Zombies swarm into DFW haunted houses

I am a dead man.

Out of ammo, out of time and out of luck, I’m surrounded by zombies in an abandoned, and allegedly haunted, 100-year-old helium plant on the northern, industrial fringes of Fort Worth. It’s here that I come to the shocking realization that I’m no Rick Grimes, the brave yet brutal hero/hunter of AMC’s hit zombie drama, The Walking Dead.

Instead, I’m more likely to be one of those loser extras whose intestines end up on the outside of their bodies, writhing in agony as they turn to zombie kibble.

This happens as I’m about three-quarters of the way through Mission: Apocalypse, a zombie-themed attraction that Hangman’s House of Horrors is running Friday and Saturday. Instead of the usual haunted-house shock tactics — where participants are passive recipients of whatever the ghouls and goblins dish out — Mission: Apocalypse is more like a three-dimensional first-person-shooter game where the goal is to take down as many zombies as possible with a kill shot to the head.

This interactive exercise in horror requires that teams of four to six are armed with laser rifles as well as a list of “supplies” — a can of beans, a flashlight, a mallet and a bag among them — that need to be retrieved from different parts of the house. Each team member also wears flag-football-style flags, which the zombies and evil surviving humans roaming the house try to snatch.

Get to the end with all your flags, supplies and a high body count, and you indeed can be Rick Grimes, the savior of your own scary movie.

But not me.

While our team of two managed to retrieve a few of the items, we’ve got no flags, ammunition or life left. I’ve made the mistake of spending too many “bullets” on too few zombies. Surrounded by the undead, we’re out of options.

See you on the other side.

Beyond Halloween

While we may have met our end, it’s just the beginning, at least as far as Hangman’s House of Horrors is concerned. While it has incorporated zombies in previous haunted-house attractions, it hasn’t pursued the interactive aspect until now. So, this opening night last weekend was a bit of a test run.

“Mission: Apocalypse is our first time to create an interactive hunt where patrons not only hunt, but are hunted and submerged in a very realistic apocalyptic scenario,” says Hangman’s owner Allen Sturgeon via email. “This event has sparked a lot of buzz across social media. We initially offered it as an invitation-only corporate event to companies looking for an alternative approach at team building. … We decided to open it up to the public for a weekend and with this event’s popularity, we’re definitely considering adding it to our roster this fall as a trial run.”

Hangman’s isn’t alone. Cutting Edge Haunted House, also in Fort Worth, just wrapped up its Zombie Apoc Army attraction — whose motto is “Shoot zombies, stay alive” — and haunted houses across the country are turning to zombies as a way to ramp up interest beyond the usual Halloween season. (Not a haunted house but Cousin’s Paintball in Forney has gotten into the act with Zombie Safari events.)

Leonard Pickel, owner and head designer of Winter Garden, Fla.-based Hauntrepreneurs, a theme-attraction design firm, says that as more haunted houses move into permanent locations — as opposed to setting up in a temporary site in September and tearing down after Halloween — they’re looking for ways to attract attention year-round.

“For eight or nine months out of the year, you have all these sets, costumes and props not doing anything. So they’ve been opening up for Valentine’s Day, Friday the 13th, Christmas. They’re finding ways to expand the market,” he says, noting that “escape rooms,” where attendees are locked in a room and have to find clues and keys to escape, are an increasingly popular segment of this trend.

Pickel says some of these escape rooms have the added element of locking patrons in with a zombie. Yikes!

Zombies are perfect for this market expansion because, let’s face it, there is no bad time of year for zombies. With the explosion of zombie TV series (Fear the Walking Dead, a spin-off debuting Aug. 23, joins The Walking Dead, iZombie and Z Nation in the lineup of zombie programming) as well as zombie movies (the bestseller Pride and Prejudice and Zombies hits the big screen next spring), zombie pub crawls, and zombie mud runs, zombies aren’t just for Halloween anymore.

“Zombies are one of the staples of the haunted house industry and have been for a while, but they’re definitely in a renaissance period right now,” says Sturgeon. “You can’t go to a horror convention without running into zombies everywhere.”

