The quarter-centennial commemoration of the 9/11 attacks inspired in me a sharp nostalgia for the late 1990s and early aughts, which sometimes seem like the last golden age before our present slow-rolling apocalypse. Thankfully, last week I attended two very different Orlando theme park events that both flipped back the calendar, letting me remember what it was like to party like it’s 1999.
SeaWorld Orlando Howl-o-Scream:
Since its inception in 2021, SeaWorld Orlando’s Howl-o-Scream after-hours haunted event has steadily upped its game, gradually gaining on its far more established competition at Universal with increasingly ambitious eerie entertainment. This year, their skull-faced icon character Havoc returns with a Medusa-like female counterpart called Pestilence, who rules over the Nekrosis scarezone at the park entrance, which serves as the turn-of-the-century thesis statement for the entire event’s theme. In reality, Y2K was a joke to everyone except those of us who were working in IT, but here it’s unleashed VHS-era zombies.
That vintage video store connection continues with Howl-o-Scream’s first-ever intellectual property maze, I Know What You Did Last Summer: The Final Catch. I don’t remember much about the 1997 film or its sequels beyond Buffy being chased by the Gorton’s fisherman, but SeaWorld did an impressive job of re-creating a seaside village with sizable facades and a striking shipboard scene. It’s evident the bulk of the budget went into this house, since all the others start strong with creative concepts — I especially liked Crawlspace’s adorably oogy slugs and DarkNet’s Carpenter-esque cyber-dystopia — but peter out into blank hallways with blasé blow-offs.
While it can’t yet go toe-to-toe with Universal’s movie-quality mazes, SeaWorld is keeping it admirably old-school with some guest-friendly methods that HHN gave-the heave-ho decades ago. Haunt queues are still pulsed, with substantial gaps between groups of guests; front-of-line passes are mostly unnecessary, and scare actors enjoy freedom to roam and improvise that Universal’s tightly programmed performers must envy. Live entertainment is abundant, including the returning fan-favorite musical Monster Stomp, a Hellzapoppin’ sideshow (which got upgraded to an indoor venue) and the Throttle stunt show (sadly, still stuck with awful sightlines). I enjoyed all three much more than this year’s edition of HHN’s Nightmare Fuel, which left me drenched and deafened by its unnecessarily overcranked sprinklers and subwoofers.
SeaWorld’s secret weapons might be their scarezones and themed bars, which are smartly integrated with nearby mazes. Don’t miss We Flip’s groovy lava lamp acrobats outside the Extermination Order area, or Odd-o-T’s off-color interactive doomsday preppers at the Black Sheep bar — and a standing ovation is owed to the conspiracy-spouting actor in the adjoining Dooms District, who had guests on their hands and knees digging in the rain-soaked ground with plastic spoons searching for mole people.
Finally, while I’m still queasy about the classism inherent in the popular Trailer Park Tragedy scarezone, I have to give SeaWorld credit for swapping last year’s red light district for the dark romantasy-inspired Just One More Chapter. For BookTok obsessives, this zone’s shirtless guys holding black roses may be reason enough to buy a ticket.
Fat One’s Hot Dogs & Italian Ice:
One of my first jobs upon arriving in Orlando was at Universal Studios’ then-new Terminator 2: 3D show, where I worked as a stage technician alongside Steve Fatone. We may have teased him a little when he left to tour Europe with his brother — who played Wolfie in Beetlejuice’s Graveyard Revue across the park — but we quickly shut up when his brother’s boy band blew up into the global phenomenon that was *NSYNC. So it felt phenomenal to find out firsthand that after 30 years and global stardom, Joey Fatone and his family are still firmly connected to their Orlando roots.
The occasion for our reunion was last Friday’s media preview of Fat One’s Hot Dogs & Italian Ice, which Fatone founded with his longtime manager (and fellow Beetlejuice alum) Joe Mulvihill. The pair previously ran a similarly named food truck and mall kiosk — which prompted rueful laughter from both when I asked about lessons learned — but their first permanent stand-alone is located at Universal Orlando CityWalk, only blocks from the Dr. Phillips High School campus they both once attended. Fatone, who has hosted or competed on several culinary TV shows, said he’d rather be recognized for his food than his music. He based his new quick-service menu on both his Brooklyn heritage and his international touring career, along with inspiration from some personal friends.
The result is an al fresco restaurant that — aside from the stylized marquee of Fatone’s face — superficially resembles the Hot Dog Hall of Fame that it replaced, down to the salvaged stadium seating. But it offers far heartier and more elaborate options, with a greater variety of toppings than its predecessor. One signature dog will run you around $10-$16 without the essential side of loaded thick-cut fries, and you can wash them down with Joey-approved Crooked Can draft (I liked the amber) and alcohol-spiked ices.
Fatone himself is a self-admitted ketchup fan — hot dog blasphemy! — but I’m grateful he’s got a delicious vegan sausage with spicy mustard on offer. Because as much as I enjoyed my bite of the pepperoni and cheese-saturated Johnny’s Pizza dog, my metabolism is unfortunately one thing I can’t rewind to the ’90s.
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This article appears in Sept. 23-29, 2026.