Lumination sent out three daring staffers to brave Nashville’s top haunted attractions. Here’s what they found:
Nashville Nightmare
Reviewed by Lumination staffer Kailey Schuyler
1016 Madison Square, Madison, TN 37115
Price: $24.99, but subject to change
Scare-O-Meter: ★★
One sentence summary: Some of my group was laughing, and some were screaming.
I follow this by saying there are four different houses you can go through, and I went through two of the houses. I walked through “Fairy Tale Hell” and “Industrial Undead.”
The scariest part of the whole experience was the walk to wait in line. My group was constantly being followed by characters that loved to torment the scared. Some of the characters had chainsaws, some were repulsive and had blood dripping out of their mouth and would try to get you to taste it, and some were sliding around on the ground and would sneak up behind you screaming.
Once we were inside the house, there were a lot of big breaks where there was nobody hiding to scare the visitors — there were too many scary props, and not enough scary actors.
I typically can get pretty jumpy in haunted houses, and I was never scared to the point where I screamed or jumped.
Nothing stood out to me in the two houses I walked through that other haunted houses don’t have to offer.
I did enjoy my experience and everyone in my group had fun. We wanted to go through the other houses, but the lines were too long for us to justify waiting.
Overall, the two specific houses I went through are perfect for those who can handle mild haunted houses. The atmosphere was fun and spooky, and all the workers were great.
Devil’s Dungeon
Reviewed by Lumination staffer Carly Reams
510 Davidson St, Nashville, TN 37213
http://slashvillehaunts.com/devils-dungeon/
Price: $22.00
Scare-O-Meter: ★★★★
One sentence summary: Blood, blood and more blood. That is the best way to describe my horrifying experience in Nashville’s Devil’s Dungeon.
This haunted house has been known to be controversial to the many Nashville goers over the years, and I can understand why. In past years, they have had many scenes that seemed too graphic or strange for certain ages. Walking through the satanic and graphic scenes myself, it was easy to see how this haunted house was named one of the scariest and most controversial.
A trail of rooms from neon hallucinogenic walls to blood-covered half-man half-animal creatures eventually lead you to a dungeon of a red devil himself, and the only way out: through more chainsaws and shovel-clanging actors alike.
I was found pretty often falling into a crouched position or running frantically with my eyes closed through the maze of horrors. The actors were great at surprise scares or just giving you that creepy tingling down your spine. If you are a thrill seeker looking for a good scare, this should be on your list of places to go.
The biggest downfall of the event is that you pay $20 dollars and are most likely going to end up in a twisting line to the front entrance. It is definitely worth it though if you are looking for a real terrifying scare.
Just grab your crucifix and hope you make it past the devil himself. Muahaha!
Haunted Hell
Reviewed by Lumination staffer Maria Morales
3039 Apache Trail Antioch, TN 37013
Price: $20
Scare-o-meter: ★★★
One sentence summary: This place will confuse you with its crazy rooms and maze.
Haunted Hell was one of the best haunted houses I’ve been to. I think it is safe to say that it was better than Nashville Nightmare and here is why:
Haunted Hell is big. The building is huge, and the whole time we were in there felt like it didn’t have an ending. The duration was around thirty minutes which didn’t feel like it since there were a lot of different rooms. We weren’t even in the building yet when we were getting scared by two guys with clown masks at the line.
One thing that was surprising that I’ve never seen in other haunted houses is that there were kids around 8-10 years old acting. The very first person to give us instructions was a little girl with a creepy white dress covered in blood bossing us around.
The route also included a girl jumping off beds screaming in our faces. This and the decorations made the place stand out from other haunted houses.
There were two sections that were the guests’ favorites, a maze and a section filled with black and white walls.
The maze wasn’t just a typical maze where you find the exit within three minutes; this one took us a while to find and was very well distributed. We weren’t disappointed. The section with black and white walls had some sort of uneven floors that tricked your mind thinking you weren’t stepping in the right way. Some people tripped but luckily, no one got hurt.
The best and most unique feature of this particular haunted attraction is found at the end with a weird spinning tunnel.
Although these concepts from Haunted Hell were my personal favorites, it could have even been scarier.
But if you are looking for something more than just getting scared, go to Haunted Hell.
Featured article image by Morales