading their home. And I just like, oh, that's a great. I never thought about that, but I love that way. But now I like this added wrinkle of like, oh, and like the appreciation of the sets

is that they survived the elements. It's like how the art got into a museum. The story is just an important. Oh, how are they faring during this early winter rainstorm? U.S.S. they had to endure heat and now cool and rain. Right. Imagine the smells in there now. And dust.

And then they have tour elements. There's also the mystery because, like, remember, we possibly got bad information about the E.T. trees surviving and being in one of the Fanfest nights, I think the Dungeons and Dragons. And then we've tried to confirm it and no one can officially confirm it, but people think it's wrong. I'm pretty sure those trees, though, were in the alien versus predator hunt they had a few years back. Sure. Because I remember having that smell. and remember getting really excited because I hadn't been to Universal Orlando

yet and really thought E.T. was a thing of the past. And I would never get to go again. And so it was like, oh, the smells! Ah, so the trees smell. That's some of the confusion. That was in the old Alien v. Predator Haunt, which is the first night I ever did at Universal Horror Nights Hollywood. So it was a thing of like, I'm going to love this place. They've got the trees. It's the first thing I smell.

Alien and Predator are attacking me. Can you confirm? I don't know. how much this is even clear at horror unleashed, Vegas, is that this is like a haunted warehouse where Universal's store is all the horrors?

First off, please, Universal's horror unleashed. Universal's horror unleashed. It's very important. Excuse me. Heaven forbid I say something for the listeners to understand. You use plain language. Yes, now that you say that,

I feel like I now understand what was being said as we whist past the line because we grabbed our tickets like on our way there because they do time slots every 20 minutes. So we were, we just walked in ourselves. At first we thought like, oh, great, no one will be here. It's three o'clock. Like, this is an odd time for anyone to go to something like this. We had something to do also in area 15, two hours later. And I'll just say we made it. We did the entire thing in under two hours.

And still manage to pay a hundred dollars a person to go in. This thing is twice as expensive as it should be. For a two hour. But the line does indicate various relics. And then the four things they call scare zones, which I realize are just like corners about as big as the room we're in, are four different scare zones. They contain the various relics that are mentioned in the line to get into the warehouse itself.

So it is like their scare zones are called, I think, dead storage, prop graveyard, Jack's Alley, because get prepared. There's an original character at Universal who has a show. Oh, Jack and Chance from Florida. Oh, wait, they're from Florida. Oh, yeah, they are. Oh.

From Florida. Yeah, they bring them back every few years. Jane knew the person who originate the Chance role. Well, get ready for his catchphrase. Hell yeah, Jack. Which you will have to say a lot during the show. Yeah, you have to hype them up in the show. They have a show where they, maybe it is based on Orlando.

Okay, that actually makes so much sense. Because I spent the entire day muttering to myself afterwards where I'm like, why did they gamble on an original character for this place? This doesn't like a cat. I'm just like, what? Like, how are they luring people in here with a clown named Jack? But now, okay, now it's a throwback to Orlando. Yeah.

So now I get it. slightly, he's not an unknown character, he's a slightly known character. Orlando diehards can fly to Vegas, being like, a chance to see Jack once more. Yeah. I think he's popular. Where he sacrifices contestants. No, he makes contestants do gamble for their lives, basically, or like beg for their lives by performing.

And because it's Vegas, like all of a sudden, you know, they can juggle or do incredible feats. And then you have to vote whether or not to kill them. but they always die and yeah so that show I think cycles every two hours the haunts close at various times because that's how they like work the space

and then they'll have like in the vampire scare zone there they'll be like a like a zip lining vampire and some photo op stuff but it's like it's interesting it's like it's big both bigger and smaller than you think it should be the haunts themselves are big

that's what I liked about it it seems like you're in this tiny space the food itself also not horrible which is surprising for Universal. Universal has some of the worst food I have ever had. I still think about the corn dog near the mummy ride. That made me so sick. Mike's Googling that too.

Corn dog's still available? Must find out for self. That actually was one of my safe food, like guaranteed. What are you saying words? Huh? What are you safe words? That's how you get out of door seven. Corn dog, corn dog.

This corn dog has issues. Hey, I got a. Corknog, save for All right and I have some privacy in my life. Jeez, Louise. Sorry. But yes, no, Horror Unleashed,

we were in and out in under two hours. Did not eat at the big restaurant, which is sort of a shrine to Blumhouse promotional items for upcoming movies. That's the theme of the restaurant. You didn't get to get marketed to

while you ate? Oh, I took a photo in the black phone phone booth. Oh, okay. Very good, very good. That's pretty good. But, yeah, there's Jack's Alley, prop graveyard. Oh, I think the vaults, which is where most of the relics are.

Oh, yeah, yeah. But these are all little corners. But the haunters are all very good. And the haunted houses, like, once you get past the initial line, the second part of the line is in like a giant entryway. Like, it's really good design within there. But then you leave and you're faced with the question of, why is this building here? What is this for? Like, why is, why are people going to go at 11 a.m. on a Wednesday in February to this.

Yeah, that's weird. Yes, will they? We'll see. Well, there's a lot of that. Like, well, people come here at 11th, Monday, wording? I mean, I think it's cool. I don't want to malign it because I like the idea that Universal has a year-round horror thing. I like the idea that Universal is making all these mini parks and, like, actually, like, I think we should be having more things.

Yeah. So I want to retract everything I said and say everybody should have to be. He said a lot of good things. So these are three solid recommendations and non-recommendations. So I think you presented them in a pretty good light. Look, I like things that I hate. Welcome to podcast. I know.

Yeah. How many times have we done a full episode and then said, so we talked to nothing but shit? And then said, so go there. Yeah. Yeah. So that's part for the course for the show. But, you know, there's a bunch of haunted stuff that you can always do.

Uh, we, I did, did any of you guys ever do the Griffith Park ghost train? No. Uh, that was perfect. And the evil train society of Griffith Park basically had it. Like the cranks there had it. Oh, oh, really? It existed for years. It was something you could have brought your children to.

It is probably the best, like, I, I put that up there, like, even more than Boney Island, even more than reign of terror. Like, to me, that was the quintessential Los Angeles perfect Halloween thing to do. Is this the Griffith Park train that exists? Like, is it an overlay of that? Yeah, or was there, okay, okay. We just went to that and we're wondering, like, we should go because I bet they do something for Halloween. And then we're on it going, they do not. They used to.

The long one, that's like a 30-minute train ride. There's a short one near the front of Griffith Park. There's three, confusingly. Yes. And then there's another train museum. Then there's the one with Waltz Barn. Yes. That's the longest, isn't it?

There's one, you enter, it's like in the back of Griffith Park. like north and it's like a 25 minute train you sit on and you sit on top of it and that that's the affiliated with the wall that's the one they used to turn

to the Griffith Park Ghost train and it was exceptional like they did so much incredible work there were animatronics I have video somewhere of like there's like a Halloween song and it wakes up an angry tree like the branches are like singing

and then it wakes up the tree trunk and he's like, what with all the ruckus? And it's amazing. I saw this the one year Boney Island was set up next to it. And I'm like, what is that? That looks awesome. So the Griffith, that was the Griffith Park Ghost Trains comeback because they, the train society had already killed them.

And then, uh, and then they got brought back. And then it almost seems like Boney Island was like a bridge too far for like the old, uh, the old fuddy dutty. Who were like, who were just like, was like, what is this a haunted, uh, like, Carnival, like, now there's Boney Island here. Like, it's all got to go. We were it. We successfully chased that Walt Disney out of here with his carnival hijinks.

We stole his barn. We planted it every third Sunday. Listen to the presentation. That barn has a flag ceremony if you stayed at the end of that. That is, um, uh, disquieting. Wow. That is. I knew somebody who used to work at one of the Burbank schools and they're like, yeah,

there are some old cranks in Burbank. He's like, I met some old cranks. He was still like, this place hasn't been the same since the Lockheed Martin factory closed. This Empire Center shouldn't be there. It's like this, that was the not, the early 90s. The old crank, were you, did you look in the mirror at all and say there? No. No.

I spotted one in this window. I turned, I turned my computer monitor on. I wasn't looking at a reflection. Okay. I too, Miss Lockheed Martin. The big boy doesn't have a drive-thru anymore. They shut it down. This town used to have some oomph when there was a super fun site where the target is.

No, but I do get sad when I think that people can't do the Griffith Park Ghost Train because I think even more so than Rain of Terror, that was the thing. It wasn't scary. It was a lot of animatronics. It was like a great way to get somebody, like a small child excited about Halloween. And it was long. Like you'd be on there and they're like, oh yeah, this is 30 minutes. And it would sell out.

There'd be crazy lines if you didn't make a reservation. Like it made the train museum money. Like they literally were just like, we don't care about the money. We care about people being on the trains for the right reason. Yeah. Right. Respect, respecting the mechanism. Yeah, yeah.

