On October 28th at 6:30-8:30PM, Palo Verde High School transformed into a spooky display of horror in the 200 hall and the Senior Quad. 

The main feature was the  haunted house in the 200 hallway hosted by Student Council, the IB program, K-Pop club, Writing Club, ROTC, and the Monster Makers club. 

There were two lines into the haunted house, one for students with prepaid tickets and one for students to buy tickets. Then, once students got in, they waited in another line to get into the haunted house in smaller groups.

The haunted house itself was a terrifying experience of darkened corridors. Each section was themed after a different Halloween movie or show like IT, The Exorcist, Squid Game, and more. Every nook and cranny was filled with horror references and interactive frights.

“There were some parts that were definitely scary, and the rest of it was a lot of references that I liked, so it was kinda cool seeing [them],” said 9th grader Zane Zavala.

A big part of the haunted house was the student actors. Some students played horrified victims and bystanders, while others sparked fear as ghoulish creatures.

“The actors made it really fun, because they were really good. I actually got scared,” said 11th grader Sophia L.

Many of the student actors interacted with the visitors by grabbing or screaming at them.

“[The scariest part was] when people would pop out from the walls. Like, someone reached for me behind this black paper thing,” said 9th grader Hannah Berry.

Aside from the actors, the rooms and hallways had a few spooky surprises of their own.

“[The most startling part was] when I got shot by a water gun because I was walking through and I saw the holes [in the wall]. I thought they were gonna start reaching out, but I got shot in the neck, and I was like whoa,” said 11th grader Donovan Bell.

Alongside the haunted house was the murder mystery activity upstairs. A student would lead you through various clues to figure out who killed Mr. Smith. Other working students were upstairs, splattered with fake blood and letting out shocking shrieks.

“It was pretty fun looking for the lockers. We found it [out] and they scared us by screaming at us the whole time. It was fun, it was just a little short. But I still enjoyed the candy at the end,” said Zavala.

A section of ghastly games and Halloween-themed photo ops in the senior quad was at the finale of the spooky experience.

“They were pretty creative. The bean bag toss and the photo backgrounds were good,” said 9th grader Priya Kothari.

 The Paloween Haunted House was an eerily excellent ode to Halloween, and it certainly helped build up school spirit—in more ways than one.