Walkthrough Part 7: The Ride!

"You are the passengers on a most uncommon elevator..."

Rod Serling's voice (henceforth done in blue text for clarity) echoed through the room as the ride vehicle suddenly began moving backwards.

"About to take the strangest journey of your lives."

Lightning crashed, and the room transformed from a generic industrial elevator chamber into a dark star field with the Twilight Zone spiral projected over the door.  During the early years of the ride, the spiral was somewhat blurry, possibly produced by just putting a cutout over a light.  In the later years (circa 2010 onward), it was a crisp projection that looked more true to the TV show's design.

Low notes of the Twilight Zone theme started playing as the ride car settled back into the elevator carriage that would carry it throughout the drop shaft.  The carriage contained a Twilight Zone Easter egg that was very difficult to see, both because basically only one seat could see it clearly and because riders were likely so absorbed in the ride's show scenes and experience that they wouldn't notice it.  The hidden content in question was the elevator permit.

Photo from didyouknowmagic.tumblr.com

The only seat that could see this clearly was the person sitting to the farthest right in the front row (the seat in row 6 that was against the wall, according to the seating chart).  It wasn't visible during load and unload, as the permit was stuck to the wall of the drop-shaft carriage and not the cage of the vehicle.

The permit referenced the episode "Escape Clause."  The permit number "10259" also referenced the air date of the first Twilight Zone episode, which was October 2, 1959.  The inspector's name, Cadwaller, is the name used by the devil in the episode.  So, yes, the Hollywood Tower Hotel's elevator inspector was the devil.  No wonder it had issues.

The narration continued: "Your destination: unknown, but this much is clear..."

As this narration played, the drop shaft doors closed in front of the car, rendering the view completely black.

"A reservation has been made in your name... for an extended stay."

The elevator suddenly moved upwards in the darkness, before stopping at a floor and having the doors open with a "ding."

Guests saw a small room with a mirror and a table, not unlike the kinds of elevator waiting areas one finds in real-life hotels.  On one side of the room was a window with curtains, and on the other side was a cutout with a background meant to suggest an opening to a hallway.  If I recall, which side the window and the narrow hallway were on differed by drop shaft, but I don't have any record of if this was the case or which configuration was in which drop shaft.  The HTH logo was above the mirror.

"Wave goodbye to the real world."

As guests waved at their reflection in the mirror, lightning struck and the reflection changed to a blue "electrified" appearance.  The electrified reflection would continue to actively reflect the guests' movements.  The curtains on the window billowed as if wind was blowing through them.

The electrified reflection.  Photo by Dusty Sage of Micechat.  Original Article

A second lightning bolt struck, and the guests' reflection disappeared altogether, with the mirror showing an empty elevator.  Often, but not always, the elevator car shook violently with this second lightning bolt.  I have no idea why this effect was not consistent.

I'm not entirely sure how the mirror effect was done.  I am, however, sure it involved some sort of one-way glass and projections (possibly a screen behind the glass?).  If one held up a bright light in the elevator (like a cell phone screen) after the reflection disappeared, the mirror showed what appeared to be a floating light/cell phone in the middle of an empty elevator!  A camera above the mirror recorded the image of the guests in the elevator and digitally compared it against a default image of an empty elevator, using that to project the electrified reflections and then the empty image.  When the camera wasn't working properly (which was often in later years), the entire mirror would appear "electrified" and then show the blank elevator rather than showing electrified silhouettes of the guests.

Apparently, the billowing curtains had actual false windows with a purple/blue skyscape behind them, despite guests not having the ability to see this at any point during the ride.

"You have just entered The Twilight Zone."

The elevator door closed and the elevator moved to the next floor.  In the left and middle drop shafts (if one were looking at the front of the building), the elevator went down to the next scene.  In the far right drop shaft, the elevator moved up to the next scene.  This was because the effects equipment needed for the second scene took up much more space than just the "on-stage" view, and thus three of the scenes could not fit together in a row, necessitating one being staggered.

When the doors opened at the next scene (once again accompanied by the elevator's "ding"), guests saw one of the hotel hallways, done in forced perspective.  Two potted plants sat on both sides of an arch, and abandoned shoes and room service trays littered the hallway.  Another elevator was on the back wall of the hallway (which was actually a screen), directly opposite the ride car.

In the Tower's last few years of operation the back screen was unnaturally bright, making its nature as a screen very obvious.  From what I can tell, this was the result of a technical upgrade that wasn't properly calibrated, such as a new screen or projector being installed and not having the brightness adjusted correctly.

"What happened here to dim the lights of Hollywood's brightest showplace is about to unfold once again."

As Rod Serling continued to narrate, lightning arced along the hallway and wind started blowing the plants around.  The lightning consolidated in the middle of the hallway, forming five blue figures--the unfortunate characters from the pre-show who were the elevator's first victims.  The little girl ghost's voice echoed through, singing "It's raining, it's pouring." (Or so I've read.  I never was quite able to make out what she was singing, and in fact for a while I thought it was a warped voice saying "Warning.").  She also still clutched her Mickey Mouse doll from the pre-show, thus providing the Tower's Hidden Mickey.

