I learned of a new local ‘attraction’ that may have been of interest to me, so naturally today I went to check it out. It’s called ‘Do You Believe’ and is a fantasy/supernatural ‘museum’ in a nearby mall.
First things first: the mall was terrifying. Dying malls are always creepy, but this one was doubly so. Almost every shopfront was empty, and the few remaining rarely had names or any signage and seemed to contain teenage employees sitting disinterestedly behind tables full of second hand trash. Only one ‘restaurant’ remained in the enormous food court and even though it was lunch time there wasn’t a single soul eating. Every fiber of my being told me to turn around and leave this depressing place and yet I soldiered on, found ‘Do You Believe’ and handed over my $10 entry fee. I walked around the corner and saw this:
It’s an animatronic Sasquatch! He didn’t move much, and his movement was a bit jerky, but he got points for being the only robotic Bigfoot I’ve ever seen (aside from on The Six Million Dollar Man). He was truly massive as well, and towered over me. Next to him, on the wall, were some Bigfoot facts:
That’s the format of the place: an animatronic accompanied by a list of dubious facts. You stand and look at the creature for a moment, read he facts, and move on. I was alone and had the place to myself, but only spent seconds at each display.
After the Bigfoot came a mermaid:
Her tail rose and fell but the display was otherwise static. Amongst the mermaid facts were these two:
The use of the word ‘fact’ to describe nonsense lit a fire in me, and less than 30 seconds into this attraction it was clear there was absolutely no science or anything educational to be found. Oh well, let’s take a look at the mermaid relics and artifacts…
After the mermaid came a dragon:
He was more animated than the others, and his mouth even glowed to simulate the fire. At least they didn’t attempt to suggest he was real!
The centaur was paired with a toy stuffed lion they probably bought on amazon. And he made horse ‘whinny’ noises, which was weird to say the least.
Around the corner from him was a giant ape versus (?) a small T-Rex:
And a unicorn:
A griffin:
And even (why?) giant insects:
None other than King Kong himself made an appearance:
Don’t worry, they didn’t forget to include some (non-animatronic) aliens as well:
Here’s the one and only ‘fact’ that accompanied the alien display:
There were a few other ‘displays’ that were just printouts pinned to the walls, including the Loch Ness monster, the Kraken and even the Bermuda Triangle:
The above is the entirety of the Bermuda Triangle display. The Loch Ness and Kraken sections were even smaller, and included what seemed to be a poor quality printout of concept art from Clash Of The Titans.
I wish one of those Atlanteans living in the Bermuda Triangle that turned into a mermaid had used her clairvoyance to learn I was planning a visit to this place and then hypnotized me to change my mind!
The ghost ‘fact’ stated that they keep their personalities, memories and emotions and act the same as when they are alive. (And yes, the above was supposed to be a ghost.)
Let me be blunt: this was the worst thing I’ve ever paid money to see. It was in fact worse than everything I’ve ever seen. Even though it only took me five minutes to walk through, I felt I had wasted my time.
Sure it’s intended for kids, and sure the budget is probably microscopic and they spent it all on the animatronics, but even had this been free I would have felt ripped off.
The mall also included a ‘Pop Culture Museum’ which also cost $10, and I was – insanely – about to enter before I noticed the feature display right now was some guys collection of Funko Pops. I turned away and left the mall without a second thought. I’ll never return.