Uh-huh. And we care about like, you know, like you come here and two of the train conductor people are nice. Yeah. And the other 25 just kind of like mill around and turn their backs to the audience and like, like, you know, clang on. things with wrenches. Yeah. They're like,

if you're not here to be serious about the lore of trains, we would prefer you not come at all. D-values trains as a genre of thing to do. If you came to look

at Halloween sets, like, that is not what we do here. So impure train desires. Somebody told me that they had an idea I was at some immersive conference and of course,

of course the Griffith Park ghost train came up. And they, uh, somebody was saying like, they're a big idea, which I think could work. They're like, look, what if we all join the train society and then we outvote them? Oh, my God.

A coup. We have the votes now. So this is my call to the Army of Podcast, the ride listeners. Join the Griffith Park train. Oh, Jason. Overthrow them. You got to do it, Jason. Get the right kind of crank on this board.

Presidents, yeah, you could really, you follow the Trump playbook and just sort of bully your way through and get everyone ousted and then. pose your will on the train society. Ooh, you're speaking my language. You could run it with a ruler with an iron fist. Yeah. And then we get that haunted thing back. So we are, I think we're currently at what could be in a reasonable length episode,

the halfway point. That's true, yeah. Is this possibly a point at which to... I sure, yeah, I think so. Because this is a, this is no slouch. Or would you rather discuss more esoteric defunct regional We have two shows

You know We're at kind of like You know a little train interchange Kind of point you know We could talk about This cool thing in Tokyo Disneyland Or we could look up the names Of who's on the train board

Oh yeah Going through them one by one Look up their houses Docks them Yeah we're gonna docks these old train men It's like We'll outfote them We're certainly gonna outlive them

There was a documentary called this film Is not yet rated Some years back Yeah It was like a big festival film That was a look at like why the MPA exists who's on the board who's on the board who does the who

and at one point in the film he like he researches everybody gets a bunch of information puts them in the documentary and then sends them the movie to rate where they have to watch all the footage is collected of them I have watched this film and you know it's crazy one of the people on the board who gets doxed and named is is a family friend Or on Aaron's side As they're going through the names And it gets to somebody And I don't want to say the name

But it gets to somebody like Oh my God I've talked to him at a thousand Christmas parties Whoa What he's one of the Because the whole point was showing That like people That the ratings are determined

By people who work at the movie theaters So that that's what they were proving With like so that they You know isn't that a conflict of interest So yes one of those people I was like oh And you hadn't known that No he's just a nice guy

Hey, hello, Merry Christmas. Yeah, but I won't say that name. So the mystery revealed there, and then we segue into Cinderella Castle Mystery Tour. Yes, yeah, yeah. Well, that documentary proved a bit of a mystery tour for me. Who knew, but what people, what acquaintances could be around every corner. And now we go to this. Okay, so Cinderella Castle Mystery Tour, a defunct Tokyo Disney attraction.

and I think probably we that we have not done an episode about it but probably we and a lot of listeners have bumped into this with the notoriety of this could be the scariest attraction that Disney ever built. It feels very non-Disney in its degree of scariness. Now, to bring it to you, Landon, I didn't, does you picking this topic imply that you got to do it? No, sadly, no, it is.

But I do want to ask you this, did you guys, like hearing about the ride, you want to do it? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Because it seems like something I could handle, especially now. Because it's not, scariest thing Disney ever built probably puts it at the mid tier of Universal or Not's things.

It's more just like the oddity, you know, probably the closest equivalent would be Alien Encounter. Yeah. As far as like, yeah, oddly disquieting just because that's never the Disney brand. Which I also never got to do. I haven't, I wasn't a Disney World kid. Uh, we went to Not Universal and Disneyland here. constantly, but the first time

I went to Disney World was 2017. Oh, so long. So I missed. I did get the end of the great movie ride and I got the end of Ellen's universe of energy which I'm so glad I got to try because I would not believe you if you told me what am I saying? That's the scariest

thing Disney ever. The Ellen Animatronic is the scariest thing Disney ever built. I still remember going into that and watching the 25 minute movie three-screen movie and then with Bill Nye and Jamie Lee Curtis also.

That's so long before a ride even starts. And I remember turning to my friend who had been on it before and I'm like wait, this isn't it? There's still a ride? And he's like, yeah. And then we get in and they start warning people to like maybe not do the ride. And I'm like, what's this? I've never heard this before and they're like, this ride

is 40 minutes. There is no bathroom. There is another 40 minutes. I'm like, every Disney ride I've ever been on is 12 minutes longer. shorter like what's happening it's incredible I'm so glad I got to do with the ones and never again yeah yeah what's strange yeah I know if you describe it to people it doesn't

it should be in Zach Beganz's hot Oh yeah yeah she should be I'm trying to quickly find my photo oh here I got it This won't help the listener but The Ellen Animatronic they were selling at one of these Disney auction things and I got to go right up next to it look at that Look at how hideous I can't believe that's what it looks like

I mean I think clearly like you know It was more formed to the body of the animatronic when it was functioning, but whenever all that skin came off and they just put it on a weird mannequin, it now is the scariest thing you've ever seen. Eyes bugging out, no teeth. As I kept saying, as I said at the time, it's what Ellen looks like on the inside. That's a frightening. Yeah, no, that might be more frightening than this ride we're just going to discuss. But no, that, like, so I never, yeah, I never got to do like alien encounter or maelstrom or horizons. And those are, or the original journey into imagination. And I have lost sleep over that. Like,

crazy person. Every one of those is, I mean, some of those, I, I was seven years old when I did it, but they like, it's, it's like honestly, some of my earliest memories. Yeah. So, uh, no, that's very jealous. Uh, but, but I get the exact same feeling when I learned about this ride, which I don't remember when. I know eventually I watched the defunct land, uh, YouTube episode on it, which is great.

Yeah. But, but I know ever since I first learned about this, this is always that, that one, you know, When you have, yeah, whenever I, like, I work with people who aren't into immersive or theme park stuff, and they're like, oh, you know everything about stuff. I'll be like, oh, but did you know about Cinderella's mystery tour? Only existed in Tokyo, Japan, based on a Japanese ghost house. It's so strange. So this was not, it wasn't an opening day thing.

It was July 86, ran for two decades. It was, it, it ran for so long for what it was. I know, yeah, yeah. That's, and I think, like, well received. I don't think it was not, I think unlike Alien Encounter, they weren't trying to chase it out of there. Right, well, also unlike Alien Encounter, you know, alien encounter

build itself as a scary ride that was maybe too scary. And Cinderella's, what's the right, Cinderella's Mystery Tour? Cinderella Castle Mystery Tour. They like Universal's horror unleashed. Yeah, yeah. I'm sure we'll

keep remembering it. It tricked you. It built itself as a tour of Cinderella's castle like a ballroom like they tricked you in the copy of it they didn't tell you

it was going to be scary and the sign is lightly scary as like Maleficent on it not from Cinderella confusingly but it's but you could if you aren't you know

if you didn't super stare at that sign even then subtle clues you might just say like I'm gonna go see what's in the castle because this is a question I think that comes up

in all of these theme parks is like okay oh the castle I can't wait to see the castle and take a picture of the castle. What's in the castle? And it's different in every single park. We covered this a little bit. There's the diorama in that little walking tour,

Sleeping Beauty in here. In Florida, there's now a restaurant, was not always a restaurant. That's sort of a newish, vaguely new, or has that been there for? No, the royal table. It's been there quite a while. I don't know if it's always been there,

but it's been there for a long time. That was the first time I ever went to Disney World and a friend who was taking me, you know, knew I had never been and had grown up there. and said, like, what do you want to do? And I was like, it's very important to me that we eat at the restaurant

in Cinderella's Castle. Oh, yeah, sure. And so he ended up scoring a last minute reservations. It was the first thing we did when we get in. And I did not realize it was like, what we had signed up for was a character meal. Oh, adults with no children. Yeah, so it's two adults with no children, exhausted from a red eye flight

coming from like another conference. And like, just princesses one by one coming up to us being like ooh have you seen Aladdin and like Snow White's doing like an old accent and I was just like oh no I've never felt creepier never in my life if I felt creepier but my understanding is that Tokyo

because it was a port of Magic Kingdom they were always intending to put this ride up so it opened it's not like it replaced a ride The castle in Tokyo didn't open with a restaurant. It opened with nothing, and then this got finished and opened three years later. Okay, gotcha. Yeah, yeah. And I think, and it was inspired by the fact that anything in, there's not a lot of room in Cinderella's castle.

And for there would be like a kind of a more robust attraction. You'd have to go downstairs. You'd have to do it in the basement. Right. So building off of that, what can you do that is, you know, fits in a basement? You could do something, I guess, creepy and claustrophobic and wandering. through, you know, different odd dungeon-ish spaces. So that's how you get here.

Sort of Cliff Notes version of it. It's like, I mean, like, broad scheme of things, yes, it's like there's a fake out. You think that you're going to look at nice Cinderella things. And then you're in a room with a bunch of mirrors or paintings of fun characters who you like. Pinocchio. Yes, there they are. All my friends I will go meet.

And then the magic mirror comes to life from Snow White. Is anything in this from Cinderella? There's no real villain in Cinderella. I read something that said Cinderella might be in there. But I feel like it's primarily the original portraits were Pinocchio, Aurora from Sleeping Beauty, Taryn of course, from the Black Corrine or the Lawn Caldron. The Disney Wiki says, like there's paintings of Disney heroes and heroines. It's like Cinderella, Pinocchio, Aurora, Snow White, and Taryn. It's like, hold up.

