Orlando landmark Skull Kingdom about to disappear

Posted Thursday, February 22, 2007 3:50 PM | Contributed by Jeff

On Feb. 12, an icon of the Orlando tourism industry passed into history. Skull Kingdom, the massive walk-through haunted house near the corner of International Drive and Universal Boulevard, closed its doors in November. Last week the building and all its contents went up for auction. But it appears the auctioneer’s gavel was unable to pound the final nail into the attraction’s coffin. Like one of the vengeful spirits it once used to scare visitors, Skull Kingdom refused to go gently into that good night, and the fight over its fate may turn out to be grislier than any of the mangled corpses it once housed.

rollergator

Thursday, February 22, 2007 4:19 PM

Two comments: Norton Auctioneers...never heard THAT name before. Those people are responsible for closing more attractions than ARN&R could *ever* hope to accomplish... ;)

^Please note tongue-in-cheek delivery...LOL!

Secondly, there's NO mention of the Screamin' Swing that sat idle out in front of the place for over a year...hmmmm.

Jeff

Thursday, February 22, 2007 5:13 PM

Every time I've ever driven past it, I thought, "Who would go there?" Obviously not very many people. I almost stopped to check out the swing a couple of years ago.

crazy horse

Thursday, February 22, 2007 5:31 PM

Now I am bummed that I did not check out skull kingdom last time we were in orlando.

lumpy72

Thursday, February 22, 2007 8:33 PM

I am bummed because crazy horse didn't check it out the last time he was in Orlando....

So how many of these "scream factories" have passed on in the Orlando area?

Agent Johnson

Friday, February 23, 2007 1:54 AM

I was there during IAAPA 2002. It was an okay gig, but not worth the a second tour. It should have been a 'major scary' place on any given day, and 'pants changing scary' from mid September to Halloween.

There is a much better Haunted House in Old Town for the dollar.

dexter

Friday, February 23, 2007 4:43 AM

The Old Town HH is not as "Spectacular" or "High Tech", but it is was more fun than Skull Kingdom. Personality is important when inventing a haunted Attraction, imho.

Having said that, Skull Kingdom was not to bad. They had a lot of expensive tricks. The only thing I didn't like about it was that the spaces were very open. The year round haunt in Sandusky is very fun because of the claustrophobia one experiences there.

Skull Kingdom was fun, for what it was. It lacked a lot of artistic expression from the designers, instead relying on expensive "store bought" tricks to offer scares(which isn't necessarily a bad thing if successfully complemented with some kind of uniqueness).

It did have a very cool facade though. It reminded me of Castle Greyskull...lol.

crazy horse

Friday, February 23, 2007 6:15 PM

I miss terror on church street. anyone remember that haunted hause?

crazy horse

Friday, February 23, 2007 6:27 PM

Here is a interesting story about skull kingdom. It seems that the attraction may live once again as a seasonal attraction in daytona.

http://orlandoweekly.com/features/story.asp?id=11353

Lord Gonchar

Friday, February 23, 2007 7:42 PM

crazy horse said:
Here is a interesting story about skull kingdom. It seems that the attraction may live once again as a seasonal attraction in daytona.
http://orlandoweekly.com/features/story.asp?id=11353

Umm, that's the news story linked above.

crazy horse

Friday, February 23, 2007 8:05 PM

lol...slaps self in face.

Lord Gonchar

Friday, February 23, 2007 8:31 PM

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