View: Midsummer Scream
- Thom the Curator
- Aug 8
- 8 min read
Updated: Aug 14
The Halloween and Horror Convention is dying to have you join them...
A Halloween Scene Event Review
Saturday - Our Day One
Well, the world’s biggest Halloween and Horror convention – Midsummer Scream – certainly lived up to its reputation today. I’ve never seen that many people in one indoor space enjoying their love of the spooky season as much as I did today. The sold-out crowd was definitely in the mood for a great time, and no matter which way you looked at the voluminous Long Beach Convention Center there were multiple options to spook you, entertain you, motivate you, sell to you and feed you. It was Halloween Scene Los Angeles’ first Midsummer Scream, and it was a blast.
Halloween enthusiasts, horror buffs, cosplayers, haunt designers, scare-film celebrities, countless seasonal vendors, and, yes, more than a few influencers – some with mini-entourages in tow - all shared the three floors of the center quite nicely as the annual event unfolded. Friday was the kick-off and tomorrow it all wraps up, but Saturday was the big pumpkin, when everybody and their costumed buddies decided to come out and visit the hundreds of sellers’ booths, line up for film-star autographs, take in a horror-themed panel or three – did anyone say Scream cast reunion – and navigate a chilling path through some elaborately designed mazes and haunt-created environments in the impressive and eerily dark Hall of Shadows.
Not a huge fan of huge crowds I have to admit this tremendously sized gathering seemed to have some of the consistently chillest people I’ve been around. As one event worker from England said to me, “Halloween people are the nicest people,” and she was right. Everyone was in the best of moods whether they were shopping, patiently awaiting entry into their mazes of choice, or just watching numerous ghouls, creatures and living-yet-playing-dead scary creations – some employed for the task, but many simply decked-out customers themselves.
Where else but on Ocean Boulevard in August can you find an eight-foot werewolf, a woman covered head to toe in a self-made Midsommar-meets-Midsummer Scream concoction of flowers, two bubbly camp counselors dressed 1980s-the-same looking for their Friday the 13th Camp Crystal Lake bunkhouse, a quartet of drag cast members from the fully-staged tribute to Rocky Horror, a few random cannibals, a guy with an animatronic and quite chatty monster on his back, a diabolical blood-covered barber looking for his next victim, er, customer, and a guy wearing shorts and carrying a beach towel. The last one was probably just headed for the ocean, but happened to find himself amongst the thousands headed toward the convention.
We have video coming – if Dropbox cooperates - with some of the highlights, but in all honesty the whole thing was a fantastic fever dream experience for this Halloween curator. Halloween Scene Los Angeles chatted with numerous sellers of everything from horror-themed clothing, props, cookies, movie posters, artwork, jewelry, handmade masks and costumes, music, books and pretty much every conceivable item a connoisseur of the spooky season could ever hope for. And let’s be frank: there really is no single season for the crowd that filled these halls and ballrooms. They live horror and Halloween 24-7, 365-days-a year.
Once we’d done two passes of the main convention floor downstairs, and had the good fortune to get a random nod from my favorite horror director, John Carpenter, the master creator of The Thing, and a nice, short chat with Brad himself, Barry Bostwick, of the Rocky Horror Picture Show, we moved into the neighboring hall where Descent into Darkness is located and where the earlier arrivals were already lining up to go through numerous scare-zones and mini-haunts designed by the likes of studios Universal and Lionsgate, and independent haunted mazes and interactive environments from Straite to Hale Productions: Side Effects, Black Casket Productions: Abandoned, and, our favorite, H&L’s Realm of Horror: Witchualz, to name just a few that stood out. Most of these temporary activations were top-notch and impressively created in just a matter of days, yet they saw numbers of walk-throughs that would rival a busy theme park on an October night. The performers inside were certainly committed – some literally, in the Shadows Hollow Asylum by Realm of Shadow – portraying backwoods killers, barbaric butchers, quasi-cadavers not quite ready for the morgue, and various witches, vampiresses, and other possessed creatures appearing suddenly out of the dark. One of the biggest scares came unseen from above, via some very impressive stunt work. No spoilers here though.
And speaking of stunts, in the same hall you could find the ever-popular Decayed Brigade who were giving a huge crowd plenty to cheer about with their incredible floor-slider exhibition. Of course, this was the perfect time for my phone battery to run out, so I’ll have to keep the memory of the stellar slides, sans video, just that, a good memory. At least until tomorrow when I return recharged.
Back to the haunt zones for a moment: one of the best aspects of this section was that it had both professional and elevated home or community options side by side. This show isn’t just for the corporate creators. It’s an egalitarian affair, and that feels so in sync with the core community of haunters and hauntees, who are a non-judgmental and welcoming group. But rest assured, all the big boys were at Midsummer Scream too, with cast-filled teaser booths or large selfie-ready exhibits to show off their coming seasonal offerings. Within just a short walk of each other were L.A.-area Halloween stalwarts, Knott’s Scary Farm, LA Haunted Hayride, and Long Beach’s own Dark Harbor. All had plenty of roving characters from this season’s scarefests for photo ops, and to remind you, always in spooky character of course, to visit this October….if not sooner.
