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In this edition of the Dandy Fun House, we’re going to close out 2024 by looking ahead to 2025 and seeing what’s on the horizon for theme parks, movies, pinball and my favorite TOTY AWARD NOMINATION picks for the upcoming 2025 Toy of the Year Awards! All this ahead! Let’s step into the FUN HOUSE! 











Hello and welcome to the Dandy Fun House 2024 year-end extravaganza where we celebrate retro pop culture, toys and games and all the fun stuff! I’m your host Neil Dandy and while most shows are just mailing it in this time of year and giving their audience a “best of” mishmash of what they’ve already done over the past year, this show is instead going to take the opportunity to look ahead into the New Year of 2025 and explore the most exciting things on the horizon. 







But first! I have to show you these futuristic DANDY FUN HOUSE T-Shirts! They do have a front and a back so you don’t get cold and we even cut 4 holes in them with the rattiest pair of scissors we could find! One to crawl your body into, one to stick your head out of and two to poke your arms through! All because we care! Find them in the Dandy Fun Shop at the Dandy Fun House website at dandyfunhouse.com 







While you’re there, be sure to load up on all the gogo juice you’ll need for the new year with our Coffee Badger t-shirts, mugs and bags of harshly-ground dark French Roast coffee! You don’t have to love France to love their harshly-ground coffee, but it helps! Just get your oui-oui over to dandyfunhouse.com ([ Ссылка ]) and get busy! 



Alright, let’s get into this new year we’re starting down the barrel of. There’s a lot of amazing stuff on the horizon and we’re going to explore that right now starting with… 







THEME PARKS!



And I’m going to start with the big thing everyone is talking about because it really is the attraction that is sucking up all the oxygen in the room right now as far as theme park chit chat goes and that is… 







UNIVERSAL STUDIOS, Orlando Florida – EPIC UNIVERSE.





This is a brand new theme park located adjacent to Universal Studios and Universal Islands of Adventure and it’s going to include 5 different specially-themed areas: Celestial Park, Dark Universe, How to Train Your Dragon, Isle of Berk, Super Nintendo World and The Wizarding World of Harry Potter – Ministry of Magic. 



Let’s just cut to the chase and talk about the REALLY interesting part of this new theme park and the only part that makes me want to visit: DARK UNIVERSE!



This is a special land within Epic Universe that is dedicated exclusively to the classic Universal Monsters, Frankenstein, Dracula and the Wolf Man! Sorry, no live for the Mummy or the Creature From the Black Lagoon. I mean someone has to recreate the movie theater attack from THE BLOB at some point don’t they?







Anyway, First off we’ve got an incredible looking ride called MONSTERS UNCHAINED: The Frankenstein Experiment. This one takes place inside Frankenstein’s Castle! Dr. Victoria Frankenstein continues the work of her ancestors deep below the family estate. A demonstration of her experiments to control monsters goes awry when Dracula leads a revolt of enraged monsters including The Wolf Man, The Mummy, the Creature from the Black Lagoon and more!











Then we have CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF! This appears to be a roller coaster where you ride in gypsy wagons to escape a pack of hungry werewolves. One thing that stood out to me in the renderings was a picture showing people sitting sideways, forwards and backwards on this ride. The information doesn’t divulge whether or not the cars spin or if you merely have different choices on the type of seating, but further investigation into the animated tour of the overall land of Dark Universe actually does show the cars spinning freely from side to side. It has a top speed of only 37 miles per hour so as long as you can handle the werewolves, I think pops can probably handle this one with you!







THE BURNING BLADE TAVERN: Upon first viewing from the outside looking in, this appears to be fashioned after the climactic final scene from Frankenstein where he (supposedly) meets his end in a burning windmill tower. It is indeed an eatery where you can enjoy burgers, wings, bratwurst and pretzels. But just the fact that they have the burning windmill from the movie Frankenstein with the windmill ACTUALLY ON FIRE is just blowing my frankin’ mind!





Another eatery in this portion of the park is DAS STAKEHOUSE: (notice how STAKE is spelled). This is apparently the more upscale dining option in the area and is a Vampire-Themed dungeon filled with vampire artwork and artifacts. 







DARKMOOR MONSTER MAKEUP EXPERIENCE: This appears to be a laboratory where you, the visitors can yourself become on of Doctor Pretorius’ mad experiments and be transformed into werewolves, vampires, mummies and more!







So, bas...

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