Our group of six and another group of six gathered around a conference table in the Administration Building at Universal Orlando HHN where our host for the Unmasking The Horror Tour informed us about the rules of the tour. Quickly, we were on our way through employees only gates, backlots, and sound stages.

The first house remained a surprise until we were inside the entryway, but our tour guide didn’t take long to announce the Grave of Flesh!

Of the three haunts visited, we stayed in Grave of Flesh the longest because our guide took the time to explain the details of haunts in general. Even knowing a lot of effort goes into producing a haunted house, especially on this scale, I was still amazed by the amount of work and infrastructure. There are art and design teams, props and decor, and even landscaping gets involved. A warehouse is maintained, and props are cataloged and their use recorded.

Given this level of attention to the small details, it was not surprising to learn that inside jokes and references are scattered through the haunts in the form of Easter eggs and small tributes to the people that make Universal Orlando HHN come to life.

The detail that amazed me the most was the amount of story contained within each haunt. It’s easy to recognize the theme of the house, and to see that the theme is maintained through the entire experience, but I never realized the haunt told a story.

In Grave of Flesh we learned the story was an exploration of death and the reduction of a person to nothing. The story starts with the a scene to inform visitors that they are now dead. Hint: look up! The grisly destruction of the flesh occurs over the next few scenes.

Followed by the departure of the spirit.

The final message, delivered with a heaping helping of horror, is that whatever happens after, you are gone from this world.

We received some other education in Grave of Flesh. Our host explained some of the terms haunt workers use, like boo-hole, ‘stuff’ in face, and the various device triggers that are activated either by an actor, a guest, or a timer. During the course of our three haunt tour, he also showed us various sensory effects such as scent cannisters, special lighting, what the different floor types and textures mean. Finally, he pointed out various safety considerations in the houses.

Finished with being dead, we moved on to the next Universal Orlando HHN house: Dolls Lets Play Dead.

Upon entering the house, we immediately encounter oversized toys and other oversized objects meant to convey the notion that we are now small. Toy-sized, in fact, and trapped in the attic with Lyla, the toy torturing psychopath in the making. As we make our way through the house, we see Lyla’s demented behavior spiral into abject darkness as she progresses from destroying toys to arson and worse.

Along the way, we learn that Universal Orlando HHN repeat offender BuzzCon may have something to do with the disturbing behavior we see. Also, we learn from our host that there are some buttons in this house that are meant to be pushed by guests! Look for the buttons or controls that are lit up.

We escape the clutches of the Doll House and proceed immediately to our next stop on the Universal Orlando HHN tour.

Welcome to Hatchet and Chains: Demon Bounty Hunters

The story told by this haunt is of two unlikely friends, Hatchet and Chains, characters from Sinister Sinema 2, that now have their own house in HHN 34.

In their new house, they fight demons who have come to this world to possess humans. Only this possession is not the spirit taking over the body but the physical infestation of the body shown horrifically by the scenes in the house.

Hatchet and Chains must stop the invasion in this town otherwise the newly added train route will spread the demonic infection across the country. I won’t spoil whether these unlikely heroes prevail, but I will mention that explosives are involved.

One less demonic detail we learned along the way is the particular way certain favorite props make their way into houses year after year, like Thunder’s portrait.

We exited Hatchet and Chains: Demon Bounty Hunters and returned to the sunlit world of Universal Orlando, tour complete. Next time I visit Orlando at Halloween, I think I’ll do an Unmasked tour and then visit Universal Orlando HHN. This behind the scenes look was fun and educational, and I look forward to doing it again.

For more information about Universal Orlando HHN or the Unmasking the Horror Tour, check out their Website.

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