Coffin Creek: 2022 Review

Coffin Creek, Corona, CA

Today, we head over to Riverside County, to a haunt we haven't visited since 2019. Coffin Creek is actually one of Southern California's longer-tenured haunts, celebrating its 15th season of fears this year. By our count, only Universal Studio Hollywood's Halloween Horror Nights, Six Flags Magic Mountain's Fright Fest, and Knott's Scary Farm have had active haunts that have run longer.

This history shows in the five attractions offered at Coffin Creek--three mazes, a haunted trail, and a haunted hayride. Each reflects the style and aesthetic of a different era of haunting, with gritty appearances, displays of death and rot, and a focus on jump scares out of the darkness and crevices of each attraction. "Haunt 2.0" (our term for today's more immersive, technologically-driven haunts that incorporate audio-visual and sound programming and theatrical special effects) this is not, which makes Coffin Creek a throwback for fans who prefer that more traditional style.

Coffin's layout is divided into two main halves. The portion of the site closer to the parking entrance features a haunted trail on the left in the wooded area and two mazes on the right, with one located at the top of a sloping hill and the other more downhill and closest to the parking lot driveway entrance. A separate parking lot further south provides access to a third maze more based on a role-playing fantasy premise and the haunted hayride. This area is also where the Koroneburg Renaissance Festival (i.e. Corona's RenFair) is held in late spring, and during Coffin Creek, it offers a small village marketplace that offers trinkets and craft souvenirs, snacks, a tarot reader, a storyteller theater, and a separate outdoor theater playing old black and white horror films. Though guests can technically walk between the two zones, driving is preferred due to the darkness and uneven footing of the dusty dirt road connecting the two sides.

There are vendor stalls at the dark marketplace.

The permanent structures left out all year mean that Coffin Creek's attractions have had mostly minor changes and tweaks year over year. The storylines and experiences are largely the same, with the haunted trail and hayride being the most susceptible to thematic changes over the several years we have visited. The exposure to the elements also means that the mazes have aged authentically and retained a very realistic appearance of dilapidation that most haunters spend time recreating in their haunts!

Also unique is Coffin Creek's ownership and operation structure. Though this is one attraction with the ability to purchase a ticket that provides admission to all five attractions, the five attractions do not share a single owner. Instead, there are multiple owners divided across the hayride, which means each attraction also offers its own singular admission as an option. Obviously, the combo pass is the best value, but those who might be pressed for time or only prefer certain attractions might benefit from the ala carte option if they're hitting up only one or two of the mazes, trail, or hayride.

What strange beings inhabit the attractions at Coffin Creek?

The Brimstone Asylum for the Criminally Insane

This maze has traditionally been our favorite maze, with its manic energy, wild and enthusiastic talent, and favorite theme. This year is no different, though the race was closer than it's been in previous years. The Asylum takes guests through a series of medical and institutional facilities, with deranged patients, doctors, and security personnel showcasing their violent and depraved tendencies.

This is Dr. Skinner. Because he skins people. Not because he’s related to the principal of Springfield Elementary.

This maze is gory and graphic, with a clear parallel to the old Knott's Scary Farm mazes like The Inquisition and The Asylum that featured blood and gore and unstable monsters. The initial section is relatively quiet, as the maze has chosen to stock most of its talent more toward the second half to create a more memorable ending run. Familiar rooms to an asylum theme, like a prison chamber, operating room, and doll room present unsettling scenes. The demented occupants provide some great screams and startles, and some even stalk and extend harrassment to ratchet the scares.

This nurse is not having a good day. My wife (a nurse practioner) can relate.

The maze can certainly benefit from a bit of maintenance, a more consistent soundtrack, and a few more scareactors. Staffing haunts has been a challenge that we've observed in many haunts the past couple of years, so the reduced number of talent this season compared to some prior, pre-pandemic years is understandable. We would love to see some re-arrangement of spaces or new rooms to help freshen The Asylum up, but this is certainly not a bad maze. Just a familiar one to those who last visited even a few years ago.

She doesn’t want you to play with her dolls.

The Catacombs and the Raven Cult

On the other hand, the Catacombs does appear to have adjusted several scenes, mostly on its back half, to present a slightly fresher maze experience since our last visit three years ago. This maze was once the iconic crown jewel of Coffin Creek--a beautiful and lavishly Gothic descent into rot and decay and horrid creatures hiding within that refuse to stay dead. Time and lack of upkeep have also removed some of the luster, but The Catacombs similarly uses its natural weathering to enhance a spooky and uneasy atmosphere.

We've gone through The Catacombs with minimal maze monsters in some past years, but this year, there seems to be a healthier concentration of scareactors in this maze. It's not packed, but we did not really notice lulls like we sometimes have in the past. In addition, the maze's silence and lack of soundtrack actually work to its favor, lulling guests into a false sense of security and allowing the startle scares sprung upon passers-by to work even better.

A cult lurks within the Catacombs, as creepy cults are apt to do.

The Catacombs takes advantage of its quiet creepiness to deliver a better experience than we expected, and there was even one monster who was able to catch me distracted with my guard down and hit a successful jump scare. That places it in close range with The Asylum and definitely cements it as one of the two best attractions at Coffin Creek. The visual storytelling with the mysterious and sinister sect setting up within the ruins works well and explains why they are so unwelcoming. Technically, guests are treading into their squatter’s rights!

No scareactor on this pass, but it’s still a great set.

