Event Report & Photos: Dread Central Attends the Kick-Off of Queen Mary’s Dark Harbor 2015
Sean Decker
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For a few years now, it seems SoCal haunt enthusiasts have been generally dismissive of Queen Mary’s Dark Harbor, but given our fun and fright-filled experience with the attraction’s 2015 kick-off this past Thursday, October 1, that attitude will more than likely be scrubbed as easily as the barnacles from the hull of the seventy-nine-year old ship which houses it.
Taking place on the dock and aboard the 1,000-foot-plus, three-stack, Art Deco steamer RMS Queen Mary in Long Beach, CA, the 2015 rendition of Dark Harbor (led by production designer and art director J.J. Wickham) offers up six fright mazes, which include the new and rather chilling “Lullaby” attraction, all delivered within an engagingly fun, carnival-like atmosphere.
Arriving to the event, we grabbed a cocktail at the Big Top Bar (which in addition to offering a full drink menu was serving up absinthe in keeping with the attraction’s sideshow theme) before venturing out into the festivities. Mere moments later, amid the searing, bellowing flames which lit the harbor and an array of booths hawking everything from food (there are many choices) and beverage to assorted spooky merchandise, we encountered a prowling, stilt-walking monkey man who clashed his cymbals at us menacingly as well as a face-painted gentleman who enthusiastically demonstrated to us a rather unsettling talent: He repeatedly and with relish tapped via hammer a six-inch nail into his sinus cavity. With these just two of the two hundred monsters which roamed the grounds, we headed into the nearest maze, “Voodoo Village.”
https://youtu.be/GceTbp8lR_U
Immediately evident upon entrance were two things foreign to most haunt mazes: a decided lack of human traffic jam and its sheer size. The maze seemed veritably without end, which allowed for our utter immersion into a Southern-fried world of Louisiana witchcraft that was its narrative. Production design was high, the actors committed, and there were more than a handful of startled screams from our group (Sinful Celluloid’s Chris Jimenez, I’m looking at you).
This personality continued throughout the majority of Dark Harbor’s mazes (although in this writer’s opinion “B340” was confusing in its design and the only letdown), in particular the hair-raising “Lullaby,” “Circus,” and “Soulmate” mazes, all held within the darkened bowels of the eighty-one-ton vessel (purportedly one of the most haunted places in America). Moving through the ship’s depths, clowns cackled, malevolent and bloody children threatened, and ghostly images flitted about our periphery, eliciting the questions, “Are the performers themselves scared working in this darkness?” and, “What if what we just saw wasn’t really a performer, but an actual ghost?”
And that’s just one more reason why one should hit Dark Harbor this year. Well played, Queen Mary. We loved it.
Dark Harbor runs 7pm to midnight Sundays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays and 7pm to 1am Fridays and Saturdays through November 1. Tickets are $24 general admission and $53 general admission plus a fast fright pass (which we recommend). For tickets and more information, visit queenmary.com/events/dark-harbor.
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