A Freak Show came to town for Scarefest 2016 and 2017, with a whole host of curious performers dying to entertain guests in this scare zone!
Fact File
- Location: Between Hospitality Suite & X-Sector
- Scare Rating: 3 Pumpkins
- Opening Year: 2016
- Closing Year: 2017
Located on the pathway running between the Hospitality Suite and X-Sector, an illuminated sign at the Hospitality Suite end ‘welcomed’ guests to Freak Show.
Inside a side-show of circus rejects awaited, led by The Ring Master, with The Knife Thrower and The Bearded Lady just some of those who were waiting. Each act had their own mini-stage where they would perform for guests, as well as moving amongst the crowds.
Before the scare zone opened in the late afternoon, there was a small opening ceremony. This saw each act individually introduced, followed by a ‘volunteer’ being selected from amongst the observing guests to be transformed into a superhuman freak to join the Freak Show – this involved luminous green gunge being dumped on their head from within a cubicle, atop which sat a tap from The Flume.
Having introduced a new free-flowing scare zone format for Scarefest 2015, the Resort continued with this in 2016 with the addition of Freak Show. The scare zone served as an indirect replacement for Nox Infernus, which had been located in Dark Forest.
The scare zone utilised some of the props from past scare maze Carnival of Screams – most notably part of the iconic open-mouthed clown face through which guests entered the maze.
Freak Show returned for a second and final year in 2017, before scare zones as a concept disappeared from the Scarefest line-up for a number of years, with 2018 seeing the introduction of a new programme of ‘Scaremosphere’.
However, the freaks did return a few years later, when the Resort introduced Freak Show: Toxic Junkyard, an outdoor scare maze, in 2020 in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.
