When you walk into Halloween Horror Nights, you're greeted by the sounds of chainsaws and screams. A thick, smokey atmosphere brews in the ambient streets of the Orlando theme park, where thousands of dedicated fans flood in, ready for a good scare. And the park has got them covered. There are the five Scare Zones scattered around the park, which are packed to the brim with scareactors and spooky sights, inspired by original creations and Hollywood fare like The Purge and Trick 'r Treat. There are two live performances, including the HHN icon Bill and Ted's Excellent Halloween Adventure, which takes a final bow this year after 26 years of bringing brash comedy and scantily clad dancers to audiences. Oh, and watch out for the roving horde of clowns, one of which gave me my first genuine scream in years. Cheers, dude.

And then, of course, there are the mazes. There are nine mazes this year; a healthy mix of original creations -- including vampires, a jaunt through hell, killer scarecrows, and a voodoo queen -- and the big name mazes, culled from recognizable film and television IPs, including Ash vs. Evil Dead, American Horror Story, Saw, and arguably the biggest draw of the year, The Shining.

And if it's a big deal for the cinephile park guests, it's an even bigger accomplishment for the Horror Nights team, who have been trying to get their hands on the property for decades. Before I headed into the park for the night's activities, I spoke a bit with HHN veteran Patrick Braillard, a key member of the Creative Development team that handles live entertainment and marquee events, who explained that The Shining was a dream project; one they worked on for years to make a reality.

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Image via Universal Studios

"We have been working on, on our wishlist of wants above all else, bringing The Shining to our guests," Braillard explained. "We have grown up watching that film, thinking about how amazing that would be to be able to have that as a live, interactive experience for our guests. To be able to walk through the halls of the Overlook and have that Overlook take control of them. "

He continued, "Not only do we dissect the film intently, we go through scene by scene, character by character, costume by costume... but also, because we're fans, we have a memory that's associated with hat and how we want to translate that memory to our guests."

And they succeeded. Not only is The Shining a real treat of a maze, the year's haul in 2017 is particularly strong. Over the years, I've been lucky enough to attend Universal Studios Halloween Horror Nights a number of times, at both the Hollywood and Orlando locations, and this year's Orlando presentation easily ranks as one of my favorite years yet. I'd also like to send a shout out to my guides Jared and Kayleigh, who went above and beyond to make it a great experience, give us insight into each attraction, and make sure we got to see just about everything. So without further ado, here are the mazes of HHN 27, ranked.

The Scare Zones

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Image via Universal Studios

It doesn't feel quite right ranking the Scare Zones with the cinematic, coordinated efforts of the mazes, but they're fantastic and fun in their own right so I wanted to break down a few of the highlights from what this year has to offer. (Note: I didn't make it to Festival of the Deadliest.)

First up, there's The Purge scare zone, which is fun, but they've done it for years now both at the Hollywood and Orlando locations so it's lost some of its charms. You can only feel freaked out by seeing a masked girl skipping toward you in a flowy nightgown, kitchen knife in hand, so many times and it appears my count is up.

Next best is the Invasion! Scare Zone, inspired by the sci-fi movies of the 1950s, which sets you on the streets next to a crash-landed UFO where monstrous aliens hunt you down to conduct experiments. The alien designs a great blend of creepy creature work and that outdated, cheesy flourish that makes the films that inspired the zone such a treat. Not a lot of scares here -- I mostly saw aliens taking selfies with the crowd, but I enjoyed the designs so much, I got sucked into snapping pictures and almost lost my group.

But the best of the best, beyond any doubt, is the Scare Zone inspired by Michael Dougherty's Trick 'r Treat. No movie has ever captured the Halloween spirit quite as well as the 2007 cult classic and walking through this scare zone is like walking through your childhood memories of the best day of the year -- you know, unless you're a Christmas person, which man, no judgment. It's an A+ Scare Zone and the general sentiment in my group as we left was that we all wished we could live there.

9. Horrors of Blumhouse

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Image via Universal Studios

It's not that the folks at Universal Studios have done a poor job bringing the worlds of Blumhouse to life in their latest maze collaboration with the horror studio. To the contrary, the biggest problem is that they've brought too much of those worlds to life in one place. The Horrors of Blumhouse maze is spooky and intense, packed with the killers and creatures of the Blumhouse world pulled from a number of films -- The Purge movies, the Sinister movies, and the Insidious movies, including a "live trailer" sneak peek of the upcoming Insidious: The Last Key that's hidden somewhere in the house. It's a lot to take in, and because you're constantly moving from franchise to franchise, the house doesn't take on the ambient impact of its more effective scares. Fans of the films will find plenty of Easter Eggs to coo (or scream) at in the house, but they won't get that sense of cinematic immersion you get from Halloween Horror Night's best mazes.

8. The Hive

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Image via Universal Studios

All credit to the outstanding creature effects adorned by the feral vampires haunting the halls of Hive, it's just that the maze doesn't quite live up to the promise of its concept. Hive takes you through a crumbling house where you awake a bloodthirsty, animalistic nest of vampires, but the mazes mundane setting doesn't do much to play up the thrall of the vampire and if Horrors of Blumhouse feels like its cramming too much into one maze, Hive runs into the opposite problem, scrounging for enough story. That said, the creatures really do look fantastic and the maze gets a bit more interesting when you wind through a cave structure near the finish line, but it's a bit too brief and far too smoky to fully take it in.

