MisterSG1

At least at Wonderland, the Lazer Zone shows also ran in the KECO/Taft era as well (who actually owned the park, I was never clear on that) Assuming we are talking about the same show, as it was held in the Paramount Theatre (now Wonderland Theatre) as well. My main beef with the Paramount days was how a lot of family rides were compromised here, the worst was when my favorite ride in the park was eliminated, Shiva's Fury which was an Eyerly Monster. Replacing these rides that parents could ride with their kids, rides that were not that intense but were a good middle ground in terms of rides, a step up from the kids rides but a step below the thrill rides. Shake Rattle & Roll is a great example of such a ride I'm talking about at Kings Island. In the end, 5 such family rides were removed and replaced by more intense thrill rides such as a "HUSS Giant Jump 2", a "Mondial Top Scan", and a "Mondial Frisbee". Also, Paramount was ignorant towards the original themes of the park and placed rides that didn't have anything whatsoever to do with the theme. Wonderland's Top Gun for instance replaced a log flume ride called the Zumba Flume, the old ride was in a section that was to resemble a 19th century World Fair, so instead of creating a new ride with a cultural theme, they place Top Gun full of its hangars in the area. Eventually World Expo would be called Action Zone, but oddly enough to this day, the flags and globe still stand to the entrance of this portion of the park that's now called Action Zone.

Good, you make me feel better.....yeah I'm 30 years old currently. So you can ride that rickety old Beast as it shakes violently through the ending double helix without a problem? I only rode the ride once but man was it rough. Honestly, I thought the Son of Beast was quite smooth when I rode it.

I was just wondering, as I haven't been on Mystic Timbers and likely won't anytime soon, is the shed portion of the ride very similar to the second lift hill of Adventure Express? Where you think there's gonna be one grand finale but the ride ends, is Mystic Timbers like that? Wonder Mountain's Guardian here at Canada's Wonderland, may have had a lukewarm response, if you call it a coaster is debatable even though it has a lift hill. But one thing it has, is quite the unexpected nasty surprise, something that totally catches you off guard if you've never rode it before, and for that, I think it's great for that nasty surprise. When watching a video of Mystic Timbers, I was expecting a similar nasty surprise but there wasn't. On a personal note, WMG was good in that it could allow me to ride.....most rides nowadays require me to take the walk of shame but I am improving myself, my only issue is that I now think I'm too old to go to Wonderland. I mean, one day I'd like to ride the new rides at KI, but I feel like I'm too old unless I have a youngster with me. This is just me ranting.

Sure, Paramount didn't seem as greedy as the current owners appear to be. For instance, a Canada's Wonderland season pass worked at all the other Paramount Parks, there was no special pass you had to get. This was one of the perks that got me to KI back in 2004. Also, when one bought a season pass in the fall, they were buying next year's season pass but could use it for the rest of the current season. Obviously this is not the case anymore in the Cedar Fair era. Of course, Cedar Fair on the positives built the Behemoth and Leviathan, something that Paramount would have never done. Paramount simply constructed a "Suspended Looping Coaster" model and named it Top Gun and tried to promote that as the signature attraction for their entire tenure of the park. Nothing to make the park stand out, it was just a "theme park" but nothing special like Kings Island or Cedar Point. From what it appears, Kings Island didn't really appear to suffer and lose some of its charm during the Paramount era unlike what happened at Wonderland. I was just wondering if Kings Island went downhill during Paramount's tenure.

While I am very critical of the Paramount era in my own park, Canada's Wonderland, what's the opinions of everyone here of the Paramount Era at Kings Island. This of course leads to a few questions, did an area exist before in Kings Island where Action Zone is today? If it did, how many rides were compromised to allow for Paramount's attractions? I know that in the era of Paramount, they were ambitious with their projects at Kings Island (unlike at Wonderland) such as the Son of Beast, and their attempt at creating a strongly themed Tomb Raider ride. I know that the mentioned ride led to a log flume ride being compromised, does anyone miss that one strongly? There was also the doomed Son of Beast, but let's face how ambitious this ride was, that ride is what got me to the park in 2004, and I personally felt nothing wrong on my ride. Is there any strong hatred of this era from Kings Island enthusiasts, boy are there many with the Paramount Canada's Wonderland era, but I won't list them as this is a Kings Island forum.

