Summary:

To kick off the tour, a large character in a white suit and black top hat led my group into the haunted house.  What followed was a collection of various scenes of assorted themes. I really enjoyed the victim scenes. Of those, the distraught mother scene was the most realistic and entertaining. Other memorable rooms included the giant ogre scene with a surprise ending, the clown area with clowns bouncing off the walls, and the backwoods shack, which reminded me of of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.  Of all of the scenes within the haunted house, the backwoods shack was my favorite.  It featured a realistic porch facade, energetic backwoods characters, a nice torture scene and banjo music playing in the background. I also liked the hallway of doors, with only one exit.  This room had a nice visual effect.  As the my group entered the room, the lighting changed and evil messages & artwork appeared on the walls. 

In the center of the haunted house there was a strobe light cage maze, which patrons were rerouted through a number of times, giving the effect that you were going in circles.  Unfortunately, many areas in the attraction were too dimly lit. The hallways with cracked walls & goo oozing out of them were nicely done, and the guy banging on the plexiglass wall was a good scare opportunity.  Unfortunately, the lighting was so low in both areas, that their impact was greatly diminished. Also, the loud siren from the cage maze bled into a lot of the other scenes within the haunted house, causing a distraction in several areas.

On the night that I attended, the acting team was well staffed.  Acting styles varied, ranging from creatures popping out of dark corners, to actors slowly stalking you as soon as you walked into a scene. Most of the actors not doing pop-out scares did a good job of invading your personal space, sometimes getting within inches of patrons, to make them uncomfortable.  In many areas (like the clown room & backwoods shack), costumes were consistent with the scenes they were in, but in other areas they were not overly elaborate; I saw several of the actors wearing dark jeans and black T-shirts (one even had an Addison community logo printed on the front).  Make-up in the attraction was fairly basic as well; many characters had pale faces, with darkened eye sockets. 

While a number of the actors did a great job, there were still some significant issues that I experienced that night. Many of the pop-out scares were poorly timed and I caught one actor texting on his cell phone.  In addition to that, there was a torture scene where a character on stilts locked patrons in a steel cage. With customers unable to get out of the way, he proceeded to wave a plastic sword within inches of their face / eyes.  Trying to scare patrons is one thing, but actions like that are nothing more than irresponsible and dangerous.    

Overall, Disturbia put on a decent show. There were a number of scenes and effects that I really enjoyed. Unfortunately, due to the various issues mentioned in this review, it wasn't as fun or entertaining as last year's performance.  Considering the brevity of the tour and the level of entertainment value provided, I don't think the show was worth the steep $18 admission price.       

To find out more about this event, visit:

http://www.disturbiatof.com/