Perhaps the most enjoyable parts of the day had to do with the sometimes hidden-in-plain-sight immersive activities that unfolded at the convention. Early on, I met a performer roaming the floor as a surgeon who looked like he needed medical attention himself — his heart had been blown up. The poor fellow handed me a card and mentioned that others like him were around who could offer more cards that would eventually unlock an art gallery tour. I gathered enough cards later and made my way to the faux Gallery Dark, which in fact was a booth that belonged to a wonderful theatre company, Force of Nature Productions. They invited me into their macabre gallery, where I received a mini solo performance teasing the company's upcoming show The Art of Heartbreak. These are the types of things a true immersive at heart lives for.
I went searching for more, and with three levels of activities there was something here for all tastes. Which, of course, reminds me of food.
All of this running around meant you’d get hungry at Midsummer Scream, but not to worry: there were ample food options in the Center and several food trucks right out back if you needed a quick meal and a break from the masses inside. After a pizza and a fresh lemonade I went back in for yet another pass. Had six hours passed already? Time flies when you’re having…Halloween….in August.
Passing a demented-looking gingerbread creature on the way to the escalator, I lamented that there was still so much to do: panels, workshops, a film festival, fully staged musicals in the Ghostlight Theatre, and even the wonderful Black Cat Lounge where you could adopt a rescue kitten. They pack a lot in, and it’s a battle of attrition to just keep going. I’ll be back tomorrow to plop down the $30 for parking, and do it all over again. I suspect I won’t be alone.
On the way out, one level above the main show floor, in the brightly-lit lobby, there were a row of other enticing options to keep you around just a while longer. I had a short conversation with the always affable Zombie Joe, who was preparing his Underground Theatre Group for a preview performance of their annual and always twisted seasonal production, and saw the Wicked Lit booth, another Halloween Los Angeles-area favorite that returns this October (in Anaheim) after a hiatus of some years. The last thing I saw before I headed back out into the late-day heat and blistering sunshine of Long Beach was the line entering Casa Calaveras, a family-friendly option that tells the story of a very merry, yet very dead couple. My feet could relate. I had to rest.
Back for day two tomorrow.
Day Two for us was also the closing act of Midsummer Scream 2026. If one expected a smaller crowd since it was a Sunday, you would be very, very mistaken. If anything, it felt like even more seasonally attired and inspired denizens were squeezed into the Long beach Convention Center for the last chance to explore mini-haunt activations, visit the mélange of Halloween and horror booths, and explore some of the live shows upstairs. From our perspective, the convention looks like it could benefit from a fourth or even fifth day, given the size and enthusiasm of the closing-day attendees.
We thought we’d seen the whole main convention floor on Saturday, but it turned out we’d missed an entire row of curiosity vendors, and were once again in awe at the creativity of many offering their wares, services and specialties – all geared specifically to lovers of the spooky season. This last pass through the shopping bazaar (or maybe bizarre would be more accurate) once and for all confirmed we’d seen everything at least once – and our favorites several times. Halloween Scene Los Angeles couldn’t resist and purchased a few items of our own, and we added several vendors’ websites to our growing list of places to buy a few items online as we move closer to All Hallows Eve…and my Birthday, which also falls in October…just sayin.’
Sunday was also another chance to revisit the dark, spooky and reliably packed Hall of Shadows, where we took a second spin at a few of the top haunted environments. We met up with our friend there, a first-time attendee, and took him along for a pass through some of the purpose-built creations built just for the convention. It was a pleasure to see him get the big scares we’d had just one day earlier.
And then we caught two memorable shows: the Decayed Brigade’s Slider Exhibition, a high-energy stunt spectacular filled with adrenaline-pumping music. The sliders owned the back of the Hall where hundreds surrounded the slide zone to watch these athlete-performers slide, spin, jump, and overall make the convention show floor their personal concrete-meets-kneepad stage. The audience couldn’t yell enough as each trick became more death-appearance-defying than the last. They’re clearly a highlight of the convention, especially for the younger set. Back upstairs in the lobby, we stopped into the Ghostlight Theatre, where we caught a few minutes of the hilarious and pro-level musical SCREAM’D, which brought in a mini-production of their parody of Wes Craven’s classic and much-loved Ghostface films — all the way from Las Vegas. Troy Heard and his creative team at Majestic Repertory Theatre are known and loved for their superb and well-travelled stage productions, both comedy and drama, and Halloween Scene Los Angeles can’t wait to take in the full SCREAM’D show in Sin City, after experiencing this energetic and winning sampling. The full-house crowd ate it all up.
My parking meter a few blocks away was calling “Get back here now or Long Beach will have something special for you under your windshield blade,” so we reluctantly bade farewell to Midsummer Scream 2026. On the way out I took one last look around at the still-entering arrivals — a mix of creatures, cosplayers, and very excited, usually black-clad newcomers, most of whom were smiling ear to ear (couldn’t tell about the creatures as their faces were covered) — and I realized: this Con gets it right. It just does. Sure the parking prices are steep, and the lines for food and popular entertainment options can get really long, but once you’re inside the action, you’re with your people. And your people are a pretty cool bunch. Halloween and Horror buffs are loyal to the core, and this is their home. The home they devotedly return to year after year, as will Halloween Scene Los Angeles, now that we’ve experienced the talent, inventiveness, uniqueness and pure scale of the world’s biggest horror convention.
Let the season begin! It already has.
Look for our faves of the Convention list next week and our full video roundup on Youtube with interviews!
by Thom the Curator at Halloween Scene Los Angeles
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