I believe you would be right, I'm somewhat of a roadgeek as well.....if you want to know what one is, go on AARoads. Considering that the exit to OH-741 is pretty much a mile away, it only makes sense that the exit to Kings Island Dr was added later on, also this exit as we know is a half interchange, meaning you can only get off north and re-enter going south. While Kings Island has had growth around it, it's not to the same extent as to what has happened in the area surrounding Canada's Wonderland. After 4PM, driving north on Jane Street between Rutherford and Major Mackenzie can take you a good 15 minutes, that's roughly the footprint that Wonderland falls under. Traffic is that serious in the area now, what we know as the Greater Toronto Area has around 6.5 million people, possibly more depending on how you define the area. Vaughan, ON, the city that Wonderland is in, had only 30,000 people when the park opened, now there's 330,000 people living in Vaughan. The metro area has probably grown by over 2 million (possibly 3 million) since 1980. This is how isolated the drive up Hwy 400 looked way back in the 80s (before my time). I mean nowadays, Wonderland for instance is fairly accessible by public transit. In the sense that bus routes commonly serve Wonderland, and with the subway extension that opened last year, roughly 4km or 2 and a half miles away from the Wonderland entrance now is the northernmost station of the Toronto subway. I don't want to go off on a tangent, but I think the situation surrounding the two parks is quite different in my opinion.

And then you have Canada's Wonderland, which is essentially a "daughter park" to Kings Island which can trace its roots back to Cincy's Coney Island, it's all great. Two of Wonderland's original coasters were based on, albeit on basic layout, on Coney Island's roller coasters as we all know. As an aside, I always thought that The Racer is based on the Shooting Star. The Racer reminded me of the Minebuster but without the helix tunnel at the end, seeing ride video POVs, the Shooting Star looked more intense than either ride. Speaking of which, with how Wonderland is pretty much in suburbia now, I kind of wish Wonderland would move up further north. I remember back when I was really young in the early 90s when Wonderland was pretty much out in the boonies like how Kings Island is (or at least it still feels like it is).

I rode the Monster at Kings Island on my only visit to the park in 2004. Anyways, I think I remember reading once that KI's Monster actually originated from Cincy's Coney Island....is this true? I was just curious. Speaking of this ride, I hope you guys never lose it, it was my favorite ride at Wonderland until it disappeared at the end of 2003 for the dumbest roller coaster ever called Tomb Raider (now Time Warp), there are days I wish that the Shiva's Fury (our name for the Monster) would fall from the sky along with its neighbor (The Great Whale of China which has now moved to Carowinds) and crush Time Warp to pieces.

Thank you Indy Guy Doing some google research on this show yielded two such results. Here is an ad for Canada's Wonderland, not sure where it comes from, maybe an Oakville, ON newspaper, advertising Lazer Zone: Time Warp. I am 100% positive that this occurred in 1994, for starters, it couldn't be any earlier than this year because 1994 was the first season when Paramount ran the show, and well their logo is on this page. I also do recall seeing the Alvin & The Chipmunks show that year, it was at the International Showplace. Canada's Wonderland Ad 1994 Although I cannot access it without paying a fee, I get a snippet of what appeared in an article for The Kokomo Tribune from Kokomo, IN on May 23, 1994. Action!, and a laser show, The Lazer Zone: Time Warp. The high-energy contemporary music show, Rock The House '94, is presented in the ... Yes, I remember Rock The House '94 at Wonderland as well, it ran on the days that Alvin & The Chipmunks didn't run. It also suggests that Paramount on Ice ran opposite to The Lazer Zone Time Warp, I assume the shows were the same at both parks. (It was called Paramount on Ice: Lights, Camera, Action!) I know Wonderland had a Paramount on Ice show but can't remember if it was in 1994 or 1995 (I regrettably never went at all in the 1996 or 1997 seasons). There was also a Lazer Zone show in the 1995 season, but it wasn't Time Warp, and regrettably as well, I never saw that one. Also as a tidbit, there was also a Lazer Zone show in the 1991 season at least in Wonderland, this time Lazer Zone: Action Heroes: Canada's Wonderland Ad 1991 And there was a Lazer Zone show in 1993 at Kings Island at least called Lazer Zone Mission Impossible.

Hello, I wanted to ask this question in CWMania, but it appears that site is gone. However a google search also shows that KI once had the show Lazer Zone Time Warp. I remember it being in the 1994 season at Wonderland in the then Paramount Theatre. What's been bothering me, and it may sound silly, are what songs were in the show. Does anyone know? The premise of the show was told as someone playing a computer game, the obvious theme song was Time Warp from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. After the opening song, the show then showed five further songs displayed as "levels". Level 1 took place in a prehistoric setting and featured Was Not Was's "Walk The Dinosaur". As for what the other 4 songs were, I've been dying to know and I don't think I'll ever know the answer. But afterwards, there's a reprise of Time Warp again and the show ends to my knowledge. There was another Lazer Zone show the following season but I never saw it. If anyone knows what songs were in this show, I'd greatly appreciate it.

If that parking lot north of Sandusky is the one outside Canada's Wonderland, I don't honestly think there will be any real repercussions from this. Someone was shot to death outside Canada's Wonderland in 2003 and that didn't really affect ticket sales. So like the poster above me, what occurded at Grad Night in 2014 anyways? Come, the spring, and next Haunt, I'm sure most will even forget that someone even got stabbed. All I was saying is that I think Wonderland is somewhat responsible due to the insane crowdiness which occured that night. It is just speculation but we do know that the incident started inside the park.