Had to look that one off. That's why this ride is extraordinary because it is and probably remains, and someone correct me if I'm wrong, like the only example of Black Cauldron ever being featured in any theme. The only acknowledgement of a real black sheep of the Disney animated film collection, 1985's the Black Caldron. Certainly the only attraction that is heavily, but maybe I think here and there

character appearances in the parks, and then there's a restaurant in Disney World that at one time was called Gerge's munchings and crunchings. Wow. Which is, I guess, something. Where was that? I don't know.

I looked at it, it's like changed names a bunch of times and I'm not sure what it is. Today, I'm sorry, I don't have that at my disposal. Scott, is that making you You're hungry? GERGies and crunch cheese. My stomach's gurggy. I wonder, I'm going to make a guess.

Is this what became the lady in the tramp restaurant? Oh, Tony's Town Square? I think that's too prominent. Was maybe always that. Yeah, I don't know. Okay, Magic Kingdom, it's in fantasy land. Oh, right. That makes a lot more sense.

Formerly Lancers in became Lumiere's kitchen. Does that answer that? Is that what it is today? I don't eat in fantasy land ever. As a rule. Yeah, yeah. Probably for the best. Generally speaking, yes.

So, yes, that's, I think, the beauty in the beast's castle. Yeah, why'd that I'll eat there? Although not anymore. It got bad, I think. Did it? Well, that was okay for a minute. It was good for a while, yeah.

Yeah, a lot of the restaurants in Disney World, you really got a double check because it's like, you could be walking into character meal, could be walking into a prefixed meal, you could be, you know, and stuff. You could be walking into the greatest goddamn toppings bar on Earth. That's right. Yeah. Well, I ate at the Canadian Steakhouse once, years and years ago, like 2013, 2014 or so.

Because I'd read all this stuff that was really good, and it was really good. And then within a year, someone's like, oh, Steakhouse got shitty. It's like, what happened? I don't know. I actually am interested in this. Did the, in the listeners' opinion, did the Steakhouse get shit? I've never been to the steakhouse. I really liked it when I went. But, yeah, that was 10, 11 years ago. Okay. So I don't.

It's been a funny time for something to get shitty? I find most of the world pavilion restaurants to be underwhelming. Like, I feel like I've eaten at a lot of them now, and I feel like there's so many other places I'd rather go. I like the Mexican restaurant a lot that is like Florida's Blue Bayou. Yeah, yeah. I've never done. I ate there a few. Oh, yeah.

I like that. I like going there at lunch when it's daylight out, because it's not, it's not like it feels like it. And I like watching the boat. Let's go by. Oh, yeah, I love hanging out in there. Anyway, so, yeah, look, besides Gurgh's Munchy's and Crunchings, this is the main way Black Cauldron was in the park. So Black Cauldron, I guess if you don't know this history, this was in this odd kind of before the Eisner-Katsenberg takeover. It was in progress.

They were making it, and then that regime came in, and they hated, hated everything they saw and tried to, like, they cut tons out of the movie. Katzenberg, especially. Yes, Casabert tried to commandeer the edit, and they were like, it's not how edits work in animation. And it's like, well, there's got to be a way. And then they had to chase him out of the edit room. But I don't know if anyone was wrong. Well, I don't know.

The movie got delayed. Yeah, the movie got delayed, I know, a couple of years. It ended up costing over $40 million. It became this big albatross. I think it was supposed to originally come out before Fox and the Hound, and then they pushed it and switched them up. Ended up coming out the week of my birth. It was new.

theaters when I was born. Number four at the box office to number one being National and Pooen's European vacation. Oh, yeah. Both unsettling films in their own way. Hey, 1988. Scott was born, I was born. Black Cauldrum was released. What a year.

What a year. What a year. For the world and culture. It's known as it's the first Disney animated film that get a PG rating instead of a G. Oh, right, right. And that's even with the like 10 minutes of apparently even spookier stuff that got cut that we've never seen though I can't imagine what that was if it was not deemed for accessible for viewers the the scary thing in it and I have not seen this movie but

the the the what's talked up as the scary thing I mean in general is the villain yeah the horn king is legit scary when I when I was rewatching this last night I was struck by like oh the villain isn't funny like like a lot of Disney villains are right these not like evil but love ball or has a cute thing oh there is but the sidekick is also not great but the no the horn king itself it's it almost feels like they're taking inspiration from

Darth Vader and it's like they're making it feel very ominous and I could see like why little kids would be incredibly frightened and I know this movie was considered a huge failure and a big black mark on the brand and almost killed the entire animation division like they were

actually thinking about not making any more animated films like that was an Eisener Katzenberg question I mean new regime comes in and there hasn't been a big hit in a while and what do you got right now and it's that? Yeah, and everybody's creeped out by it and it's number four to European vacation. And all the changes just keep ballooning the budget up

and it becomes this huge, costly thing. It's hard to blame them in a way. But do people like, does anyone like this movie, though? Is it like, has it been reclaimed by any sort of audience of Disney fans or anything? It doesn't feel like it. Yeah, yeah, I know. I don't hear that a lot.

I think it's like a little too slight. The thing is, though, is it is visually, the problem is it's like visually both really interesting and really cheap intermittently. So you can see a bunch of stuff where there'll be shots or sequences that are really incredible to look at and look like great special effects and genuinely scary

and then there's like a lot of recycled kind of very kind of trashy parts of it too. Okay, okay. So it's like it's just very disjointed and I think you can tell they cut stuff out of it because even when I was watching it I was like, wait, how did they get here from here and then they like it's like oh I know somebody gave up.

They went like, the movie's done. If they're having trouble following a children's film, yeah, you know there's a problem. The Horn King, like, dissolves in acid or something. He, like, melts in a horrifying way. It's everything about the Horn King is frightening. And I do remember, like, it got put on it, like, a camp, like, movie night under the stars thing where I watch. And I read the books that it's based on as a kid. Like, they're called the Pride and Chronicles.

I'm sorry, fairly recent books for a Disney movie to be based on. Yeah, they're from the 60s. I think Disney bought the rights in the 70s. It was part of the post-Walt. Like, Walt has died. We don't know what the company is now. Let's start buying up things that could be movies. Pretty well-liked books, I think, of the people of a certain age.

I remember really liking them as a kid. Like, it was a thing where it was like, oh, I read Lord of the Rings. I read Narnia. What else can I read like this? And it was like, oh, there's these. And I loved them. I read them. I feel like I read them each a few times.

I cannot remember a single thing in them. But I do remember feeling like the Black Cauldron. The Black Cauldron is the name of the second book, but the movie is mostly the first book, which has a different, called the Book of Three or something like that. And it's not, and I remember watching that at camp and being annoyed

where I was like, what's going on here? This is like a mishmash of the books and it's not doing like. You may be the ideal audience member are already chased out the door. Yeah. I think they made them,

I mean, the thing is is they accidentally made a movie for no one. I think Katzenberg, there is even some quote I found where he talks about lamenting, where he's like, we did not do Lloyd Alexander's work justice. Whoa. Wow. So he used it as a failure.

And he would go on to make a streaming service for no one. I think there's still life in it yet. It might come back. Yeah. Anybody buy that name. But so it's a very, it's a strained bite, like the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the. Black Cauldron already, and now we're going to open a year later after it's kind of box office demise, new attraction, scary attraction in which this is the basis, and it all builds

to meeting the Horn King. Right, which is really weird. It does feel like maybe they took the most successful part of the movie, which is a terrifying villain and just took that, and then we're like, well, we've got to like pad this out with a bunch of Disney characters people like. Well, not just that, but a terrifying villain who wants to raise an army of the undead to take over the world. Like, his aspirations are very much like an evil dead film.

It is not like genuinely, uh, disheartening imagery. Yeah, it's real. So if you, I mean, imagine especially being, you know, I think if you speak Japanese, you, you could be easily tricked by this tonally, but if you don't speak Japanese and you walk in, you just, I just want to be at the, you know, as we got to do, I don't care if I don't speak the language. I want to experience this. You could be truly tricked and terrified.

because you wouldn't have a sense of what's going on. And the ride is lying to you. But also, yeah, you would have no understanding what's going on because it is one of the few rides that is entirely in Japanese. There was no English spoken. Until it ends, and there's three English words at the end as you exit. But otherwise, entirely Japanese. And even the fake out is helped along,

not just by the sign that doesn't really tell you anything, but also by, it's tour guides. It's individual tour guides who unlike, which is beyond a jungle cruise kind of situation where the tour guide also has to lead you through the physical space, which seems confusing and weird to navigate. And it's a little intimate group of 30 people, odd amount, I feel like, for a Disney attraction. It would, dare I say, it be the closest thing to a tram tour. Yeah, yeah, a little bit, a little bit. And to the degree that what the person's responsible for and that they have to personalize it. And it seems like you had to, like, the tour.

guide would start pleasant bubbly happy Cinderella tone and then you watch you know their spirit break as you have to go into scary closet yeah and like the magic mirror comes in and it's it's like this spooky special effect of it and forces you changes all the character portraits to the villains to their respects up the villain terran became the horn king pinnovia became strong bully everyone was saying it everyone was thinking it Yeah, so it's like Maleficent, Strombole, although then Strombole's not in the attraction.

