October is a time for costumes, pumpkin spice, and recreational anxiety and terror. Haunted houses are a major place to find two—if not all three—of such seasonal mainstays. And this year Portland has three big attractions: One transforms a local landmark into a haunted fairground, another offers slick, high-end screams, and a third is a family-friendly haunt for small children and scaredy cats. Which will spark panic for you?
Oaks Park Scaregrounds
Vibe: What if Oaks Park was haunted?
Carnivals, circuses, and theme parks all make terrific scenes for terror. This is long established; think Carnival of Souls (1962), Terrifier (2016), Ray Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes, the collected works of Insane Clown Posse, et al.. Oaks Park Scaregrounds leans into that with enough scary clowns, the occasional contortionist zombie, and trolling actors crawling the midway to make you believe it’s been infested with the powers of evil.
Scaregrounds offers three mid-sized haunts with different themes: A haunted castle, a scary clowns area, and a maze populated by characters from popular horror movies. All of them are fun and varied, but the castle stood out as distinctive. Creepy wizards, mad monarchs, and raging dragons are less common sights at haunted attractions than zombies or clowns, so if you’re looking for a unique haunt check this one out.
How scary is it? Pretty darn scary. Jump scares come at you from multiple, surprising points; the scare actors did a splendid job of faking us out. One group of witches made good use of an environmental effect—that I won’t spoil—and cackled at us evilly after we collectively yelped.
The clown area and movie haunt both feature small maze-like sections where you have to find your way through a deliberately confusing room. It’s not at all a hard puzzle to solve, but trying to do any problem solving while a scary clown watches (and makes it weird) changes mood. That little bit of added tension is a lot of fun.
Extra fun: Several mini-haunts, games, small escape rooms, food carts, local craft vendors, tarot readings, mocktails, and Oaks Park itself. The park is open until 10 pm on Friday and Saturday nights in October, so after getting startled by slashers you can subject yourself to gravity-based rollercoaster terror making Scaregrounds a great option for a date night or group outing. It’s worth noting that Scaregrounds is also open on Thursday nights, but the amusement park itself is not.
(Scaregrounds PDX, 7805 SE Oaks Park Way, open through November 1, $25-$75, more info, recommended for ages 13+)
The Fear PDX
Vibe: A high-production haunt with a ton of amazing scares.
Fear PDX’s large main attraction is divided into five sequential areas: A sci-fi alien area, a gothic mansion, a creepy swamp, a scary clown area—there must always be a scary clown area!—and a rural cannibal outdoor section reminiscent of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.
The haunts differ in tone and feel quite a bit, and just as you get used to the dusty halls of the gothic mansion you’ll be thrown into the sickly green glow of poisonous bog infested with beastly things out to get you.
The amount of thought that went into giving each area a clear, distinctive look and feel is impressive. The swamp used green lasers to create the illusion that we were walking through chest-high water, and the clown portion made generous use of glowing paint and blacklight. The gothic mansion was a classic ghost-infested Victorian house, and the corn stalks and wooden shacks in the cannibal bit were like nothing that had come before. When you get used to one type of scare, another’s around the corner.
Fear PDX’s high production value sometimes works against it. The amount and quality of animatronics is impressive, but even the most charming janky robot isn’t as much fun as a skilled actor doing their damndest to make you scream. And sometimes the technology wasn’t up to the task. At one point a hokey-looking CGI ghost appeared on a screen that wasn’t quite working. Instead of being impressive it killed the mood.
Since the main attractions are strung together into a large, linear sequence, Fear PDX handles this with a series of waiting areas where a host character will stop the crowd and let groups in gradually. This is understandable. Conga lines in ghost houses aren’t scary, and diffusing tension after scream-inducing moments is a nice reset before diving into another parade of scares. But there’s nothing frightening about having to wait in line.
These are nitpicks, though. Production values that are a bit too high and being a bit too popular are good problems to have. The Fear PDX is an amazing experience, and if you like horror you won’t be disappointed.
How scary is it? The Fear PDX is very scary. I was grinning the whole time out of sheer, terrified joy.
The frights are pretty varied. Obviously, you’ll find a ton of jump scares, but also a healthy amount of actors being menacing and weird, and sometimes even the environment itself is against you. You’ll have to go through multiple inflatable walls, primed to squeeze you in, negotiate your way through hanging corpses and dangling severed heads. The scary clown section has a fun part where you walk across slanted ground and cling to bars for support.
It’s a lot and might overwhelm some haunted house newbies. I was with a friend who had never been in a haunted house before. She was absolutely terrified, covered with sweat, and clinging to me like I was a cat tree for much of the experience. Fortunately, emergency exits are clearly marked at regular intervals if it gets too much for you.
Extra fun: Smaller haunts and short escape rooms are available on top of the main haunt, and food carts are on hand as well. Several very excellent scare actors were also doing crowd work in the waiting and exit areas, getting jumps out of attendees in line for the attractions or after they’d exited.
(The Fear PDX, 12219 NE Glisan, open through November 7, 45-$65, tickets and info at fearpdx.com, recommended for ages 14+)
Dead Media Haunted House
Vibe: All of your favorite movie monsters rendered in Mike Bennett’s distinctive style.
Dead Media contains a whole alphabet of movie monsters and a museum of VHS tapes. The idea is that it’s a video store filled with old scary movies, and the owner (played by Bennett via a monitor) got sucked into mysterious tape while alphabetizing. Mostly the conceit is an excuse to create a museum of nostalgic media.
Each room is filled with large wooden cutouts of monsters representing a different letter. D for Dracula, P for Pennywise, X for Xenomorph, and so on, along with old posters and VHS boxes that people who remember the ’80s and ’90s will recognize. Creepy lighting and smoke effects give the installation a spooky atmosphere, but there aren’t any jump scares.
If you have a small child who likes scary things they’ll have a great time. My five-year-old loudly proclaimed “Dad, ‘F’ is for ‘Frankenstein!’” simultaneously showing off basic phonics and enthusiasm for Halloween stuff. If that’s your thing, this is a good time with the kids.
There are some delightful deep cuts here for horror fans. If you’re the kind of person who remembers that Q – The Winged Serpent exists, you’ll have fun recognizing obscure horror movies from decades past.
How scary is it? This haunted house is for small children learning about the alphabet.
However, if you’re old enough to remember ever using a videotape you will have to reckon with the pitiless and unyielding march of time. The ’90s were a quarter century ago and videotapes now only exist as relics and curiosities. Someday the Reaper’s icy fingers will grip your heart and you’ll be as dead as the videos on Mike Bennett’s shelves. Your child, gamely learning about letters from a family-friendly haunted house, will eventually mourn you. Nothing lasts forever. Not movies. Not you.
Extra fun: This is a Mike Bennett project, so stickers, T-shirts, and art are all available in the gift shop.
(Mike Bennett Studios, 707 NE Fremont, open through November 1, more info, FREE, all ages)
