This past weekend at the Midsummer Scream 2023 Halloween and horror convention in Southern California, I was invited to participate in “The Boogeyman Experience” immersive activation in promotion of 20th Century Studios’ acclaimed The Boogeyman film arriving on home media.
Having seen and enjoyed the film, I was excited to see what the studio had in store for “The Boogeyman Experience,” which was located in the upper level of the Long Beach Convention Center, right next to the Grand Ballroom where all of the event’s biggest panel presentations were held. Upon arriving on Saturday morning I was asked to sign a waiver and then read the disclaimer about what I was in for. Then I was paired with two other members of the media (for this before-opening preview) and sent into the dark. The basic concept of this three-minute experience was as follows: I was chosen to split off from the other two participants and asked to stand in a room that was almost completely pitch black– I could see the outlines of the walls, shelving, and other scattered objects around me and not much else. My two cohorts, I would learn later, were seated at a monitoring station just outside the room, where they could see what I was up to using an infrared night-vision security camera. Their mission was simply: give me directions over a microphone to track down a series of special objects related to The Boogeyman using clues they found at their table (not to mention the fact that they could see into the room and I couldn’t). And naturally, this being Midsummer Scream and all– never mind The Boogeyman being a spine-tingling horror movie– there was something lurking in the dark with me as well.
It’s a very fun, clever, and simply scary concept, and I would say it was pretty well executed considering the very short amount of time and limited space the creators of “The Boogeyman Experience” had to work with. My fellow team members and I started off pretty strongly, tracking down two of the (I believe) five items right off the bat. The third was more challenging to find as I frantically searched throughout the room and my teammates struggled to decipher their clues, and by the time I got used to the ominous whispers emanating from every corner and what looked like a giant hand coming out of the shadows into the room with me, our time was up. One major complaint I did have about the experience was the amount of sound bleed I could hear from the other teams going through it at the same time… it was fairly confusing hearing a set of directions being barked at a different participant while I was trying to decipher the instructions that my own allies were giving me. Still, I do think I enjoyed “The Boogeyman Experience” for what it was– bear in mind I didn’t have to wait very long to try it out, as most regular attendees of Midsummer Scream did, and as one of the first 50 to go through the experience on Saturday morning I walked away with an amazingly cool and complementary The Boogeyman poster featuring artwork of actor David Dastmalchian being menaced by the titular closet-dwelling creature. Ultimately I would say this was an innovative idea for an immersive activation, though it probably could have benefitted from being developed and play-tested a little bit further to work out the kinks.
The Boogeyman will be released on home media (including Blu-ray and DVD) soon from the Disney-owned 20th Century Studios.