No, no. And Strombole, like, some of the, some of them are like, it's witches and practisers of the dark arts. And then there's just a mean guy who buys up puppets. Child trafficker. When you put it that way, yeah, he sounds more evil.

Maybe that's why he was not represented in the rest of the ride. They were like, he gets an acknowledgement, but we don't want to, we don't want to truck with that. The magic mirror is terrifying. I find that performer and then that effect really scary. Guy in makeup, which is something they did on some particularly unsettling specials on TV in the 70s and 80s. Yeah, he's really upsetting.

And they made him a walk-around character. You can find a picture of this upsetting walk-around character with like the frame of the mirror around the performer's head. With his head as if the painting fell on his head. That somehow didn't last long. The there was a whole, did you read about this? there was a fight between the Japanese company and the Disney company about whether or not the mirror should be a Japanese performer or an American one and they ultimately decided on their compromise was an American performer who was phonetically taught the lines in

Japanese. Whoa. Wow, weird. Whoa. Is it their voice doing it too or was it dope by a Japanese person? I think it's their voice learning phonetically. It's a hard language to phonetically learn. And to do a giant block of the attraction set-up text.

But I guess there was a weird, probably racist argument about what, like, what the magic mirror looks like in the Disney brand. Oh, because it wanted to look like the snow-white magic mirror. And, of course, the snow-way magic mirror was white. Yeah. We all know that. No question. No question. Yeah, yeah.

This animated character. Yeah, yeah. But then the compromises, they do. sort of do like a Japanese painting style on the magic. Oh good. What a good compromise. It's like such a weird, like yeah, such a weird unsettling. Yeah, why? Because Snow White is set in

anyone in that sentence. Bavaria? I don't know where snow white is set. Why can't it just be a Japanese actor? Where's snow white on? It's a small world. Then we can figure it. Oh, yeah, yeah. Let's work backwards from there. Yeah, I'm not sure. But the, yeah, no, so it was like weird. And then Like, there are a lot of casually racist commercials for Tokyo Disney in the early 80s that are unsettling to watch. Yes.

Well, the defunct land video uses a couple of these. It's not commercials, but it's news reports that are like, we're buying their cars. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That kind of weird. Yeah, yeah. Now, advertising. Oh, sorry, go ahead, Jay. Oh, I was going to say, is it Beverly Hills Cop 2?

One of them has like, no. I think it's the Jay Leno. What you're talking about the Jay Leno, Pat Marito? There's a lot of stuff in that of like, they're not playing our American cars. They're buying cars from Asia. Like, everyone's what Jay was concerned with. Right.

Yeah. Like, so. I'll do it if you get my issues in it. I mean, I'm not political except for one thing. But that's like a big, like the mystery is like some sort of MacGuffin. Oh, God, you'll forgive me for not remembering the exact plot. details of the movie whose name I can't remember. Should we take a pause

go watch it and come back? Yeah, we'll do that. Us and all listeners watch Jay Leno and Pat Marita's collision course and we'll be right back. I've never heard of this movie. It's a weird. The taglines are racist.

I forget like, he's a little more hot dog. Can you program this in a little more festivals? Sure, why not? Is there a reunion? Yeah, yeah. Is there a restoration coming? I mean, we need Jay.

You need to get Jay down to. Get that. Steal book. Get that 4K collision. Okay, but this though. So, yeah, scary first room. The villain, a fun tour is going to be ruined by villains. You end up in the lab where the apples became poison apples.

This is awesome. You see the real test tubes and beakers that, yeah, jump in with anything, I forget. No, a secret passage opens up, which feels like a great effect for, especially the 80s. Yeah, that's cool. Like if I could bring up the What's the Poseidon attraction from Poseidon's Fury? Anything, it's very similar when you get into something

Yeah, similar I guess in that it's a walking tour And I just remember going into it the first time And I never looked up what happens in it And it's a cool and rare thing To get to like I don't know the space I'm in I don't know how far this goes I don't know how big a set piece can be or not So I'm sure it had that effect really

Is this just a thing in this room Oh shit secret packets? passageway. I'm sure it's surprised. Like, this is what I think about, like, the surprise and delight of it all is that, like, I'm sure people who genuinely weren't sure what it was when it first started are like, oh, okay, I'm doing this castle walkthrough in the giant castle that is, like, the big center of this park.

And then, like, a mirror effect comes in that seems like it's really good for the time. The portraits all change. A passage opens up. You go down this scary dark thing. The tour guides with you the whole time, like, great movie ride style or Jungle Crew style, just, like, really amping. you up. I'm like, this sounds amazing and unlike anything

at any other Disney park. It sounds really cool. And I obviously didn't get to do. This was long gone by the time I went to Tokyo and same with Mike. But I remember it like added to the mythology and the mystique of this place that like it was in there. And they have cool, they have cool original things and one that seems

like upsetting and weird and it was always in there as a like, God, I got to get to Tokyo. I mean this poster, I don't know how much this old what this will do for the listener but look at this ad this is a really upsetting where it's just silhouette

of castle and then scary scary horn king visage overlooking it as if his soul is looming over the entire thing and then down at the bottom just one open dungeon door

in which a bunch of like you know like cartoonishly American tourists in baseball uniforms football uniforms are with goofy and they're all scared shitless peering around to bend. I mean, this does not seem like a Disney ad. In the best

way. It's nice that Goofy's there. I am comforted by a goofy being. And another little character in a big tall hat. He is a known... Is it a Cinderella mouse? I don't know what he... There was a castle show that tied into the lore of this. Really? In front of the castle.

In Tokyo or elsewhere? In Tokyo. Let me find the video. In the world of because that crazy thing we talked about, Splash Tacular was based on something else called Fantalusian. Or no, that's related to Phantasmic. I forget, the Tokyo Castle shows are insane. So it would make sense that they would do something upsetting, like, what's down in the castle.

It's hard to tell, like, the narrative of what's going on, but it was called the Mystery of Cinderella Castle. Wow. And it ran, yeah, it was one of those in front of the castle shows, and it's long, 25 minutes. It's got goofy and everybody, and it's, I think it's got Maleficent. But, yes, this is whatever, whatever's going on in the show, and I really cannot tell you exactly. Yeah, yeah. It's supposed to tie into the mystery of... Is there a Horn King right now?

I didn't see the Horn King, but it's also not the greatest VHS footage, and some of these characters are like in the background. Okay. They have to save him for the right. You can see... Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we'd step on the red. You can see, I'm like, is that Maleficin in the background? I think so, because it's got the cape.

So, like, that looks like Malefuson's up on a pair. Malefson is just vaguely standing out of tower waving arms. And it's just like there's a lot of different... Oh, I would... Donald has a sword. Yeah. Wow. So they're, like, fighting some villains.

I assume they're, like, Gladiators, like, Horned King, maybe like Horn King minions, I don't know. We'd love to see Donald and Goofy meet the Horned King. Yeah, I don't, I didn't see the Horn King. Maybe I'm, has that not happened in like a Kingdom Hearts video game? Oh, probably. I would wonder about that. You know, I'm not that familiar with the franchise, but it feels like something that would happen. I was Yen Sid from Fantasia.

Of course. I recall that I made, I asked. asked the question about if Yen Sid was like they had done a cool like up 90s update, but Yen Sid is DJing in a Paul Roodish Mickey Short. So they have done fun Yen Sid. So do Yen Sid and what's the Star Tours, the original Star Tours animatronic competing DJs? Oh yeah, maybe.

Yeah, yeah. Is DJ Rex and DJ Yenzy? If you're having a Disney party, which DJ, which Disney DJ do you book? Right. So has, yeah, has anyone brought horned King back in any way. Horn King is on House of Mouse. House of Mouse is always the way that things...

The DJ, or the nightclub show, right? Yes, where all the characters come together because there's a big Disney nightclub. Yes. What does he do? He enters the club and shakes hands with Donald. There you go. Wow.

Then later, collusion with him the whole time. Goofy's singing a song on stage, and then he's seen at a table where a penguin waiter serves him as dinner. Okay. These are a vibrant use of him. I get a meal not listed, God. I got to look up the episode, Goofy for a day from House of Mouse.

I would love to see an animated short. Like the old, in the Looney Tunes, when the guys would come in and clock in and then start chasing each other if, like, Yen Sid and DJ Rex are like, what are you doing? Oh, Sweet 16. What about you?

Uh, Kinsenura. It's like, okay, have a fun time. Isn't that exactly what happened? at the rest of the Cinderella mystery tour? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That pretty much sums it up. No, let's say some of the stuff in here. So then you enter like a, there's a Fantasia room.

