It's a little late, but I did get to Scary Farm again this year, and it's time for my yearly ranking of the mazes.
First off, I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by how nice it was to go on Halloween. It wasn't our first choice of day but it was the only one that worked for our group. I was expecting huge crowds, but the park was (relatively) empty. Perhaps the combination of Halloween being on a Friday and a Dodger game happening, but the longest we waited in a line all night was 20 minutes, with some of the mazes being walk-ons. They also had those days priced lower than some earlier in the month, so maybe that's just a trend.
Anyway, here is the ranking, from best to worst. As usual, these rankings are entirely subjective and could be influenced by timing as much as anything else.
1. Mary: The Haunting of Worth Home - Ok, this maze slapped hard. Maybe the best mix of scares in the entire park, and the only maze utilizing the "Boo Box" method of scares that Universal seems to exclusively use. That's not to say the maze wasn't full of actors otherwise, because it was. The set design was fantastic, with a lot of genuinely interesting rooms and monsters, and the flow was excellent. The spot underneath Ghostrider has delivered for almost a decade now between Trick or Treat and Wax Works, and this maze is a worthy successor to that lineage. This might be the best maze debut we've had since Origins, if I'm being honest.
2. Widows - Returning for a second season, Widows was already a strong maze that got some upgrades and had some work done to improve the flow, and the result was a genuinely creepy maze for the majority of my group. I think the ending is a bit weak, but everything else is really good so you can forgive it.
3. Room 13 - Look, I'm just as surprised as you are that this is as high as it is, but this isn't a result of other mazes being bad; Room 13 was legitimately good this year. I don't know why, maybe an increase in scare actors (there were definitely more than I'd seen in previous years) and more inventive scares, but this maze finally felt like it justified its wait, and so I want to give it props and encourage Knotts to continue building on it.
(Also, I have to say the Goreing 20s area really hit for us this year. As we came out of Room 13, we watched all the scare actors run to the bumper cars and ride it as a group, led by one of the actors clearly playing out being controlled by the Devil's Elixer. Just a fun time all around.)
4. Origins: The Curse of Calico - The true workhorse of the event. Origins still hits, though it is starting to show its age. I would not be surprised if next year was the last year for this maze, and they do a major update, but I also think it is hard to get rid of this specific maze given what it has become lore-wise to the park.
5. Mesmer: Sideshow of the Mind - One of two departing mazes this year, and I really considered putting this maze much higher just because of how much I enjoy it. They definitely made sure there were enough scare actors this year, and the effects were all in working order. I'm going to be fascinated to see what they put in this spot next year; it feels so long since we last had a clown maze in this spot, and after two different magician mazes and a samurai maze (all of which were great) we're due for a return of some goofy stuff, especially if they do what I'd like them to do with Chilling Chambers.
6. Cinema Slasher - Honestly only down here because of the strength of other mazes. I thought this maze got a good upgrade as far as scares, and it had my favorite scare actor of the entire event (the popcorn mascot wielding a knife between movies). What I like about this maze is that it lets the Knotts crew get some of its thematic scare needs out without having to dedicate an entire maze to the concept, aka, we don't need a Slaughterhouse or a deadly sleepaway camp maze, but they work as segments in this one.
7. The Zoo - Not a bad new maze by any stretch, but I think this maze is hurt by the flashlight gimmick more than anything. When we went through early in the night, they still had lights on so we didn't need the flashlights, but you could see many of the rooms were a bit more sparse than you would expect. There was a good mix of heights in this maze, but definitely something they need to work on to improve going forward.
8. Eight Fingers Nine: The Boogeyman - This maze is right on the border from great/good to just ok and bad, which is disappointing because I'm pretty sure this was one of my favorites last year. The whole maze just felt flat, partly due to some horrendous line pacing (I'm guessing there was a group ahead of us that was slowing everyone down, because we breezed through the ending segment), and some scare actors that just did not have the energy required. I still really like the setting, and do think this is a good maze, but sometimes you do your walk-through and get a miss, and that was this one.
9. The Grimoire - God they really just did not care about this maze at the end, huh? The few scare actors we had gave their best, but it felt like Knotts cut so much from this maze and was running it at bare minimum levels. A sad way to go, but also this maze was troubled from the start so let's see what we get next year.
10. The Chilling Chambers - Fix this maze. Good lord someone fix this maze, change up some scenes, something. This maze should be so much better (especially in a spot that has had great mazes prior).
