Screemers: bigger and badder bumps in the night

08 Oct 2019 - Photos by Drew Rowsome


It is pitch dark and all I can hear is someone, or something, beating a blunt object rhythmically against the wall and whispering what sounds like threats. And there is a scrabbling sound, fingernails or claws inside the walls. I step forward and slam up against a wall. Step to the right and there is another wall. Turn and can see a pinprick of light up above and ahead. Or it might be the way I just came. It doesn't matter. I must keep moving. I step carefully though I want to run. It is pitch dark and who knows what is underfoot. I focus on the light. One step. Hands out. Focus on the light. A shadow looms and blocks out the light. I bump into what I hope is the person who dared to enter The Darkness just before me. But there is a very good chance that it isn't . . .

There is nothing more exhilarating than being scared out of one's wits. To, as Screemers states, #livethefear. And Screemers has been delivering the fear in ever escalating doses for 27 years. Though it isn't a notable, except for longevity, anniversary they are celebrating by moving to larger quarters in the Better Living Centre with, of course, the 'Living' crossed out and replaced with 'Dead.' Expansion is always risky, especially in what is becoming a crowded market, but it has also inspired them to expand the fear factor.

We hastily exit Chucky's playroom, his slayroom, to face a long dark corridor of dripping pipes and abandoned metalwork. Freddy Kreuger, as tall, lean, scarred and cadaverous as a nightmare, stands behind a flimsy-looking stretch of chain link fence. He idly taps his razor fingers on the support beam and watches us with bemused eyes. If we get past him we will pass under the entranceway announcing Camp Crystal Lake. And beyond that, we can faintly hear the menacing music of Leatherface revving a chainsaw. If we can get past Freddy . . .

As well as expanding the grounds of Screemers, the proprietors have taken the opportunity to increase the length of each 'haunt.' Mixing and matching what they had in storage, to disorient those of us who have been loyal victim visitors, and have added enough new corpses, clowns, body parts, ghouls, animatronics and surprises to utterly overwhelm. Each creepy corner turned leads not to an exit and the prospect of survival, but to another terror to be traversed. All without losing the attention to detail. There is literally too much to take in. Especially when one's eyes are closed in a palpitating plea of a prayer.

There are a multitude of corpses hanging from the ceiling. A macabre meat rack. Or several tortured almost, or definitively, to death corpses chained to a wall. Or several bodies in a morgue with sheets pulled over their heads. As we enter their environs, we know from experience that one of them will spring to life or undead existence. But which one? No breathing or movement can be detected. Maybe this time they are all props. Probably not. And it startles, scares and delights every time. We may not all have an infinite capacity for living the fear, but Screemers has an infinite capacity to frighten.

The midway and rides have also been moved indoors which is a relief on a cold and/or rainy night. The line-up for the Grotesque dark ride is lengthy, it is a slow loader, and much pleasanter out of the elements (though there is no relief, thankfully, from the marauding packs of goths, ghouls, killer clowns and one persistent lounge lizard who seems to be wearing a skinned pink bunny). I miss the particular trepidation of navigating a corn field with only the stars above and chainsaw-wielding maniacs ahead, but the alternate version that has been come up with is equally disturbing.

The walls, floor and ceiling blare neon and expand in three dimensions (thanks to the paper glasses balanced precariously over my own spectacles) to the edge of sanity. It is gorgeous and voluptuous. Yes, the carnival has fallen on bad times - the clowns are debauched and murderous, the games of skill are deadly, and the trained animals and freaks have run viciously amok - but its tarnished glory is vibrantly intact. It is the opposite of dark and spooky, it is nuclear colours and pulsating energy. Except for the strewn appendages, blood splatters and overwhelming sense of foreboding, I want to run away and join this circus. Until, in the time-honoured amusement park ride tradition, something goes horribly wrong . . .

The Screemers design team have also brushed up on the trends in horror. What Winter Horrorland does to Christmas, already a holiday that induces fear and trembling, is sumptuous and gore-soaked. Turns out Melania was on to something with her blood red Christmas trees. Even the innocuous giant gingerbread man's initial sweet spiciness is undercut by the malicious gleam in the eyeballs peering out from where raisins should be. And that is where Halloween will always trump Christmas, and Screemers will always trump a visit to a non-homicidal Santa Claus, the visuals that incarnate our fears are better than presents. And won't need to be returned for credit.

We are lost in a maze. Each potential way forward leading backwards or to the side. A woman, separated from her group, has latched onto us and follows still shouting fruitlessly for her friends. I tell her not to worry, if we don't get out we will eat her first. She begins to cry. Newbie.

And they have also studied the trends in haunted attractions. Of how far things can be pushed. Everything is a little darker, a little more claustrophobic. Being alone in the dark, while fully aware that one isn't alone: something is very nearby, brushing against your shoulder raising goose bumps, is a terrifying proposition. A fact the cast takes gleeful joy and pride in. They are masters of misdirection and surprise. Or double takes. Popping out and then doubling down and doing it again. Working in tandem so that someone, something, gets the advantage of digging in when the initial reaction or adrenaline-laden panic has turned to relief. Getting us when we are vulnerable.

We turn a corner and I involuntarily scream. There is something there behind the wall. Moving. Advancing. A hulking monstrosity. It is a mirror. And I have been played, jump-scared, in the best way possible. The fears and terrors that Screemers exploits and presents, are all expressionistic masterpiece renditions of the ones that I brought with me.