“It’s kind of sick in a way,” confesses Danusia Rogacki, Canada’s Wonderland’s area manager of technical and event services. “I like to watch the ends of the mazes — there’s always something especially frightening — and see the people sprinting to get out. It means we’re doing our job.”

Rogacki oversees the creation and execution of Wonderland’s Halloween Haunt, which has been terrifying park-goers since 2005. “We call them mazes, but they’re really walk-through attractions,” says Rogacki, who insists that the environments be “immersive. I would love to get our guests more isolated. Alone and completely in the dark” so the scares would be more intense. The crowds make that impractical, but she can always rely on the “startle scare,” especially if combined with a distraction.

 “If you’re walking through a room in The Asylum and you see someone well lit — chewing on a foot or something — then you are concentrating on that and if someone jumps out behind you . . .”

This year Wonderland has added Iron Empire, which Rogacki calls “a steam-punk war zone with lots of new special effects,” and Streets of the Undead, an urban, underground environment full of “violent zombies on the offence; not old-fashioned, but very aggressive.” Old favourites get refurbished for new frights, but the one maze that seems to be timeless is Clowns at Midnight, a big-top tent filled with bloodthirsty and greasepainted creatures.

“One in five people are freaked out by clowns,” Rogacki says. “It’s such a fear that they’re already going in there uneasy. From a scare point it’s just so easy.”

Halloween Haunt runs Fri, Sat and Sun from 7pm–midnight until Sun, Oct 28. canadaswonderland.com/haunt2012

Review: The above interview with Rogacki went to press before Halloween Haunt actually opened. A visit over the opening weekend would have delighted Rogacki -- I personally jumped out of my skin six times: her staff is well trained in the fine art of the "startle scare."

As the sun goes down the atmosphere grows progressively more unsettling. Upon entering the park, one is immediately greeted -- if that's the right word -- by characters culled from the numerous mazes. People begin screaming immediately as ghouls, zombies and clowns welcome them to a night of horrors. An undead apparition gliding on rollerskates reduced a teenaged girl to tears. As she huddled sobbing in the fetal position until her friends were able to ease her hysteria, the poor zombie broke character and tried to calm her down. He looked stricken but proud -- a job well done.

All of the mazes have been buffed and polished and are appropriately frightening. Special kudos to the Clowns at Midnight and Mother Noose, where the glow-in-the-dark paint design adds an extra dimension of disorientation. The Cornstalkers are creepy because of the open air above and claustrophobic corn and creatures all around. Redbeard's Rage has the most spectacular design and actually delivers some real jolts -- especially for those with seafood allergies. Club Blood is like the worst night ever at fly or Zipperz.

The new Streets of the Undead maze is a huge undertaking, and walking -- soon running -- through a collection of crashed cars filled with zombies is unnerving and frightening on a large scale. Iron Empire is stunningly designed, but the Civil War concept seemed more an observational visual rather than involving or frightening -- that is, until a simple "startle scare" involving an explosion did the trick and I received a jolt of sheer terror adrenaline. Congratulations, Rogacki -- this year's Halloween Haunt is beautifully, blood-curdlingly done.

Of course, Wonderland's roller coasters are also running during Halloween Haunt, and there is a special thrill to riding a monster coaster like Leviathan in the dark. The only caveat is that a thrill ride in the cold is bone chilling, so dress warmly.

Halloween Haunt runs Fri, Sat and Sun from 7pm–midnight until Sun, Oct 28. canadaswonderland.com/haunt2012

Photos by Raul Da Silva