A Monstrous Encounter Taught Me Just How Seriously Epic Universe Takes Its Theme Park Storytelling

I've been a theme park fanatic my entire life, but I was never one for character meet-and-greets. It's not that I dislike them, nor do I have any hard feelings toward anyone who enjoys them. I just remember, even as a kid, seeing long lines to meet Mickey Mouse at Walt Disney World and thinking, "Well, at least they're not in line for a ride," and speed walking past them to find hopefully shorter lines at nearby attractions.

So, color me surprised that the most memorable moment from my recent visit to the Epic Universe theme park in Orlando, Florida, was a costumed character interaction. And one that I definitely didn't plan.

I previously visited Universal Orlando Resort's newest theme park during an early media preview, where I was very impressed by what I experienced. But a press event with special access and attractions still operating in technical rehearsal is not necessarily reflective of how a park operates when it's actually open to the public and has been battle-tested against countless thousands of daily visitors. On this recent visit, I was pleasantly surprised to find a theme park that was just as beautiful and innovative as the one I had encountered on my first trip, as well as one that felt more comfortable with its storytelling and identity. Cut loose and able to fully and properly explore, I could appreciate the nooks and crannies that I didn't see before. And more importantly, I could find the bits and pieces of storytelling that don't immediately present themselves.

And that brings me to the Dark Universe section of the park — which is themed after the classic Universal Monsters — and my encounter with Frankenstein's monster and the Bride of Frankenstein.

I have already written about Dark Universe before, and how I think it's a brilliant concept executed to near-perfection. An update on Universal's horror classics, it's a theme park land set in a spooky European village called Darkmoor and the nearby Castle Frankenstein. Here, the events of the classic Universal Monster movies ("Dracula," "Frankenstein," The Wolf Man," etc.) all occurred, and this land is a sequel of sorts to the entire oeuvre. As the wildly ambitious, story-driven dark ride Monsters Unchained: The Frankenstein Experiment showcases, the entire land is built on the perfect balance of spookiness and humor, with neither diluting the other.

At one point during my latest tour of Dark Universe, I saw a seemingly impromptu queue snaking its way into a dark alley behind the streets of Darkmoor. Curious, I peeked toward the front of the line and saw that everyone was waiting to meet Frankenstein's monster and the Bride of Frankenstein, two undoubtedly iconic characters, here in the flesh. And I, a certified classic monster movie aficionado, did what I never do at other theme parks meet-and-greets: I got in line.

I expected a brief photography session. Instead, I got so much more. Since my wife and I were using our visit to Epic Universe to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary, I thought I'd make a crack about asking the world's most famous undead couple for relationship advice. What I got was a delightful lore dump about the fictional land I was in, along with the status quo of the modern Universal Monsters.

Appropriately, the actor portraying Frankenstein's monster was caked in heavy prosthetics and spoke monosyllabically, grunting each word with proud effort. Meanwhile, the actor playing the Bride was clearly an improv wizard prepared for anything. She spoke clearly and eloquently, noting that she was well over 150 years old but that this version of Frankenstein's monster, her paramour on so many posters and T-shirts, was only three years old. (Cue the monster proudly holding up three fingers to demonstrate.) They were not a couple, she explained, but he seemed promising enough.

Then it all clicked: In the Monsters Unchained ride located a brief stroll away, the plot hinges on the ambitious/twisted Dr. Victoria Frankenstein creating her own monster, having seemingly learned every necessary lesson from the mistakes of her ancestor, Dr. Henry Frankenstein. The original monster, the one with Boris Karloff's face, is even on display in the queue, dissected and very, very dead. Here, in Dark Universe, I was not talking to the classic couple of monster iconography. Instead, this Bride has been alive for a long, long time (seemingly since the events of "Bride of Frankenstein") and has found herself forced to babysit a lumbering newborn, so she's a little annoyed that everyone keeps wanting to pair them up in their heads.

Epic Universe traded an easy photo opportunity for some surprisingly layered interactive world-building. I grinned like a clown.   

We riffed for a few more minutes. We got a lot of great pictures. We came away buzzing. I was impressed by the actors and their performances, but I was equally impressed by the layers of the interaction and how it rewarded my knowledge of not just monster cinema but of the theme park land around us. There's a cohesion to Dark Universe that feels, well, as real as this kind of thing can get. 

Did this convince me to stand in lines to meet characters in other corners of Epic Universe, like Hiccup and Toothless in Isle of Berk or Mario and Luigi in Super Nintendo World? Nah, not this time at least. But as I walked by the lines, I did linger for just a moment. If a character interaction built for me worked this well, then I can only hope that every other character encounter in Epic Universe is handled with similar care. Maybe my next visit will bring new revelations. I now feel like I'm part of the narrative. They've got me.