I am blindfolded in the Rope Room of the Queen Mary, unable to see any of the other ghost hunters that are with me. I cannot hear them either, thanks to the noise-cancelling headphones that only allow me to hear radio frequencies altering so quickly that it becomes a wash of white noise. Without warning, the white noise seems to dampen to a high-pitched hum and I hear three words clear as day: “Frightened right now.” A ghost may have just actually spoken to me, I think, and now it’s not the only one who’s frightened. illusions of the passed ghost hunt

Two months ago, I had the great pleasure of experiencing Illusions of the Passed, Aidan Sinclair’s combination of Queen Mary ghost stories and magic that creates a wonderful night of entertainment. One review is normally enough for any show, no matter how exceptional, unless something significant changes.

The new Illusions of the Passed Ghost Hunt experience blows the previous version out of the water.

The new Illusions starts with a variation of the original show. Once again, Sinclair treats audiences to a performance based around Victorian spiritualism and séance magic. He performs illusions based around the well-known ghost story about Jackie, the little girl in a swimsuit seen around the Queen Mary’s first-class pool area. He asks for the ghost to join the show and multiple guests are given the chance to become involved in the experience as the ghost makes her presence known in multiple ways. As much as I enjoyed the original version, which focused on a male ghost known for his top hat, I think the new show using Jackie as its center creates an even better framework for Sinclair’s top-notch magic performance.

When the performance is complete, however, a second part of the show can now be experienced that is nothing like the first half. Sinclair believes that The Revenant Room (Illusions’ theater space) and the Rope Room (found down a narrow set of stairs just off the theater) are actually haunted spaces. He’s been attempting to understand what is happening in these rooms and now a small number of audience members can join him in his ghost hunting.

As Sinclair himself points out very clearly at the beginning of the hunt, this time there are no illusions being performed. The hunt is emphatically not another magic show. Instead, Sinclair turns on recording devices to keep track of whatever happens (if anything) during the hunt. Then he and the audience use several forms of equipment to see if any ghosts appear or wish to communicate. There is a stark difference between the obvious entertainment of the earlier show and the serious nature of this latter hunt. Sinclair treats the hunt with an impressive seriousness and uses forms of ghost hunting equipment that I’ve never seen on any ghost hunting television show.

The most impressive piece of equipment is a spirit box connected to noise-cancelling headphones. In general, a spirit box rotates randomly through radio frequencies, based on the belief that ghosts can manipulate either the frequencies themselves or the energy from the static into direct communication through the box’s speakers. Ghost hunters typically use these boxes to ask ghosts questions in the hopes of getting answers from the frequencies. However, because the hunters ask questions and listen for answers, they can actually end up with an unintentional bias toward hearing specific answers. In other words, if you ask a question, your brain starts trying to find an answer – and that can make you hear what you are expecting to hear.

The spirit box Sinclair uses erases that bias completely. One person in the group wears the headphones as well as a blindfold. Because of the headphones’ ability to cancel external noise, the only thing the person wearing them can hear is the static from the box itself. This person becomes unable to hear any questions being asked by others at the hunt or even see the others as they ask the questions. If the person hears something from the box, they are told to repeat it out loud. Without knowing anything about what the others at the hunt are asking, however, they only find out whether anything they heard might be an appropriate answer to those questions at the end.

While I’ve seen spirit boxes many times on television and used them myself in a previous Venice Beach ghost hunt, using one this way is a completely different experience and is significantly more interesting, whether you are asking questions or repeating words with no idea what is being asked. When these questions and words appear to actually connect, which happened several times during my hunt, it creates the fascinating possibility that something may legitimately be attempting to communicate.

Illusions of the Passed already stands as one of my favorite current events in the Los Angeles area. The new ghost hunt add-on experience transforms Illusions of the Passed into the definition of serious entertainment. First you get a wonderful show and then you are challenged with the serious possibility of real interactions with real ghosts. I do not know whether anything I repeated came from someone no longer living, but I have never been more open to the possibility than I was during this hunt. Aidan Sinclair has created what may be the best chance for someone to interact with those who have actually passed in the perfect counterpoint to his magic show’s legends. I plan to return to the hunt again as soon as I possibly can.

Find out more information on Illusions of the Passed Ghost Hunt and buy tickets here. Check out our Event Guide for more immersive and horror entertainment throughout the year.

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