7. American Horror Story: Volume 2

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Image via Universal Studios

This maze is a whole lot of fun, but it suffers a bit from that "too much of a good thing" over-stimulation that plagues Horrors of Blumhouse. But unlike the films in HoB, all of the seasons at work in American Horror Story: Volume 2 come from the wild and garish mind of Ryan Murphy, giving the maze a bit more coherence as you work your way through the separate themes. Last year's event translated Murder House, Freak Show and Hotel into a single maze, so for their second collaboration, the creative team pulled from Asylum, Coven, and Roanoke, which make for a wild, supernatural ride as you make your way through the stylistic flourishes of each season. Thought the maze is a bit overstuffed and light on cohesion, it handles the iconography of the three seasons in creative ways with plenty of impressive creature effects and set design.

6. Saw

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Image via Universal Studios

To be blunt, I'm not a big fan of the Saw films past the first two, so I wasn't especially looking forward to this one but I really appreciate the approach to presentation and audience interaction taken with this maze. Unlike the usual maze set-up, which relies on scareactors to provide jump scares in fairly easy to identify intervals, this spin on the Saw franchise offers up some of the franchise's most iconic deaths in a sort of living tableau format. What that means is it doesn't depend on where you are in the "line" to determine if you'll get a well-timed scare. Instead, the creative team has installed bright red buttons throughout the exhibit and when you push one, it provides a scare for someone around you. So the best scare I got in my trip through the maze was when I was watching my buddy lunge at a bright red button and a dart of air shot across giving me a good jump I could never have seen coming. I may not be crazy about Saw, but I love the element of interactive scares and definitely encourage more of that in the future. Note for the Saw diehards: this maze also offers a sneak peek at one of the traps seen in the new film Jigsaw.

5. Ash vs. Evil Dead

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Image via Starz

A few folks in my group didn't love this one as much as I did, so remember it's all subjective, but if you're a fan of the Evil Dead films and especially the Starz spinoff series Ash vs. Evil Dead, this year's maze is one hell of a fun tribute to the rollicking spirit of Ashy Slashy Williams. Straight up, this is not the scariest maze of the year, so if that's what you're looking for, your time may be better spent queueing up for other attractions. A few years ago, the park featured a maze inspired by the remake and that was naturally a much darker, scarier experience. This is not that, but if you appreciate the cheeky humor of Ash vs. Evil Dead and the experience of hailing to the king, baby, as he dispatches deadites with his trademark one-liners, there's a lot of fun to be had.

4. The Fallen

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Image via Universal Studios

How does a quick trip to hell sound? As the name suggests, The Fallen transports you to the realm of fallen ages in an eternal battle against the forces of light and pits you up against the forces of hell. There's a distinct Hellraiser vibe to the dastardly demon creations popping out at every turn. This was also a distinctly smelly maze, with musty corridors and stinking chambers. But the most impressive effect in The Fallen is the implementation of aerial stunts, which send the scareactors flying and shrieking above you like the hounds of hell. So be sure to keep an eye out for scares in unexpected places since you'll need to look more than around the corner to see all the spooks this maze has to offer.

3. The Shining

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Image via Universal Studios

The Shining seems like a film that would be impossible to do justice in a maze, defined by Stanley Kubrick's filmmaking tricks of psychological discomfort and trademark visual flourishes, but the folks at Halloween Horror Nights have treated the film with all the love and attention it deserves, it's a damn delight to walk through the halls of the Overlook Hotel and see it brought to life with the attention to detail it deserves. Wisely, the lights are a bit higher in this one because you'll want to take in the environment around you as best you can as you travel from one fully realized room to the next, taking in the homages to the horror classic's iconic scenes. They even found a clever way to make the blood elevator work, though no need to bring your galoshes, it's a dry effect. The Shining was considered a holy grail property for the HHN creative team for decades, and it's obvious that once they finally got their hands on the rights, they put their whole heart into making the maze a worthy experience.

2. Dead Waters

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Image via Universal Studios

This one's a beaut. If you're into mazes with a sense of story, creepy creatures, and gorgeous set design, Dead Water is a must-see at this year's event. Without a doubt, it's the most aesthetically impressive maze of the lot, set on half-sunken Mississippi riverboat where you enter the lair of the Voodoo Queen -- a character resurrected from a previous Halloween Horror Nights. The house is built with forced perspective and canted floors, making for a fully immersive and physically engaging trip through a black magic bayou, where waterlogged zombies pop out at every turn. Pro-tip: the slanted floors and forced perspective on this one are definitely a trip, so if you're planning on doing some drinking throughout the night, hit this one up early while you've still got your sea legs.

1. Scarecrow: The Reaping

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Image via Universal Studios

I always love the original mazes and the pure creativity put into realizing a new horrific nightmare in a live-action experience. This year, Scarecrow: The Reaping easily walks away as my favorite maze of the year. A huge amount of credit goes to the costuming and creature effects, which are such downright fantastic looking original creations, I wish there was an online gallery. But Scarecrow also thrives thanks to a huge investment in production design and making the maze a textural experience for the audience. Scarecrow: The Reaping takes you through a Depression-era farm where the hungry scarecrows spring to life to reap your soul, and every wall, every dangling thread -- even some dripping water that got me good when I was least expecting it -- every element invites to be touched and felt in a completely absorbing environment. Hell, they even grew a big ol' corn maze out front that will have you looking over your should before you get in the door.