Universal shared a behind-the-scenes look at the creation of Dead Exposure: Death Valley, an original house at Halloween Horror Nights 2024 in Universal Studios Hollywood.

Behind-the-Screams of Dead Exposure: Death Valley

Dead Exposure: Death Valley is a brand-new house but was inspired by Dead Exposure: Patient Zero from HHN 28 at Universal Orlando Resort. In Patient Zero, the planet is ravaged by a disease that turns humans into zombies. The Death Valley story also features zombies, but this time guests find themselves in a top-secret government facility in Death Valley, California.

John Murdy, creative director and executive producer of Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood, said the following via Discovery Universal Blog.

If you were gonna build a facility somewhere that you didn’t want anyone to know about, you’d build it in Death Valley. It’s one of the most inhospitable places on Earth.

Sirens blare, as guests see the smashed-open gates of the facility upon entering the new house. The mysterious and uneasy start invites guests to speculate and create their own conspiracy theories about the facility.

Conspiracy theories are the first cultural theme of “Dead Exposure: Death Valley.” As Discovery Universal Blog states, good horror “often speaks to the cultural anxieties of the moment.”

While the genre, of course, creates new monsters and terrifying scenarios that haunt our nightmares, those monsters are often a magnified, exacerbated and personified version of what we already fear. Whatever’s happening on the cultural or political stage crops up in the horror movies of the time. Whether it’s fear of nuclear war in the 1950s, anxiety over protest movements of the 1960s or the “stranger danger” paranoia of the 1990s, the genre is a funhouse mirror of ourselves. 

Discover Universal Blog

While conspiracy theories are rampant today, Murdy also drew inspiration from Soviet-era conspiracies.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, in the early ‘90s, there was a lot of chatter about all these secret military facilities and labs popping up all over the world. In the world of Horror Nights, we can open that Pandora’s Box and let [the guests’] worst fears become reality.

The house’s design was also inspired by the Soviet era. Murdy was a foreign exchange student in Copenhagen in the late ’80s and spent time traveling the Soviet Union. Being American in late-Soviet Europe triggered paranoia for Murdy. He describes one particular incident that has stuck with him through the years.

I remember taking pictures in Red Square and having my camera taken away, and the film taken out by a soldier. That paranoia stayed with me. I knew I was going to do something with that feeling one day.

As guests continue towards the facility, they see a vehicle labeled “DANGER: RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL.” It’s slammed into the building — so it must be what smashed through the gate. Guests also see, through hazy green smoke, that the radioactive material is leaking.

They then come face-to-face with their first zombie: one of the facility guards is experiencing the early stages of radioactive poisoning. They have skin lesions and their eyes are turning red.

After escaping the guard, guests end up in the security station with another view of the crashed vehicle. The person driving the vehicle is “splattered all over the windshield.”

A computerized voice blares “WARNING” over and over again. It’s sometimes slowed down and sometimes sped up to create a disorienting feeling.

Guests eventually realize that the lab has been creating super soldiers who could get shot and keep fighting.

The super soldier zombies are HHN’s answer to AI anxieties. Murdy’s team created their own look for the creatures. The tops of their skulls are gone, exposing their brains with wires and cables for experimentation. Their red eyes stand in their skulls.

In addition to the facility guard, guests will encounter lab tech zombies in hazmat suits, a zombified gorilla going nuts, humans in body bags with oxygen lines hooked up to them, and a thawing freezer unit with half-frozen test subjects.

Halloween Horror Nights 2024 is on select nights from September 5 through November 3. Get your tickets now.

For more Universal Studios news from around the world, follow Universal Parks News Today on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. For Disney Parks news, visit WDWNT.

The post Behind-the-Scenes Details of Dead Exposure: Death Valley House at Halloween Horror Nights 2024 appeared first on WDW News Today.