They repurposed like so the end of the scary, the Chernabog stuff. It seems like they projection map Chernabog on or like you see its actual sequences from the film. Like, what I love about is every room has like a different special effect. It actually does seem like whoever designed these rides were pushing themselves like a haunted mansion style. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, each has like a new kind of gag. that the other previous did not have. Is it after this that there's, you kind of enter like a calm room and there's like a nice

fountain that you look at? Well, I think the tour guide leaves you, I read in certain versions at one point. Like it's scared off by the laboratory, by the evil witch's poisoned apple thing and then like meets back up with you in the next room. But there's like a fake out that you've been left on your own. Oh, geez. Well, that's pretty scary. And I think there's a bit where like a good guess.

where you get into a scary room and they're like night statues and then they start shaking because they're scared like the nights Oh I missed that one It is really hard to There's you know

The Defunkland video takes you through it And then there is like one guy Name Rob Fuzz FUZ Yeah Take who has And it's I don't know if it

If it adds to it If it makes it scary It might make it scarier in a way That it is like You know Ghost Adventure style That it is it's They had to shoot it in night vision

Yeah on kind of a mid-2000s camcorder, which I don't know, it does make it a little scarier. In a way, that's the only footage you can see this thing. There are a handful of videos most very hard to see. Yeah. But the defuncleland doesn't give you the actual, like, feeling of it. Not really.

So not that I, because obviously he's not just playing unedited footage, but when I went back after that, watching that video again, I went and watched a couple of the different walkthroughs. And I'm like, the vibes in here are coming through the VHA. record whatever like old school video camera what like so go and watch those too I think if you're gonna if you're interested because like it does feel creepy these videos feel creepy yeah it sounds like there's a lot of sound effects like Maleficent's minions are constantly like threatening you as you get places like there's audio they like climb up you're like

you're looking at a fountain and you think things are like placid for a second and then then her lagoons start rising up in the fountain yeah I think there's a little bit of seeds of what I assume that effect is in the Sleeping Beauty Castle when you get to like you can see like a diorama of the guard of the guards like spears going past the window that's what I imagine the effect

probably could have been like yeah yeah good use of shadows in this in general is a talking skull I forget what the talking skull does or warns you about a room so it's like yeah it's like these special effects feel like incredible for the time period dragon you get a dragon

and that's if you've been to Disneyland in Paris, the dragon that is in the basement there underneath the castle is inspired by this ride. Yes. I remember getting those mixed up. I was like, I know the castle's doing weird stuff and there's dragons and I don't remember which is which. And then in Paris, yeah, it's just a, it is just a room where you just peer at that dragon, although it is incredible. It is, it's not as unsettling as this, but it is still unsettling. It feels like kind of extra scary for being a Disney thing. We finally made it out there last summer, and I remember it was like the point, like, we were trying to do everything in one day in both parks in Paris. And I do feel like we hit that point where like, you know, you've been traveling, you've been there.

Like by the time we got to the dragon, it was like, I'm hungry, we have to eat. Like, well, we've got to see the dragon. I'm like, we saw the dragon. All right. Like, here's the dragon. Let's go. And like, my memory of the dragon is like, oh, yeah, there it is. Okay.

And eating there is a tough gambit. Eating is a rough situation in Paris. I listened to an entire episode about that. Well, no, because I was prepped for, I didn't go until last year and had a ton of research. So, like, we ate at the Ratatoui restaurant, but, like, had to, like, keep refreshing. Got a reservation for one on the day before. And then walked over to that restaurant and were like, I have another person with me. Can they just join me?

And they were like, oh, the reservations for one are actually for two. And I was like, I don't, you know what? I'm not going to get frustrated about this. I would just enjoy the. Why even offer a one? I was like, there's actually a second chair at the table. I'm like, so it's for two? Most tables for one can easily become tables for two.

And then we ate at, I was very adamant that we eat at the restaurant Waltz because it was the only Walt themed thing. And that was actually great. It's kind of like their club 33, only you can make a reservation instead of have to go through a bunch of hoops. So by doing only those two things and not eating at. anything else, we had a good time. This is a good tip. This is good tips for future a pair of scoers. But they have a beautiful dragon down there that we grumpily saw while starving.

Enjoying it. It's fun, right? Cool dragon. Okay, moving on. Everybody gets in an elevator at some point. Yeah, you get chased into an elevator by goons or something, by Maleficent's goons. And I don't remember if the elevator's before or after the dragon, but the dragon is a surprise, right? Like, you're in a treasure room and then, like, the dragon is revealed.

Yeah, it appears, yeah, or so, yeah, it is, yeah, that would be crazy if a dragon just shows up. Like, it feels like you're getting overwhelmed by sensory thing. You're like, what else is going to happen? It's stressful and in an exciting way. I don't know. You get into an elevator at all feels crazy. It does feel like the thing that we all did together years ago, the delusion blue blade time travel. Yeah, yes.

We were in a van and then you pour out of the van. and then there's climbing and then you have to get under a bed and then there's like it is interesting because like so much stuff especially with Disney parks it's just like okay I understand the rhythm of all of the like generally speaking

this stuff all follows a pattern I guess rise of the resistance is the only thing that's like broken patterns hard lately but it kind of feels like Rise of Resistance is doing a playbook that this ride started I don't think you can say it's a one to one influence

but like it is it is that playbook of magic tricks as you are walking through to the ride. Being surprised, but not knowing what this thing has up at sleep. That you get into an elevator in the middle of this seems like crazy. And you must be like, where are we? Are we in the castle? Are we under the castle? Is there a separate show building?

I don't know what's going on. And I think the tour guy does a bit of like, all right, I'm getting you out of here. And then a demon takes over the elevator. It's like not so fast. Right, right, right. So it's a bit like the mummy pulling you back from the ride, the fake exit at the end of the Orlando.

landover shit. This is a cool thing. This is very cool. This is possibly the greatest ride. It seems like some of the videos were alluding to it like losing popularity after the last few years too, which I'm like, is that true? It was like such a classic thing for that park. I saw they were cautioning tourists not to go because they had no English options because it's so much Japanese narration that they were warning people and people were complaining that they didn't understand. what was happening

but I would grow up loved it makes it more exciting that I don't know what's happening I get the vibe

the tour guide scared like yeah yeah yeah things are getting worse yeah this is a big

demonic character is he good or bad I don't know I can speak English to me I don't think it's the most hard to understand ride of all time

yeah yeah no I think you can you can parse it with the mute button on yeah okay so I think when you get out of the elevator that's after the dragon and the demon and the treasure room and the com and all that

reveal stuff in the skull you get um there's a mural of the black caldron where they very smartly explained very quickly the plot of the black cauldron because even in 1986 they're like nobody here has seen this in case you decided to hang with the griswolds instead of because he shows hijinks with eric idyll instead of uh hijinks with terran yeah right so there's a mural and i guess the tour guide quickly run through the broad strokes of the plot of the black coltons. So real quick, you know, it's actually interesting what's been happening. It kind of reminds me of the Black Cauldron. If you don't know Black Calder

is what it is. And his armies is dead and we would watch out for Horn King. Hope we don't see Horn King. Uh-oh. Next room, Horn King. So that's your tour guide training. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hyper speed. A quick can you jam through it? If you were not paying that much attention, that first room with the paintings, I

could see being very simple to like glance at Taryn and go like, oh, certain stone kid yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah who's that baby man that's funny and he's not doing any fair he was rewatching that movie last night i was struck with like terran's obnoxious he is not fun to he is not fun to follow around it's the weird movie the horn kid the horn kid to get him make him the horn kid the horny kid the horny kid horno jason oh yeah horno that happened on cemetery gate too check out cemetery gate to be up on all the latest twists in terms i don't

I don't recall. I don't know which order. Well, who knows around which corner will Jason become Hornow? Oh, it's the Tyne Tram. Much like Cinderella Castle's Mystery Tour. You never know what's around. We've been chased into an elevator where Jason's Hornow. Like a house of leaves.

So, but let's talk about this grand finale in which you were. Which sounds incredible. This is the thing that makes me jealous. I never got to do it. Scary dark room. Horned King rises up behind Black Cauldron. And apparently an animatronic. Yeah.

And I have to imagine. the greatest animatronic on earth like up there with the shaman in in the 80s it looks like that maybe he doesn't have the fluid motion of the shaman but it is the oh i bet it does it seems fluid and not i don't denigrate the horned king just saying the shaman is very fluid i'm just that's all i'm saying but now can i can i show this in the same account that showed me that i should be name-shaking it but wherever had that cool ad also had a photo of the sculpting of the horned King and take a look this scary, scary creature being

carved by a Disney name I've never heard before. Adolfo Procopio. It's master sculptor Adolfo Procopio. Sounds like a new name. Yes, we have a new you have a new attention, Landon,

new names. People are, you're hearing it more and more. People are saying it. Jason's quoting Trump more and more. the air. No. Adolfo Procopio is objectively amazing. Adolfo Procopio. There is a

sculptor of the horned king. There is a sculptor of the horn king. There is a lingerie list of things that he sculpted for, but they don't say a lot of specifics. So there'd be no point in saying other than just, all right, imagine every attraction that we love from the 70s and 80s. He did presidents. He did

not imagine your characters. He did great movie right characters. But here's the ones I can shout at is that I know that Adolfo Pocopio did Mickey in the Mickey Mouse review that we've barely talked about like the old animatronic show in Fantasyland he did Mickey and the Horn King and he also did Humphrey Bogart in the great movie ride

That's a hell of a distinction because that's a very close animatronic That's as accurate as they get This isn't the president guy that came out of retirement though right Remember there was that one sculptor who came out of like retirement That's Blaine Gibson Who sculpted Walt as well, yeah. They may be trusted him.

