Phantom Theater: Opening Nightmare Reviews

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

The hole in the wall of the queue has been patched (possibly with some painted plywood, but it's covered nonetheless) and it's not really noticeable thanks to the lighting. Larry is still thanking guests. At this point it's a nice little quirk of the queue. After riding a few times with a hat on, the hat definitely helps reduce how much I care about being able to see the ceiling during the ride itself.

[BryanJay]

37 minutes ago, Losantiville Mining Co. said:

Larry is still thanking guests.

Larry says “thank you” in the middle of a few of the slideshow segments in response to “keep your legs in the opera box” as a part of the script. Is this what it’s referring to or does it randomly glitch in during other dialog? 

[MaestroJr]

You know Larry’s flashlight in the queue was on opening day and I swear it hasn’t worked since then has anyone noticed that, it’s not a big deal just interesting 

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

8 hours ago, BryanJay said:

Larry says “thank you” in the middle of a few of the slideshow segments in response to “keep your legs in the opera box” as a part of the script. Is this what it’s referring to or does it randomly glitch in during other dialog? 

I've often heard it during the slide show, but either the timing has been off (to where it's said in the middle of/over Rick's line) or I haven't been paying as close attention as I thought. Both are possible. Otherwise, it might just be that his line is so far out of the context in terms of volume and speaker placement. 

Something I forgot to mention was that only the first two queue switchbacks were open, while the third was closed. That was a nice touch since it made sure that everyone could see Maestro throughout the line. This is also a result of the new queue setup compared to Boo Blasters, but it's a thoughtful result.

[CedarPointer]

Meanwhile, on my ride just now, the first No Legs Larry, Hilda, and the second Maestro at the organ had no sound or movement, and the two unused flashlights in my vehicle managed to score around 300k points (in addition to my 999,999). Still fun, but I feel like that's a lot to not be working on a ride that's only been open for a month and a half.

[brenthodge]

20 hours ago, MaestroJr said:

You know Larry’s flashlight in the queue was on opening day and I swear it hasn’t worked since then has anyone noticed that, it’s not a big deal just interesting 

it turns on and off, but I agree that the other day I didnt see it switch on at all. 

[kingsislandfan1972]

On 6/2/2026 at 7:02 AM, CoastersRZ said:

Yes, I wish they at least played some of the original ride`s soundtrack music in the background more.

I agree, but who knows they might change it up next season and add the og ride music to the ride. 🙂

[MaestroJr]

I absolutely adore the ride I’ve ridden it twelve times now and I think we have to sorta come to the realization that it is an amazing dark ride that Kings Island is going to have to try diligently to keep maintaining. Having said that it is unreasonable to expect the ride to run perfectly every day or to have the scenes always running perfectly, mainly they need to try and get the flashlights working properly and the scenes can follow after, I know it’s frustrating when a certain scene doesn’t go the way it’s supposed to but I still enjoy it and I think we should all try to give the park benefit of the doubt in that they are trying to make the ride as good as they can but obviously like the other dark rides that have been in the building some days the ride will be working great and others not so great but I think trying to enjoy it the best we can is the main thing. I still can’t believe that I’m riding Phantom Theater again after all these years and especially given that the park is owned by Six Flags now. 

[Captain Nemo]

10 hours ago, MaestroJr said:

“…it is unreasonable to expect the ride to run perfectly every day or to have the scenes always running perfectly…”

As a technician who worked in shows just like our phantom friends, I have to strongly disagree with this particular point. All departments have a duty to make sure that each presentation of the show is like the last and we do that fairly regularly. 

[MaestroJr]

46 minutes ago, Captain Nemo said:

As a technician who worked in shows just like our phantom friends, I have to strongly disagree with this particular point. All departments have a duty to make sure that each presentation of the show is like the last and we do that fairly regularly. 

I understand that but I’m just saying that we have to be honest with ourselves here, Kings Island is a great park but they haven’t exactly been keen to keep every effect working on these dark rides, every time I rode Boo Blasters in the past several years a large majority of effects either didn’t work or barely worked and I think after a while that’s just what you come to expect with a seasonal theme park, I’m just glad to have Phantom Theater back at the park but I do expect there to be some problems with it as seasonal theme parks seem to struggle to keep dark rides at 100 percent 

[beastfan11]

Just had a solid ride with the wife and kiddo. Only thing not working was the boiler screen. Seems like the issues are intermittent and probably vary from ride to ride. Really love this one. 

[kingsislandfan1972]

I remember in the OG PT ride they gave you a blast of heat in the boiler room scene, this season when I rode it, I didn't get a heat blast, is this supposed to be a working effect in the ride?

[MaestroJr]

17 minutes ago, kingsislandfan1972 said:

I remember in the OG PT ride they gave you a blast of heat in the boiler room scene, this season when I rode it, I didn't get a heat blast, is this supposed to be a working effect in the ride?

