By Charly SHELTON

Every fall, as the fog creeps in and the screams echo down the backlot, Halloween Horror Nights (HHN) rises again at Universal Studios Hollywood. It has become a seasonal rite of passage for horror fans, drawing crowds for its cinematic-scale haunted houses, cleverly themed scare zones and that addictive scent of churros mixed with fog juice. But this year, with more returning content than ever before, the scare comes not just from what lurks in the shadows, but from the creeping realization that you might have seen it all before.

Let’s start with what worked – because when HHN hits, it hits hard. Easily the breakout star this year is Five Nights at Freddy’s. Between the practical animatronics, the lighting design and the sense of dread baked into every hallway, it’s a slam-dunk. Red glowing eyes pierce the darkness, sudden reveals bring the jump scares and the set design captures perfectly the grimy, eerie feel of the nearly-abandoned pizza parlor. For fans of the franchise or just fans of good haunt design, this one is unmissable.

Another standout was Terrifier, the gory, chaotic house that somehow manages to be both horrifying and hilarious. Art the Clown does his thing — and if you know, you know — as you wind through a string of gruesome set pieces. Even without having seen the movie, the story is relatively coherent, the effects are wild and the energy is off the charts.

But those high notes come in a playlist that feels awfully familiar. Poltergeist is back, albeit toned down from previous iterations. Scarecrow: The Reaping makes a return, this time scored by Slash, though the music isn’t as forward in this rehash house as it has been in the Universal Monsters houses that Slash scored over the last several years. Monstruos is on its third version now, this time subtitled Ghosts of Latin America, and while the theme of all-female monsters adds variety, the execution doesn’t reach the atmospheric highs of earlier years.

The new Jason Universe house is more a remix than a reinvention. Jason appears in multiple settings with some decent effects — a Pepper’s Ghost illusion here, a jump scare there — but it feels like another chapter in a well-thumbed book. Fallout had so much potential, especially with the success of the recent series, but it feels too generic, too reliant on static props and basic masks rather than the creative set pieces and amazing makeup that we’ve come to expect from HHN.

Meanwhile, WWE Presents: The Horrors of Wyatt 6 offers great set design and mood but unless you’re already steeped in the lore of pro wrestling the narrative doesn’t quite land. And the Terror Tram, once again under the Blumhouse umbrella, serves as a highlight reel for its greatest hits. It works better this year than last with vignettes from The Black Phone, The Purge, Happy Death Day and M3GAN, but it’s still more remix than revelation.

There are bright spots and if you’ve never been to HHN before, there’s plenty to enjoy. But for longtime fans, this year leans too heavily on repeats and only Five Nights at Freddy’s really swings for the fences.

Still, it’s HHN; it’s the fog, the screams, the adrenaline. And that counts for something.

Halloween Horror Nights is on now, select nights through Nov 2. For tickets and more info, visit UniversalStudiosHollywood.com/HHN.

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