Maybe he was, you know, the most trusted for kindly type. But I guess, but if you want weathered faces, like Humphrey Bogart or the Horned King, you've got Adolfo Procopio, whose son is also a master sculptor who's done Disney stuff, but has his own company now. That's cool. So there's one. I wonder if he worked on the Walt animatronic. Oh, yeah, I'm not sure.

I'm not sure. Is he around still Adolfo? Not Adolfo, but the sun, the sun could have. Yeah, yeah, I'm not sure. Adolfo passed away in 2018, I think. Okay. Burbank resident. Oh, wow.

Hey, great. Not a Burbank crank? We don't consider him a Burbank crank. I guess he'd have to read more about it. He was on the board of the train society. No. He should love it. He made the horn king.

He shouldn't be chasing him away. So anyways, you're trapped in a very, type space with a big scary animatronic, I think that's sort of freaked out me and anybody. Although around this time, a kid is taken aside, right? Somebody is picked. Oh, right. Yes. This plan is in motion.

And given the sword of light. Yes. And it's usually a child. And I think given when this ride ran, it probably was before the common age of the Disney adult where you'd have people being like, it's going to be me! I didn't get to be the chosen one.

We have to do it again. So I think you say, yeah. So you've experienced in your ghost town of lives and you're the like children being shoved out of the way for immersive obsesives. Yes, it is. It's the problem. It is the vein of my existence. As somebody who is one of those people

who tries to be respectful of children, it tries to be like, you're giving us all a worse name. People already think we're crazy. Stop pushing children out of the way. Hold yourself back. Let children have fun at the theme park for children. Hopefully the kid is holding this sort of light.

And then you get to hear a bunch of scary, scary shit which I feel like someone should read I do have a bunch of it okay the I mean to me the most upsetting thing is that the Horn King says don't be afraid it will all be over shortly

it should be reassuring because it'll be over that's good but I think what he means is death I think we are talking about facts or just doesn't he like summon Satan or say something to that effect yeah he says oh Satan's kiln

awaken and resurrect the soldiers of death. Rebuild an army without rivals. The army of death rise. The devil's servants go and capture them and throw them into the cauldron. Don't leave anyone behind. The black cauldron wants more bodies.

This is in the castle. Cinderella's fairy tale castle. If this was in an American park and presented in the same way where it was a mystery and you didn't know, everyone would have a story of being traumatized by this. So I do wonder

like kids, if you were a kid age, I guess for 20 years in Japan, do they all have stories of being horribly traumatized by this? I would imagine they do. Because how could you not be? I mean, I feel like kids are traumatized by any dark ride from time to time.

Minor, snow white stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Those trees, branches look like an arm grabbing me. Scary. Oh, and then then also animatronic, a big skull said the black cauldron wants more bodies. And you could expect. He's calling about the end of the world. and making it clear that it's like it's imminent right now.

It's not just you 30 in the room. This is all humans. But the difference also is like I guess as a kid you go on Snow White, you go on Peter Pan, you expect Captain Hook. You expect the witch. So even though it is going to be scary, you know what to expect to some degree. Nobody's not a horn king coming. Nobody's preparing you as a child. Your parents maybe don't know.

Yeah. Didn't you see Black Cauldron? You should know Horn King's coming. It's worse because you've never seen Black Cauldron. So this demon you've never seen in your life is threatening to kill you and use your soul to resurrect your soul as some sort of a henchman. It was there for 20 years. It was there for 20 years. They never poured it to America too many religious psychos.

It would have been upset about summoning the devil. Or they're like, yeah, I agree with a lot of the views of the Horn King. Yeah, actually, I just think it'll be the God's servants that capture all the souls and throw them in. his cauldron. Right. Frollo was summoning demons. Hunchback. No, he was a man of the cloth.

Yeah, but he had the, well, hellfire is, well, I guess it's when he's feeling horny. When he's feeling horny is when he's, the demons are coming up from the fireplace. For him? He would add, he had scary dreams where Esmeralda turns into the horn king. And then he's, the horn king's going down on him. No, hellfire.

He would be going nuts. The worst glow job of my life. He would be going nuts. if we went to a doll's kill store. It was so uncomfortable. Please, Lord, save me from this sexy too-to. Sexy woody outfit.

And that it gets even more confusing because if it goes to the area of 15-1, people start clapping for them. It's like, ooh, a pop-up performance by the... No, I'm not a priest character. I'm a true man of the cloth. Are you part of the 747 art installation they parked here? No, I've lost my way.

I thought I was going to the new parish I was assigned to. Look at me. Everything you need to know about Area 15 is all the Burning Man art they have appropriated and collected. Oh, yeah, yeah, that's the jet. I'll drive up that was like, hmm, maybe I won't like it here. It is, yeah, it's a tough place.

But more immersive things happening there than most other places. You got to pay attention to it. We're all required to pay attention to it. You get to the phrase, capture those fools and gratify the black caldron, now we're really in proletaire to gratify. I'm so mad I never got to see it. The Caldron needs

gratification. Yeah. That's a loaded word. Yeah, no, it's, it is upset. Again, I would love to talk to, like, people who went on this as kids. That's really, if anyone's out there and went on this as a child, let us know. Because I just, is it, do you

describe it? A podcast wants to interview you and then you just hear, mm-hmm, and then you, like, move four hours into the countryside, off the rid to never be spoken to again. Right. Or they say, what is a podcast? Yes, but it's possible.

If anybody calls in, you can just add it to the end of the episode, like jelly rolls. Oh, this episode? That format should be done more often, yes. Somebody had not to derail this, but somebody had to call in and defend jelly rolls. Oh, yeah. Wait a minute. You did it?

I was a voice. What was cut out of it was me. You're in there? Calling you guys cowards for not having done reign of terror. Yes, I had to cut it out. There was a lot of... Really? I didn't know any...

I didn't know you were in it and I didn't know you threatened us. Did you not listen to the tribute to jelly rolls at the end of that episode that I put it? You cut my threats out. I got the threats out just because it was running very... It was long and everyone's was kind of long. I did it.

I did it at text. I was like, oh, I don't think I can. You're like, oh, I don't think I can. You're like on this thing? And I called... I left a message, driving from San Francisco to Los Angeles. On the road you defended

Jelly Rolls? On the episode, I was talking I was talking about the multiple people who had reached out that were big jelly rolls fans and Landon was one of them. Because he had recently gone. He's a recent jelly roll. I had gone because it was about to close so I had to go pay my respects to the Muppets and Rock and Roller Coaster

What sold you? I guess you probably said it in your memo. For jelly rolls? Yeah, the thing of my memo was about it was specifically one piano player who was there both nights we were there you are also a two-nighter

but you all did it wrong you're not supposed to get there before 1130 p.m. No I was fine I was happy. You're supposed to be there when nothing else is open you're completely depleted and you have to give yourself over to it. You can't go there

when you have any... Capture those fools and gratify the dueling piano bar. Yes it's the horned king. The dueling piano bar wants more bodies. They are too tired to defend all these Muppets Just saying the part of Sweet Carolina. Scott, if you had been there at 1145, you would have heard the jauntyest let the bodies hit the floor. You need to have caught the last skyliner that's literally closing as you get off at the beach club.

That's my problem. I had other options. I had buildings I wanted to go look at. If you have anything else to do, then you won't like it. You need to be falling asleep with like a $22 piece of terrible cake next to you that you got at the cake. Did that expensive cake, too. I felt like we had to try it. And then it took two bites and I was like, oh, this is so terrible.

It's bad cake. We tried it. Did you find it to be bad? You had a little piece of it. I have no memory of it. It tasted so much better in jelly rolls. Well, everything does. You could bring outside food in?

Well, now I'm bored. I'm sorry. I never left. This is good. The more rules that are required for how to enjoy. No, no, no. You made a mistake. Not only being there.

at 10.45 and being sort of tired. Way too early. The 11.30 and incredibly tired. You have to be so exhausted that you're wondering why you're there. And then it just all comes into play. But no, it's the staff. The piano players were amazing. They really were reading the room.

You could tell it was like the end of their time and they were trying to milk it. Sure. They were really prepared like on their break once like somebody learned something because somebody had like a hometown sports fight song they wanted to do that they thought they would stump them. And like the piano players actually went and learned it on their break. break so they could come back and surprise them. One of them did the entirety of the Main Street electrical parade at one point because he

was like, I taught, I learned this myself. My piano teacher said I couldn't do it and I learned it. And I was like, yeah, I wonder how you ended up here. But like the and did the whole thing. And that's when it won me over when I was like, oh, this guy's got skills. That sounds pretty good. That's better than anything I saw in my 20 minutes. Now I feel trapped as if trapped in a dank,

room with the horn king now that I've ended up after this long journey stuck in a room discussing jelly rolls let's see if we can I use the sword of light to get us out of here so the I don't know kid uses the sort of light and yeah then you could strike down some jelly rolls

fans if only I could have used that to end this sweet Caroline cover well jelly rolls is again the sort of light one we've heard your description sounded very night I I was the major electrical parade Yeah, and that piano player I saw at the, when I went to Epic Universe, he's now in a band at Epic Universe.