Opening weekend it worked and has been turned off since then my guess is it’s an effect that broke and they just didn’t feel like fixing it

[TheCrypt]

3 hours ago, MaestroJr said:

I understand that but I’m just saying that we have to be honest with ourselves here, Kings Island is a great park but they haven’t exactly been keen to keep every effect working on these dark rides, every time I rode Boo Blasters in the past several years a large majority of effects either didn’t work or barely worked and I think after a while that’s just what you come to expect with a seasonal theme park, I’m just glad to have Phantom Theater back at the park but I do expect there to be some problems with it as seasonal theme parks seem to struggle to keep dark rides at 100 percent 

Six Flags or not, seasonal park or not, realism or not: Nemo is correct that a ride of this caliber requires significant maintenance and attention to detail day by day. A story-based attraction has to tell the same story at the same high level no matter what time of day or season, and anything less will not tell the right story. The park has already learned the impact of poor (and positive) SFX investment over the years. Adventure Express, Flight of Fear, Tomb Raider, The Crypt, Phantom Theater, and of course Boo Blasters have all taught valuable lessons for what theming can do to an attraction.

The park chose to add this type of ride for this year knowing what it would take to put it at the top. What is conceivable to me is that they may not have the right people caring that those details are missed, or those people are limited by higher ups on what they can and can't do. While not a 1:1 example, I do think it represents the issue well. Take a look at how many burned out lightbulbs are around the park. Nearly every attraction, shop, menu, or roofline has something simple like this burned out, and they will go months at a time without fixing them. There's a park-wide permissiveness to let some things go. I think that's more of what we're seeing here.

[MaestroJr]

10 minutes ago, TheCrypt said:

Six Flags or not, seasonal park or not, realism or not: Nemo is correct that a ride of this caliber requires significant maintenance and attention to detail day by day. A story-based attraction has to tell the same story at the same high level no matter what time of day or season, and anything less will not tell the right story. The park has already learned the impact of poor (and positive) SFX investment over the years. Adventure Express, Flight of Fear, Tomb Raider, The Crypt, Phantom Theater, and of course Boo Blasters have all taught valuable lessons for what theming can do to an attraction.

The park chose to add this type of ride for this year knowing what it would take to put it at the top. What is conceivable to me is that they may not have the right people caring that those details are missed, or those people are limited by higher ups on what they can and can't do. While not a 1:1 example, I do think it represents the issue well. Take a look at how many burned out lightbulbs are around the park. Nearly every attraction, shop, menu, or roofline has something simple like this burned out, and they will go months at a time without fixing them. There's a park-wide permissiveness to let some things go. I think that's more of what we're seeing here.

Yes I agree, I think unfortunately that’s just the way the park has been, I hope long time they continue to upkeep Phantom Theater and it doesn’t end up looking terrible like the original version did towards the end of its life, so far I’ve been pleasantly surprised I’ve only had two rides where my flashlight didn’t work halfway through and that was both times In car #20

[Tr0y]

I think it’s unrealistic to expect everything to be 100%, 100% of the time. Minor imperfections are always noticeable to those who frequently visit.

[disco2000]

1 hour ago, Tr0y said:

I think it’s unrealistic to expect everything to be 100%, 100% of the time. Minor imperfections are always noticeable to those who frequently visit.

Even the Disney folks that visit the parks weekly notice imperfections.  Although Disney will tend to the issue a lot faster in most cases because they have a bigger set of cast members to tend to these things.

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

As one of the folks who go to the park almost every week, I agree that it's much easier to notice little things like these when you see it so often. I write my ride reports to simply update the forum on how things are going for the ride. We can get into more conversation about maintenance within the park, but Phantom Theater: Opening Nightmare is well taken care of IMO. Kings Island still has not stooped to Cedar Point levels of being a maintenance nightmare — and I'm very thankful for that.

 

I wonder how hard it would be to fit one of those Mystic Timbers trees (or a similar object) somewhere in the queue or elsewhere in the ride for a seasonal overlay...

[Captain Nemo]

2 hours ago, Tr0y said:

I think it’s unrealistic to expect everything to be 100%, 100% of the time. Minor imperfections are always noticeable to those who frequently visit.

I’ll take 90% maybe 80% but under that becomes a bigger issue.

[Hawaiian Coasters 325]

Great Adventure has ocean/seagull sounds playing on the speakers in their new Shoreline Pier area that soft opened the other day. I can't see how KI couldn't have done something similar on the path from I-street that goes up against the ride exit and first aid as well as outside the ride entrance but with eerie/spooky sound effects kinda like what played outside the original Phantom. I just don't like how they play the Kidzbop along that pathway. If they want to play Kidzbop in Planet Snoopy fine, but move it toward the Character Carousel/Whirlybirds area and have a custom soundtrack playing outside Phantom. It's not too late to do this whoever is in charge of music if you're reading this! 

[TheCrypt]

^Not to beat a dead horse, but that is totally another example that boils down to details... 

[CedarPointer]

I like how the solution to the signs on the nearby map still saying Boo Blasters was to remove them, leaving rusty holes where they were originally attached.