It’s that time of year again where Christmas meets horror at the Season’s Screamings 2022 convention, held in Pasadena this past weekend. An event featuring haunted attractions, spooky shopping, and more for fans of haunts, horror and Halloween… but with a winter holiday twist!!
The sister con to the very popular Midsummer Scream, where that con celebrates all things Halloween and horror, this con takes that and gives it a yuletide macabre twist. All the vendors at this show add a little Christmas flare to their booth or art, which really does add something to the fun vibe of the whole con: a great place to shop for those unique Christmas gifts you just don’t see anywhere else.
The special guests this year included Keith David (Nope, The Things, Princess and the Frog), Henry Thomas (E.T., Doctor Sleep), Kate Siegel (Midnight Mass, Hush, The Haunting Bly and Hill House) and writer/director Mike Flanagan (Doctor Sleep, Midnight Club and Haunting of Hill House). All signing autographs at different prices depending on the guest themselves. They all seem to be in fine spirits for the holiday con, trying to give each guest their moment with them no matter how small an amount of time it may be.
“The Hall of Yuletide Spirits”: a dark show floor of holiday theme haunts and yard displays, was created by southern California’s most talents artist. This year’s floor was solid. Only three house walkthroughs, but what they lacked in quantity they made up in quality. The one that stood out was a 3D clown maze presented by the last year’s summer haunt “Valley Fight Nights” which ran in August of this past year. Good scares and great 3D effects.
The shopping this year was a little smaller than it has been in years past, but I still found some great gifts and good people to chat with. The booths this year seems more “crafty” items than hard to find horror items, which is a positive or negative depending if you had your heart set on something specific to find. Either way, looks like all the guests were having a grand time. And as usual the cosplay game was off the chart as people gave their horror characters a holiday twist. Seeing the creative way people do that is worth the price of admission alone.
It was a little smaller than it has been in the past and I’m a little disappointed some of the vendors that are usually there were not, but overall, another good year from the Midsummer Scream people. They really do make the best horror con in southern California.