The ghosts were created using a variant of the Pepper's Ghost effect, hence the need for extra space beyond the "on-stage" hallway.  The ghosts were being reflected onto carefully-angled glass across the middle of the hallway, to produce a transparent appearance.

The ghosts in the hallway.  Note the unnaturally bright rear screen.  The original article in which this photo appeared surmised that the screen issue was due to the anticipated shift to Guardians of the Galaxy, but the problem was in place long before Guardians was announced. Photo by Dusty Sage of Micechat.

The ghosts gestured at the guests, waving their hands as if beckoning the guests forward.  After a moment, lightning began arcing between the ghosts' limbs, they reverted to electricity, and zapped back toward the second elevator.

Ghosts disappearing.  Photo by Dusty Sage of Micechat.  Original Article

The ghost-electricity zaps back toward the other elevator.  Photo by Dusty Sage of Micechat.  Original Article

"One stormy night long ago, five people stepped through the door of an elevator and into a nightmare."

After the ghosts reached the elevator, the lighting changed, making the hallway disappear into a starscape, leaving only the other elevator behind.  The hallway actually had small lights embedded in it, so that when the main lights darkened the building would appear to melt away into space.  The effect was somewhat ruined by those potted plants if you were sitting in certain seats.  If you were sitting towards the sides of the car in the front row, some of the plant leaves would stick out and be visible against the elevator projection on the rear screen, thus interfering with the illusion.

The other elevator appeared to float and tilt, opening its doors to reveal the ghosts inside before they suddenly dropped down.

"The door's opening once again, but this time--it's opening for you!"

Immediately, the elevator dropped, sending startled guests downward in the darkness.  Just as suddenly, the car paused and the lights flickered, before sending the "unlucky" passengers plummeting again.

After another quick pause, the elevator surged up to the top of the Tower, the exterior doors opening to reveal a wonderful view of Disneyland and the surrounding areas.

Two views out of the top of the elevator.  Photos by Dusty Sage of Micechat.  Original Article

Those lights you can see in the photos were for the on-ride pictures.  The cameras flashed just as the elevator shook and sent guests dropping to the lowest of the exterior-view doors.

One could see out that view for only a brief moment, however, as the elevator paused there for less than a second before going into possibly the best part of the ride: the airtime element.

The airtime element consisted of one long drop, then surging upward only to suddenly switch to dropping again, with the result being an awesome two seconds of flying "weightless" out of your seat (hence why I've termed it "airtime").  I believe this was the longest drop in the Tower's sequence, dipping a little into the actual basement area below the loading levels.

At the end of the airtime drop, the elevator paused a final time, lights flickering and making a distinct "engine revving" sound.  It surged all the way up to the top doors again, providing one last view of Disneyland.  Then, it shook before dropping all the way back down to the loading level, braking in the darkness as the sound of a pipe falling down provided a humorous final statement to the chaos of what occurred.

After a second, the doors reopened, revealing the star field spiral again, as the Twilight Zone theme music played.

"The next time you check into a deserted hotel on the dark side of Hollywood, make sure you know just what kind of vacancy you're filling, or you might find yourself a permanent resident of... The Twilight Zone."

As the elevator moved out of the drop carriage and forward into the unload, the area transformed back into an industrial elevator station.

With a clunking noise, the elevator doors opened, with the bellhop cast member greeting the guests and welcoming them back (sometimes jokingly counting the passengers to see if they'd "lost anyone").

The same creepy voice that recited the other safety spiels then stated, "Ladies and gentlemen, please gather your belongings and watch your step as you exit through the elevator doors.  We trust your stay at the Hollywood Tower Hotel has been a pleasant one, and please, do come back and see us again!  Thank you."

Unfortunately, I do not have a recording of this spiel.

At this point, guests unbuckled their seat belts, and proceeded to the exit hallways.

But wait!  I can't leave coverage of a thrill ride to mere text and still photos!

Here is the entire source audio for the DCA Tower of Terror, posted by SuperHotLarry on Youtube:

Listening to the source audio actually provides auditory details one probably couldn't hear on an actual trip through the ride, as most of the musical cues and sound effects were drowned out by the guests' screaming!  Note, however, that the source audio does not include any pre-recorded screams. Florida's Tower soundtrack included a couple pre-recorded screams to enhance the experience.

Here's a great low-light video of the ride by LMGvids on YouTube:

The video should start at the right place, but if it starts from the beginning skip ahead to 3:27 and watch until 5:35 to see the ride itself.  Note that the mirror effect is not functioning properly in this video (it electrifies the whole mirror rather than showing the guests' silhouettes), and that this was filmed when the "bright screen" issue was already happening in the hallway scene.  However, this is still the best, clearest, and most "true to life" DCA Tower video I've yet seen, so it is well worth the watch.

Unfortunately, part of the Tower's nature as a thrill ride meant that it was experiential; it couldn't be completely captured completely in any way besides actually riding it.  Hopefully, between the video, audio, and text, this post has managed to impart at least some feeling of what it was like.

Although this marks the end of the actual "ride" portion of the Tower of Terror, it's not the end of the Tower experience!  In the next post, I'll be covering the hidden details of the exit hallways and the gift shop!