Slightly over 20 years ago, the first “Icon” was created for a Halloween Horror Nights (HHN) event. Jack the Clown was created by Universal to be an icon for HHN10. This year being an anniversary year, the history of 20 years of icons is a prime focus and one of the most anticipated houses for 2021 was ‘HHN Icons Captured.’
During my most recent RIP tour, I experienced this house. Our group has seen the Halloween Nightmare Fuel show. We walked through the Crypt TV scare zone and then went to the Seek and Destroy scare zone. We spent time there being ridiculed by the “Controller.” He referred to our tour guide Jim as the “keeper of the light.” RIP tour guides carry colored light devices so groups stay together. This apparently is a standard banter with the tour guides in this zone.
Jim took us to the HHN Icons house. He gave us the back story:
The backstory was straight forward. In HHN lore, “Fear” has captured all the icons in the lantern once again. Now, do not think about this too much because this is the year that Jack is everywhere. However, to some extent he and all the icons are captured in this house. Every room is themed to a different icon such The Usher, Chance, Undertaker, and The Storyteller for example. The sets are the inner working of the lantern.
If I understood the basic plot, we were walking through an early place that each icon was introduced in HHN lore. However, in these scenes, a HHN super-fan is being tortured and/or killed by an icon. As you walk through the house, you get to encounter each icon in the process of their evil acts. The scenes were well done and had a solid dose of scares.
Things that I think I noticed while walking through but had confirmed with photos from my friend’s unmasking tour the following day were:
-The totems controlled by Fear could be spotted. There were even totems for Lady Luck and Chance that appeared in HHN lore after Fear’s year of lantern control. This was done to make the “Lantern” idea complete.
-There is a throne at the finale portion of the house which is also a call back to HHN 20 house Hades: The Gates of Ruin. This throne will have a champion of the lantern seated on it at the end. These champions rotate as the night goes on.
I thought this was a great house. Remember this is an opinion from someone who may know about HHN Icons but has never seen them before in person. I am sure there were so many references to the lore of HHN that I missed. Even despite that, this house was great and very enjoyable.
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