Sure that is very true. Of course, I can assume none of us, at Kings Island, or Canada's Wonderland or wherever want the entrance to the parking lot to resemble a border crossing. Mind you, this incident did happen in the parking lot, just like the 2003 incident, but however, it is possible that the incident escalated due to a situation of the overcrowding of Canada's Wonderland on Oct 25. As I said, I can't fathom the park being so crowded that it takes 10-15 minutes to walk half the distance of International Street. I do recall the parking lot was fitted with many of those emergency telephones in 2003 after the incident. So what to do about incidents in the parking lot, in theory, Park Security as far as I understand the law, could choose to do "secondary inspections" of vehicles. I don't see that being unlawful because Canada's Wonderland at the end of the day is private, their rules determine their policy on people coming in. Again, I am not for this, but maybe there should be better surveillance by Park Security of the parking lot. I do not feel totally safe, even at my age, when I walk around a very dark theme park and smell marijuana. My taste of Halloween Haunt more or less reminded me of Pleasure Island as I said.

Canada's Wonderland has had "security" in some form since a shooting occured in the parking lot on Mother's Day in 2003. Security checks at Wonderland have been miniscule at best. I got buzzed going into Wonderland and took out just my keys, and the person said go on. That's not how you do security, I could have for instance had a knife on me and they would have let me pass. Wonderland originally had a security perimeter that covered the whole front gate area, where Guest Services and Ticket Sales are located. I recall at Kings Island in 2004, they had a similar set up. Later on, Wonderland's secured zone move to the area right in front of the turnstiles to enter the park. I personally think the position where the metal detectors were before made more sense. Just doing a quick search, there was reports of a mugging at the Haunt in 2009 at Wonderland with a knife. Security basically shrugged and said "oh well, that sucks". Wonderland may have been incredibly lucky over the years and not suffered one serious ride incident, but safety in the park should be a #1 concern. Here is the incident from 2009, http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2009/10/29/11565316-sun.html Wonderland and Cedar Fair, I honestly think should acknowledge that things went wrong in the park and are seriously rethink how these events are run.

As a person from the GTA, who has been a Wonderland fan on and off in my life. I wanted to join the site CWMania, but no one there wants to seem to activate my account, let me explain some things. I was not at Wonderland the night this happened but was there the very next day due to a free pass I had when I went to Haunt for the first time in my life the previous Sunday. Also, I did visit Kings Island in 2004....and rode the infamous Son of Beast. First thing, reading many accounts on Trip Advisor of the horrible experience many people had on Saturday, October 25, there seems to be a common theme. While I got easily into all the mazes at Wonderland on the Sunday I went into, (I could probably do them all again with the crowds they had) many were complaining of horrendous crowds, worse than they had ever seen. People on CWMania are also complaining about it. Could this have been a large powder keg that allowed someone to go off on the deep end and kill someone? As for me, I had a free visit during the day time for yesterday. Let me clarify a few things, the police tape was around the area where the toll booths are. Wonderland actually had it's employees standing outside the toll booth area collecting their money. Also, the Jane Street entrance is NOT the main entrance. The main entrance is off Rutherford and furthermore off Hwy 400. In much the same way you enter Kings Island from I-71. This roadway from Highway 400, which appears as "Canada's Wonderland Dr" on maps, takes you from Rutherford/400 to the parking lot, incidentally, and I always thought unusually, there is a way to "bail" going in and go to Jane Street.Similarly, you can't go to Jane Street when you exit the parking lot, unless you U-turn. You can easily see what I'm talking about on Satellite view. There is an exit onto Major Mack on the other side of the parking lot but as I understand, you can't enter the parking lot from there anymore. That big spot where those ramps are north of Major Mack is where a hospital is being built. I think Wonderland myself has blood on their hands from what has happened. They refuse to acknowledge it had anything to do with their park, but if the place was that crowded and the level of disorder that many have been talking about on TripAdvisor, it wouldn't surprise me. Even in a small crowd, I particularly didn't enjoy Halloween Haunt, as the park is no longer a fun family park, but a place full of negativity. In a sense, it kind of felt like Pinocchio's Pleasure Island in a way when I went. Considering that even the very next day, the park security and staff still didn't monitor the metal detectors very seriously. My keys and change set the metal detector off on Sunday, and they told me to go through still. To please them further, I took everything out from my pocket and walked back through the metal detector and said "This is what you should be doing to every guest, there was a fatal incident in the parking lot last night". That's not to mention that on Haunt night, I also smelled cannabis, I don't care what your opinion on that drug is, but it is in my opinion unacceptable. When people who are fans of Wonderland claim that it took them 15 minutes to walk halfway down International Street (which is around the same length as the one at Kings Island), there is something seriously wrong. This is my rant on this situation, and like many, unless Wonderland really steps up to the plate and acknowledges that Haunt operations on Oct 25 was a total disaster, I do not think I will be going back again for a long time. On Sunday, other than parking, I did not spend a cent in Wonderland.