Okay. Hey, good. But hopefully, you know, jelly rolls reopened soon and he'll be back. Are you, now, Mike, you know you can go to a dueling piano bar whenever you want. Are you, do you need it to be jelly rolls specifically? I'm curious if they can recapture the 90s Disney magic of jelly rolls. If the vibe, maybe it'll be a totally different vibe. frame it that way because I think

we all know that 90s Disney Magic is one of my biggest interest. It's the thing I chase the most in this world. I don't feel that magic when I'm in jelly rules. Because they've got to do a cover of Splish Splash. I've been taking a ban. A bunch. Magical.

And Sweet Caroline again. Then my friend, let me introduce you to the East Side Lounge in the Encore Hotel in Las Vegas. A dueling piano bar near the Lake of Dreams. I think you've got a lot of options for doing pianos. That's true.

Oh, we hope. I hope and pray. I just want to see. In a Frollo type way, please, Lord, bring back my dueling piano. What is the new one actually has like a food program and they serve actual jelly rolls? That wouldn't be like a roll like a Swiss cake kind of roll with jelly and cream. That's what Johnny Gargano wanted. He was upset.

I think we can all agree that that is a good plus up that he had that a place called jelly roll should offer jelly rolls. Sure. I think it would take away from. the music, quite frankly. I don't think. To honor the legacy of Jelly Roll Morton. With dueling piano.

Scary, weird songs from Wicked. Tree animatronics take away from the trains. Jelly rolls would kind of take away from jelly rolls. Yeah, I don't know. You don't want too many distractions in there. That's what I think. Yeah, you can always bring in a $22 piece of cake. If you have to, you could.

If you have to. And the shopping center detracts from whatever is in the groundwater above the old locking barn. factory. So the sort of light. The sort of light. The sort of light. And that makes the guy go away.

And then luckily good does conquer evil, as it says at the end and the only English words in the whole thing. Yeah. So the chosen one that's been pre-determined and the tour guide now have a sort of light that lights up and vanquishes the horned king in some sort of effect.

That's cool. Kid gets to strike down a truly terrifying villain. And it's kind of funny after that. It's just like, Go to Conquers Evil. Okay, well, because it didn't seem like it was going to go that way for a while. Here in the darkest attraction.

Yeah, for the most part, you were just running away from films. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I'm not fighting a lot. And the first time you fight back for a second, you win immediately, which is pretty great.

And then the chosen one always got a medal, which I liked. Yes. And that is an immersive staple. When you do immersive shows, oftentimes you'll get a trinket to take home. And I cannot tell you how many times I've been like,

I will remember this night forever. the feeling I had at this incredible immersive show and, like, recently opened up a drawer and were like, the fuck is this marble? Like, what are these? I don't remember any of this. I know at one point I, like, held this. It was like, this will be a marker

of the incredible experience I just had and the great art I just witnessed. This is who I am now. I believe the magician that Mike saw Heldr, right? Is that how he says he? The Frank Marshall directed? The Frank Marshall directed. Oh, wait, it was Helder?

What? Oh, I'm not even getting into it, because I got two more hours on this. Oh, no. But I saw one of it. He did shows over Zoom on the pandemic. Yes, that is a deal. And I did one of the second ones.

We've really built, you got a tube, a tube nailed to you. Yeah, with like a pack of cards and other stuff in it. And yeah, when I moved, I was like, oh, I got this tube. I don't know what box to put this in. I don't know what to do with this too. What did you do with it? Did you throw it out? No, I have it.

I just remember whatever the one, while we were doing this show, we had like a cup of water and like some drops of water got on one or two playing cards. It's like, well, that deck of cards is useless now because you know. The show ruined your pack of cards. It ruined the freebie pack of cards. Oh, man. No, the show was amazing. You're calling moving places.

Like, I'm sorry. I'm stressed out. I'm really sorry to throw this. Do you guys move, do you move magic tubes? Do you have any way to do it? There's a note where I'm supposed to, I was supposed to write down some dreams and wishes. I don't think I ever did.

One day you will need to do a second gate about the ongoing rivalry between Heldor and the magician Derek Delgado, which is a Hatfield and McCoy-level feud that I will stop myself from getting into here. Oh, my God. That's insane because this guy seemed like the nicest. like quirky European man.

Oh, you will be surprised. You're silencing yourself. You have words that are at the tip of you're telling me. I'm not a judge. I'm not summoned to cursed item. I'm summoned to magicians. I'll say this. I have seen every Heldar show and every Derek Delgadoo show and I view it as the

Arthur Miller Ilya Kazan feud where they were only speaking to each other through their work. Oh, my God. This is interesting. Oh, yeah. Get ready for the magic. culture you never knew you needed. If only it was only, if this was

hour one, I'd say let's get into it. No, yeah, no. But given that let's The Horn King is vanquished. The Horn King is vanquished. And then eventually, unfortunately, the attraction is vanquished. And it doesn't seem like, I mean, maybe there was, like, people were starting to, like, be weird with the tone of it. Some places say

maybe this was an earthquake compliance thing. Yeah, I've heard the laws change. Yeah, and like, they would have had to redo it. And then they're like, well, if we're going to redo it let's not redo this because maybe we're starting to have questions about the programming of this and now what they have is Cinderella's fairy tale hall which is now they have what you would expect to be in there not a complete subversion of the expectations and I'm sure that's cute and fine but it's not this no it's crazy because like yeah I didn't know a ride like this could

be in a park like this like I feel like if I had seen that like what that would have inspired the thing I talk about with Ghost Town Alive what I love so much is about how the kids uh young kids will get to experience this like magic unique thing they didn't know like it'll expand their world and open up their minds like I feel like this this would have done that I yeah wonder what that would have been like to see that trauma and all no Disney thing will ever do that again no it'll never be like that and with Poseidon's fury gone it feels like that whole age of kind of 80s 90s live actor um walkthroughs is kind of gone as well and this is like why I really wanted to do this was because it is the precursor to like this is a lot of the model of what all the

immersive experiences that I always go to horror or otherwise are kind of all based on you're sort of chasing and now it's all it's had to go I say independent I don't know if that's the word it's not like it still these things are you know a huge a huge budgets and are very well produced but you like you're chasing it outside of Disney and Universal oh yeah which is where the Disney had it in Japan. Yeah, and universal. I mean, I always like Besiden's Fury the first time we did it

the opening summer. None of us knew what it was, and it was pretty my family all really liked it. I will say since we mentioned Lost Continent's construction starting there soon because there's so many closed attractions there. And storyline-wise

that actually is the land where it would make sense to just leave shuttered attraction. Right, right. To each, like their mystery, their artifacts of a pygon, pygon era. And there's a fountain that's mean to you. Yeah, that fountain is great. The fountain is great and mythos is great.

And I'm sure they'll stick around at some capacity. Are we? Are we sure? Huh? Are we sure that that fountain is staying? I bet it's gone. Oh, I think some iteration, I think, not that actual fountain. A different fountain.

A some sort of like different talking fountain. It'd be a Zelda fountain. That's me and to you. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But any like closing thoughts here. I like how you've tied this together.

Like it's your like this. It's the philosophy you're chasing and these other things that you're interested in. And it's, no, it's, it's wild that there was this. I feel like it, you couldn't say it put Tokyo Disney on the map. I think it was on the map. But it sure like it gave me from a far. wondering if I'd ever get to go. It definitely was a like, I don't know,

it was like throwing a gauntlet down of this is how different we are. This is how, you know, we differentiate from the American person. And it was popular, too, at least when it started, which is interesting. And I think partly that might be because it was based on Japanese ghost houses, which started post-World War II and were like early immersive, more immersive haunted houses. Right. So it's like that was culturally there.

right so it makes sense more like they were used to that versus in the parks i mean the haunted they were in the early days they were thinking about making it a walk through right so like there was the big fight about is it going to be scary or funny yes yes yes uh and they cited both uh it's going to be both things um but yes this one seems like it was just scary yeah no this is kind of a window into if the other path had been chosen on haunted mansion yeah yeah right um and then you get good conquer's evil goodbye. And you don't even get to tour Cinderella's ballroom. It all worked out, though.

Don't worry about it. All right, get out of here. I wish, I mean, there is the only opportunity for something like this, and it won't happen probably, is the villains' land and Magic Kingdom that they're building. I mean, we're not sure exactly what that is yet, but, like, it would be, I mean, not going to do a horned king walk through. I'm not naive here to say.

No, it'll be horn king-centric. I don't know the horn king will be represented anywhere in the land. He can DJ. I would love him to D. We also don't know what decade that of when Slate is open a game. Oh, well, we don't. This or the next? Oh, I see.

What decade? We'll see. I'm making fun of them for how long they take to open an attraction. Sure, they do. They do. That's true. I thought you meant more like an Avengers campus thing where it's sort of like a weird, like, this place doesn't exist in any continuity.