The Curse of the Voodoo Bayou

The haunted trail takes on a sinister voodoo theme this year, though guests may not really be able to discern this going through--unless spiders count as voodoo. This year's location is different from our last visit, entering to the side of the picnic area and generally staying near the parking lot road before winding back around and exiting the other side of the picnic space. This greatly cuts down the feeling of being isolated in the wilderness and removes the innately eerie and ominous solitude that the haunted trail has traditionally brought.

The trail itself is shorter than past years and much more sparsely themed. There are a lot of cobwebs, a few shallow graves at the start of the trail, and a shack in the middle of the course that didn't seem ready when we stopped by last Saturday. A few scareactors dot the trail--a creepy hag, a chainsaw murderer, and a ghillie suit creature who seemed to be looking for a "friend." There was no indication of any voodoo or bayou setting from what we could see.

This chainsaw actor was one of the hightlights in an otherwise listless haunted trail.

We can speculate on some reasonable causes for the relocation and shortening of the haunted trail. The previous course deeper into the woods was harder to maintain and supervise, and there have been years where rains caused flooding and mushy, muddy trails that rendered the attraction unusable. Greater nuisances with pests further away from human activity could have also led to the change. But unfortunately, the resulting product is uneventful and poor, with limited energy and no consistency in any storytelling. This is a shame, since we've had some very fun experiences on the haunted trail in the past.

The Dark Realm

The first time we experienced The Dark Realm in 2017 was also the first season that its new operators had switched to a more fantasy-style storytelling experience, with an initial guide leading guests through dark mines before being ambushed by evil orcs and leaving the guests to flee and fend for themselves. That year saw a promising first half weighed down by an uneventful second half with limited talent, much less refurbishments, and missing scares. Fortunately, the following year improved drastically, providing a more complete and evenly distributed experience that was exceedingly fun and engaging--and not just because that was the first year we met Companion!

This year follows a similar format of guide into a spooky fantasy realm with possibly supernatural creatures lurking, but an elite military squad officer replaces the fantasy wizard character from before, and the storyline has been tweaked to support an agency in charge of handling multi-dimensional, invasive creatures and corralling them to neutralize their threat. It's a sci-fi spin on the fantasy theme, though once guests are inside, the settings are generally the same.

The introduction of dolls seems odd to the themes, but maybe these are vessels for captured multiversal spirits?

The resulting experience is better than the 2017 experience but doesn't really hit the caliber of 2018. A greater absence of talent doesn't help either, and a revamped final room full of creepy looking dolls and a motion-activated animatronic doesn't seem to make much sense to the story being promoted. The Dark Realm ends up being a middle-of-the road maze, with the sets still looking mostly still evocative but the creativity and surprises feeling lacking.

Shady Hollow Hayride

Finally, the hayride seems to continue the government agency theme by bringing guests on a tour put on by the SCF, or Supernatural Containment Foundation, a sketchy outfit charged with managing the odd and potentially terrifying creatures lurking further beyond. The hayride rolls through the Faire village area, taking guests through mostly dimly lit sets that are occasionally set upon by zombies that don't quite behave as well as the tour guide assumes. As dark creates come forth to menace the staff and the wagon, the tour guide seems to brush off worries.

The far end of the hayride rounds the Lightning Tree, which is apparently being studied for reasons never really elaborated upon. The back half back to the hayride loading features some nightmarish creatures that reveal themselves in silhouette and approach the wagon but don't really pounce or scare. An ultraviolet spider creature provides something more discernible, but generally, the threats are again dismissed. Arriving back at the station, it was unclear what exactly the purpose of the ride was for.

A rare instance of a high contrast, lit element on the Shady Hollow Hayride.

Our favorite version of Coffin Creek's haunted hayride was in 2018, when Uncle Zed’s Zombie Safari brought a slapstick, dark humor-filled take on the hayride that was fresh, sarcastic, and entertaining. This year's hayride seems to aim for that feel, with the tour guide spouting off quips, but it doesn't achieve the same effect. Hayrides in general are tougher because the surprise scares are easier to spot, but the Shady Hollow Hayride seemed to simply be going through paces rather than lead any direction in storytelling.

Coffin Creek's 2022 season thus offers an uneven presentation. The Asylum and Catacombs are clear highlights of the event this year, while The Dark Realm is a middling production that will probably improve as the cast rekindles familiarity with maze flow rhythm. The haunted trail and haunted hayride, unfortunately, are very lackluster and don't meet the standards of past peak years. As events are still adjusting in some cases to a semi-post-pandemic environment, we know that logistics and planning can sometimes remain uncertain and hinder a full execution of said event. Potential staffing shortages similar to the challenges seen in many starting salary-paying jobs could have also created challenges.

We do hope that Coffin Creek can rekindle a little more momentum and restore more of the edge and energy it's had in the past. Though in some ways, it’s a bit of a relic in the haunt world today, it can still be a fun and unique experience—as evidenced by our past visits.

Coffin Creek is certainly one of a kind!

Coffin Creek is located at Riverview Recreation Park at 14600 Baron Dr, Corona, CA 92880, and runs Fridays through Sundays this month plus Thursday, October 27th. The even opens at 7:00pm and closes at 10:00pm on Sundays and that one Thursday and at midnight on Fridays and Saturdays. Tickets cost $17 per single attraction or $49 for one-time access to all five attractions or $69 for the five-pack with Fast Pass front of line access and can be purchased online with added fees or in person at the ticket booth near The Asylum. There is also a $5 parking fee payable by cash only at the parking entrance gate.