Rise of the ‘Dead’

While zombies have been part of horror lore for generations, their pop-culture cool skyrocketed with George Romero’s low-budget but groundbreaking film Night of the Living Dead in 1968.

That continued through his many sequels, such as Dawn of the Dead in 1978, but things really revved up in the early 2000’s with the film 28 Days Later (which introduced the concept of “fast zombies” as opposed to the slow, lurching variety) and the publication of Robert Kirkman’s popular The Walking Dead comic books. They became the basis for the AMC series which is now, as it gets ready to start its sixth season in October, the No. 1 TV show among adults 18-49, according to TV by the Numbers.

Because of this, everyone knows what a zombie is.

“It’s a real easy character to do. There’s not a lot of imagination,” says Cory Kennedy, one of the Hangman’s actors, though he was playing a more behind-the-scenes role last weekend. “People know what a zombie is up front, as opposed to other creatures sometimes [where] they have to think about it.”

“You almost have to have one attraction that’s zombie-based,” Pickel says of the haunted-house industry. “[Zombies] have become hugely popular, and with the modern state of affairs, it’s a psychological release. You have the ability to get out and do something more lifelike that makes you feel alive.”

It seems that several of those who survived last weekend’s Mission: Apocalypse — sweaty and breathless from the 90-degree heat and near-death by zombie — agree.

“This is the most intense [haunted house] I’ve been to,” Michael Mullenix of Fort Worth says. “You’ve gotta keep moving.”

“It’s cool to have a shooter,” says Clint Morris of Burleson. “It’s kind of cool to be able to interact with [the zombies].”

“It’s an adrenaline rush,” says Danica Lindsey of Crowley.

“It’s pretty intense,” she continues, before trailing off, “if you’re not in good health …”

Will zombies die?

Ah, health, something zombies never have to worry about.

But it remains to be seen if zombies really have the stamina to survive the plague of media overexposure. Or maybe they will shuffle off into the sunset like their vampire brethren after the conclusions of Twilight and True Blood.

Todd James, co-creator at Cutting Edge, says that for all of zombies’ popularity, it’s not a huge profit center for haunted houses because ticket sales have to be kept low, as only a team of four to six people is let in at a time. “You have to do things slowly,” he says. “You can’t do very many people.”

But he says Cutting Edge may do another zombie-themed attraction in February and that attendees’ love affair with the undead shows no sign of slacking. “It’s truly a craze right now,” he says. “Zombies beat out vampires and werewolves hands down.”

Sturgeon too thinks they will be around for a while.

“I honestly don’t see the zombie fad going out any time soon,” he says. “Zombies have stood the test of time.”

Dave Marks, editor and senior writer at the Toronto-based Zombie Research Society, a group dedicated to all things zombie, says zombies tap into primal fears of the modern age.

“A lot of the population sees all the crap in the world like global warming, and it may seem like a huge leap from that to zombies, but entertainment is reflective of the world around us,” he says. “They’ve surpassed vampires as the creatures of choice. Vampires were sexy and zombies aren’t that.”

Sturgeon also says people are intrigued by the zombie back story.

“Zombies bring forth many more creative explanations and possibilities than other ghouls,” he says. “How did they come to exist? Is it a virus? If so, was it chemical warfare? A government conspiracy? The much-warned apocalypse?”

Yet, for all of the zombie fascination and the seemingly undying appeal, Sturgeon thinks the industry needs to be careful in terms of staging events outside of Halloween.

“Year-round haunted houses are a delicate balance,” he says. “Once you start opening every single month, I feel it takes away some of the mystery and appeal. … Theming the attraction is the only way to open more times per year. We do special events like Friday the 13th and Valentine’s Day and now Mission: Apocalypse simply in an effort to give the public something different to see.

“[It] keeps us fresh on the minds of our patrons so that when the big show comes in the fall, they’ve hopefully had several unique experiences that will draw them back to us.”

This story was originally published July 29, 2015 at 11:46 AM with the headline "Zombies swarm into DFW haunted houses."