Review: Six Flags Magic Mountain’s Fright Fest (2021)

This year we have to give haunts a little bit of slack and not be too hard on them. Despite all odds, the creative team at Magic Mountain managed to pull off one of the best iterations of Fright Fest yet. There were, however, some issues.

Disclaimer: Six Flags Magic Mountain invited us as media to the event and provided tickets free of charge. We try to stay as neutral as possible. You can expect us to say it like it is – even if that means putting our relationship with the event at risk.

For the most part, Fright Fest remains the same as it has the last several years with the haunted houses utilizing the same spaces and themes. What was surprising was how the few changes they made improved the existing houses. Everything feels a lot more refined and detailed now.

The houses were overall very fun. Scare zones were interesting with scare actors engaging and scaring people with their excellent make-up and personalities. Waits were short even without express, in fact, the longest waits were for rides and to buy a maze wristband. This is something the park really needs to streamline. No doubt they’re losing out on serious cash.

The weakest part of the event was the entertainment, which was oddly absent from media night. For some reason, they didn’t have either show running on the second weekend. Having shows return is really what excited us the most too, so disappointed they were advertising them only to find out we were swindled.

Now for the bad. Parking: the lot was basically full when we showed up right before media check-in. They were using the overflow lot which isn’t a good sign of things to come. Remember this pandemic we’re still in? You wouldn’t know it at Six Flags. They packed so many people into the park that even in a normal year it would be too many. Sidenote: Six Flags recently commented to the LA Times regarding the new vaccine mandate…

“Our guests are not seated next to unrelated parties for extended periods of time, and we have ample room for parties to social distance”

Six Flags Magic Mountain via LA Times

Come on, guys… 🙄

The food lines extended into the main walkways with no employees around to help direct people to not block the walkways. Teenagers were getting out of control as they do, again with little to no employees around to stop them.

We talked to a couple of other media outlets at the event and the consensus was clear, there were way too many people there. It’s a real shame. The team putting the event on are extremely talented and dedicated but park management, whether it be corporate or locally, are ruining all their hard work.

Six Flags needs to make Fright Fest a hard ticket event instead of allowing anyone with park admission to stay in the park. Fright Fest has outgrown that gimmick.

Our recommendation would be to skip Fright Fest this year and support a smaller local event if you can. You’ll be safer and have a lot more fun.