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Inside the HHN 2024 Sequel House Monstruos 2: The Nightmares of Latin America
The follow-up haunted house to 2023's Monstruos gets a terrifying sequel at HHN 2024.
One of the hallmarks of Universal Studios Hollywood's annual Halloween Horror Nights event is its consistent inclusion of Latin American culture and mythology in its creative Haunted Houses and Scare Zones.
At HHN 2024, the Upper Lot has a whole mini Latin themed section where you can hit up the brand new Monstruos 2: The Nightmares of Latin America house, the Luchadores Monstruosos and the Dia de los Muertos Bar right in Universal Plaza.
Recently, Halloween Horror Nights creative director John Murdy walked NBC Insider and other select outlet through the area to give us a taste of the creativity they've scared up for this special section that he and his team take great pride in every year.
"We're in Los Angeles and this is the heritage of our city," Murdy said of their honoring of Spanish and Mexican culture. "It's been something we've been doing in Horror Nights since we started doing content in 2010. It's grown over the years into its own thing, and pretty much every year we've been doing that with this location."
What's inside Monstruos 2: The Nightmares of Latin America?
One of the most popular haunted houses, as expressed by the fans in 2023, was the original Monstruos: The Monsters of Latin America. It introduced guests to three monsters, the Tlahuelpuchi, La Lechuza and El Silbon. With more stories and legends to bring to life, Murdy said they created the sequel house around the return character of the Latin American Grim Reaper, Muerte.
Meaning death in Spanish, Muerte is the narrator again for three more monster tales.
"He's out front, tending his cemetery," Murdy said of his presentation this year. "He's got a big sack of bones that he's putting into this wheelbarrow and collecting. He's talking to you as you're waiting in line."
What are the three new monsters?
Muerte prepares guests for three more terrifying creatures, El Charro Negro, El Cadejo and El Cucuy. At the start of each section dedicated to the individual monsters, Murdy pointed out original poster art by concept designer Lucas Culshaw that sets the stage for the creature to come.
"Muerte is telling you about the three monstruos that we're going to be featuring in this house," Murdy continued. "El Charro is sometimes called El Charro Negro, the dark horseman, or the black horseman. It's kind of a skeletal figure in a Charro suit. If you see what mariachis wear today, that comes from the Charro suit. It's a suit that originally was worn by the Spanish when they colonized Mexico. And then eventually got adapted into Mexican culture, and now today is a symbol of Mexico."
The second character is El Cadejo. "El Cadejo is pretty much like a devil dog," Murdy explained. "The myth of that story is that God created a white dog that would be like a spirit animal for people and help guide them on the path to righteousness and get them to the paradise at the end of their life. But the devil got jealous and made a dog of his own and sent that dog to Earth to mess with all of that and that's El Cadejo."
The last story and large area to explore is El Cucuy. "A story that originated in Portugal, essentially, it's the Latin American Boogeyman," Murdy said. "But then it came over with the colonization of Mexico, and it spread throughout Latin America. El Cucuy is the classic story that parents tell their kids to get them to behave. It's like, "Go to sleep or the monster under your bed is going to take you away to his cave in the mountains and eat you."
In the haunted house, El Cucuy is also the big finale featuring the reveal of its lair which is festooned with stolen trinkets from children it's eaten and rotting pumpkins everywhere. "In Portugal where the story comes from, there's certain translations of Cucuy that is coco which are the earliest forms of Jack O' Lanterns," Murdy explained. "So there's all these rotten pumpkins and we're pumping in the smell of pumpkins as you're going through this."
How does the Luchadores Monstruosos scare zone tie into it?
Once the guests have made it out of clutches of Muerte, they'll spill out into the tie-in Scare Zone, Luchadores Monstruosos.
"The Zone is celebrating luchador cinema from Mexico of the '60s and '70s, but also the Lucha Libre," Murdy explained. "It's monster wrestlers fighting monster wrestlers. We created our own luchadors, and all this original artwork and characters. When you get to the end of the Scare Zone, that feeds back to the Universal Plaza, which is a big celebration of Dias De Los Muertos with food and bar. And La Llorona will be there too."
Halloween Horror Nights Hollywood runs now through to November 3. You can purchase your Universal Studios Hollywood Halloween Horror Nights tickets now!