Any Avenger alive or dead is, uh, consider this, uh, the heaven of Avengers. Yes. I, I am. We're all vanquished. They're all dead. I am a little, like, unnerved that, like, the comic book logic of, like, yeah, that doesn't matter. Anyone can come back. And, yeah, you know, you'll figure it out.

And everything is act two. That's what they say. Comic books are just act two of a story because they never end. Did you say you were ennerved by that? No, I'm unnerved by how much it's leaked into mass media, into popular culture. Ah, sure. Well, that's a whole, yes. The monkey's paw when we were 10.

Because there's never satisfying endings to things Because it has to be enough to go and go Go and stuff can't end Yeah well that's a fear I'm starting to get about this episode So to that end I will say Because I notice some things under the table There are There are I mean it is hauntcast the fright

It's the Halloween season Halloween means a lot to me and my family So I needed to bring you some treats Oh my First off Is it Horn King sculpture? It is It's close

Really? For each of you Whoa Oh the monster cereal The serials Did you pick I deemed I picked these

Specifically for each of you Wow Thank you Jim Henson covers Yes The new Oh I didn't know this was happening Yeah these are puppets of the

Wow I got a Chocula I have Frankenberry Jason is booberry Thank you Yes I love booberry I love pink

Wow enjoy those treats these are very these are very well rendered these are the puppets to accompany yeah I know the puppets are great and to accompany them uh coasters for each of you from my favorite whoa establishment Casa Benita the true happiest place on her oh man this this makes me happy because I like like I said I know I've like that's the most money I've ever spent in a gift shop ever because you just this logo is addictive to yes look at I I always want to be looking at this so I've gotten more things I was there again recently and and and and and and and and still bought a new shirt but that's because that one has

the characters and the characters might be going away it's like a whole thing where there's there's a union now and I hope they I hope the characters all stay the walk around characters but it is still nevertheless did they like turbo charge that guest let's start getting through this thing the guest list is gone you can make reservations and the windows are larger now you can do by season. So you can make a reservation for the rest of the year right now.

Because I kept like so many friends have been there recently, I feel like. It's really working. Erie's making the pilgrimage and, but you know,

but they still, it's, they still reward, I feel like the, the founders club. Yeah. I'm a founder's club member. We get,

we get 10% off that merchandise. This was, these coasters were 10% cheaper. Hey, okay, well, that's good to hear. Well, now I appreciate it

so much more. Yes, yeah. A discount was occurred. Well, thank you for that. I have one final. I have one final. have one final gift in an audition like it's big trash bag whoa that um yeah the trash bag oh my god man it's very rainy outside so exactly that has been sitting here unnerving from the

Halloween season the whole time jason why don't you do the honors oh boy okay it's for podcast the route okay but you're getting but you're not having jason do it might mean it's in scott's garage Is it a bag of locusts? Oh, there's a head. Is this a head? Oh, my God. There's hair. I see hair. Oh, no. Is that a snoot? Oh, is it ahead of a Minotter? No, it is not. It's something better.

Holy shit. What is this? It's a bear from the country bear movie. That's what it is? What? What the hell? Lanton. What do you mean? What it is? Explain. You sent me a picture of a movie. this the other day. Did you not? Whoa.

I, this is the head of a country bear. The severed head of a country bear. Holy shit. That now belongs to podcast the ride. Wow. We vanquished it.

You couldn't get the minotar. But we got you the next best thing. An unknown country bear. So we don't know who this is. We have defeated the podcast. The podcast the ride wants more bodies and you've given us the mounted head of a country bear. I don't know who this is.

It is confirmed from the movie. Is it like a background character or is it one of the primaries? I don't know. I'll figure it off. I leave it. One of the reasons I'm gifting it to you is for you to find its origins. Oh, you're giving us a little mystery to go on. Much like the mystery tour at Cinderella's Castle.

You can go on one for this. This for well over a year, maybe even two years, I have been going back and forth with like a friend who has a friend who has a friend who has a friend who, this was going to come into my possession and then it wasn't and it's somebody who was connected to the special effects of the movie who got past to someone who got past to someone who then it got left on a friend of mine's door and for months I keep forgetting about this and I literally got a text while I was in Vegas that said if you do not come and get this I am throwing this out and so I said okay I'll get this on uh I will get this the day I come back and then Mike you set the record and

I realized last night as I got it, I was like, oh, I know two things. One, I cannot bring this home. There is no way this will get to be in my house. There is no world. Yes, what's that discussion? It gets to be in Mike's house. I've already been told I can't buy any more trinket. So this isn't going anywhere.

And, oh, wait, I know where I'm going immediately tomorrow. Wow. You know the place. This is the home. This is the home for this head that has now been saved from the trash and it was used in the country bear movie supposedly.

I'm so curious. And hopefully I am allowed to have this and give it to you guys. It feels like this, my guess is that we're looking at like a concert, not to say that this isn't like a primary bear, but I feel like a primary bear has like mechanics inside, right? I bet we're looking at like we've got to fill out the room with bears

and that is, but I could be totally wrong. That's just my, if I had to plan a flight. is a guess. I don't know. But I know it is not an animatronic from the ride. This was never in the theme park. No, it doesn't look like the ride. Yeah, it looks like the film that all three of us holds so dear. It's scary as shit, which is what I know from the movie. It is really, really do you mind handing it over? Let me get a good look at this baby. Oh my God. Oh, oh, it is like,

it's really something to stare down the barrel of. Wow. Jesus. I'm experiencing true terror with this thing sitting in my lap. Because it has no eyeballs. It, like that, I guess, was a separate piece. So it's just, it's this eyeless, and I'm staring into its rotting, foamy mouth. Maybe the, maybe the, it's a lot of textures for sure. Animatronics were inside the head and they could be removed. Maybe.

I mean, it's, it's an immaculate piece of work. Like the laying of the foam, the painting and the hair. It is, it's an incredible piece that has amounted to the most scared I've been, the entire haunt season. Having this in my lap is so much more upsetting than anything we did at Orrinites or scary farm. That is scary. I'm looking at Booberry just to calm down. Well, now, now, yeah, I'm trying to build up your resilience so you can go get electrified

at the 17th. Yeah, that's nothing now. Oh, my God. Thank you so much. That's amazing. I'm amazed how many guests have brought us things. It's so, like, surprising and sweet and unnecessary, I swear. That's not a cost of entry to being on the show.

And I've been delighted whenever this happens, but I can't believe we're holding it. This is one of the top. Yeah. Yeah. We'll take a photo with it and post it. Well, let me, should I try it on? Yeah.

I do want to know what my voice is. Do you want to take the photo with? It probably won't be the goosebumps mask rules. You probably will be able to take it off. All right. Well, let me see how this sounds. Oh, the mouth moves. Oh, the bear head.

I'll take a video of you doing the end here. Okay. Landon, Zachheim, you survived. cast the ride. Let's exit through the gift shop. Is there anything you'd like to plug? Yes, I would. Unnamed country bear. I run the Overlook Film Festival, a four-day celebration of all things horror, returning next April, 26. Passes should be on sale around Halloween, and submissions are open now if you are a filmmaker. We're also taking interactive submissions for the first time this year. Usually those are closed submissions. So if you have an idea we want to hear it and yeah it's spooky fun you might barely make it in time

that's great unknown country bear as for us yeah I should probably do the thing alright I'm taking it up okay does the asbestos off your skin came off

yeah yeah what's on me does my hair look normal it does feel like there's weird crumbs and stuff on my jeans I really felt like I was on another planet or in another reality in that head that transported me oh my god that you know well i mean having a this is a fear to face mike this when you put this on you will have like a like a hood in trapping your head

much like you much like in a certain maze with a certain monster yeah you want to give it a shot before we don't oh should we all try do it on you do it on your own time i'll i'll tell you what i didn't tell you before i myself was too frightened to put that head on Oh, hey! I was just saying it's the most scared I've been all month, and yet I faced my fear, and I did the wrap-up in it. So, all right, well, that's what it's all about

is conquering fears, and you helps by giving us the scariest thing we've ever seen. Oh, my God. Well, you know, I should have said you survived Hauntcast the Fright, and you, the audience, survived Hauntcast, the Fright. If you want a grave dig even deeper, join us at the Cemetery Gate or our IP tier, Crypt 3, where you get one more booness episode

for just three more bones a month. That's at patreon.com slash podcast. the ride. Thank you. Landon, thanks for a presence in this show, for your various encouragements, threats, and for giving us Godfather style a big, weird, hairy head is a gift. Jason, you got to take that home.

No, you're telling it. Surprise, Jane. Now I'll bully you to do Mystic Manor next. Oh, I was. No bullying. I just got to go to Hong Kong. This has been a Forever Dog production. produced by Mike Carlson, Jason Sheridan, Scott Gairdner, Brett Boehm, Joe Sillio, and Alex Ramsey. For more original podcasts, please visit Foreverdog Podcasts.com and subscribe to our shows on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keep up with the latest Forever Dog news by

following us on Twitter and Instagram at Forever Dog Team and liking our page on Facebook. Thank you.