There really isn’t much that could make Halloween Horror Nights more exciting for me than this. This week I found myself walking the blood-red carpet at Universal Studios Hollywood, getting an early look inside the brand-new Ozzy Osbourne Maze and speaking to Sharon Osbourne about the rather gruesome fate Universal has given her husband — being decapitated by a giant bat.
As a Halloween lover, being invited to Los Angeles for the opening of Halloween Horror Nights was already something I was incredibly excited about. But Universal had gone one step further, inviting me to spend the week with them and experience the VIP treatment, including exclusive access to several of the new mazes before they were opened to the public.
There was one maze I knew was going to attract plenty of attention.
With The Prince of Darkness making its debut, Ozzy Osbourne was always going to be one of the biggest names at this year’s Halloween Horror Nights. Even so, I don’t think I was prepared for the reaction from fans. As a metalhead myself, I knew people would be excited, but the level of love surrounding the maze has been incredible.
Within days of opening, the queue for the Ozzy experience had reached four hours. That’s four hours of people willing to wait just to enter the world of the Prince of Darkness.
When I met Sharon on the red carpet, it was clear just how emotional the evening was for her. She held Ozzy’s hand as they posed in front of huge images of him, and I asked her whether she thought Ozzy was somewhere looking down on everything and smiling.
“I do, absolutely, he’s probably in there!” she said, pointing towards the theme park.
“He’d be so happy, he’s having a great time just watching us right now, he’d be so happy about it.”
I have to admit, the thought of Ozzy somehow haunting his own scare maze feels almost perfect.
If there was ever a person whose spirit could belong inside a Halloween Horror Nights attraction, it would surely be Ozzy. The maze takes you through his life, beginning with his childhood before moving through the different stages of his extraordinary career. It’s such a detailed recreation that you can almost imagine Ozzy himself wandering around somewhere inside.
It certainly adds another layer to the experience. As you’re walking through the maze, there’s always that little thought in the back of your mind that perhaps the real Prince of Darkness is lurking somewhere, waiting to give you a scare.
I had already been lucky enough to get an exclusive lights-on tour earlier in the week, when Universal Studios Creative Director John Murdy took me through the attraction before it opened.
That’s when I really began to appreciate just how much work had gone into creating it.
John told me that the maze had been more than a year in the making, with the Universal creative team determined to get the details right and properly honour Ozzy’s legacy. Sharon was closely involved throughout the process too, with John speaking to her every two weeks and keeping her updated as the maze developed.
During the tour, John also told me about another Ozzy experience at Universal from years ago, when the singer came to walk through the Black Sabbath maze.
Anyone who knows Ozzy probably won’t be surprised by what happened next.
Rather than simply walking through and watching the actors do their thing, Ozzy became part of the show. He was grabbing scare actors and licking the blood from their necks, completely embracing the madness of the experience.
The fans outside were equally enthusiastic. Ozzy’s name was being chanted around Universal Studios, and eventually John decided they needed to get Ozzy off-site before things became even more chaotic.
His driver took off at breakneck speed, but the getaway didn’t last long. The car suddenly came to a stop, and Ozzy called John over.
“But I didn’t get to say thank you.”
It’s such a small story, but for me it says so much about Ozzy. Even in the middle of all that chaos, he was thinking about saying thank you. It was also the beginning of a friendship between Ozzy and John, one that grew over the years through a genuine mutual respect.
Having the opportunity to walk through the new maze with the lights on meant I could take my time and really look at everything. Without the darkness and the scare actors, I could see all the little details that had gone into bringing Ozzy’s story to life.
And honestly, the maze is phenomenal.
There is so much passion behind it, and the attention to detail is incredible. It begins with Ozzy’s early life as a Blitz kid, with a train station surrounded by the rubble of World War II.
Then you arrive at Platform 666, where several rather interesting characters are waiting for you.
From there, there was only ever going to be one way to travel.
You board the Crazy Train.
The madness continues as the journey takes you towards the Osbournes’ Asylum and into the Werewolf era. This is also where you’ll find Ozzy’s throne, and this particular piece of the maze has an incredible story behind it.
The throne is an exact recreation of the one Ozzy used during his final-ever concert at Villa Park. The original is now displayed in Birmingham, but Sharon gave John the exact measurements along with a selection of photographs so that Universal could reproduce it as authentically as possible.
And then, because this is Ozzy Osbourne we’re talking about, a dragon comes rising out from underneath it.
The dragon is a 3D animatronic based on Ozzy’s own tattoo, adding yet another personal detail to an attraction already packed with them.
Then comes the finale.
A huge bat bites Ozzy’s head off.
It sounds completely insane, but somehow it is exactly the ending this maze needed. It’s theatrical, gruesome, unexpected and unmistakably Ozzy.
As you leave, ‘See You on the Other Side’ plays, the song having been personally selected by Sharon.
Seeing the maze with the lights on was a surprisingly moving experience. Without the screams, darkness and jump scares, I was able to see the attraction for what it really is — a huge celebration of Ozzy’s life and career.
There was something almost ethereal about it.
It didn’t feel like a normal scare maze. For those few moments, it felt more like the church of Ozzy, somewhere fans could come and pay their respects while celebrating everything that made him such an extraordinary character.
I genuinely felt a tear coming.
Naturally, I wanted to know what Sharon thought about the giant bat taking a bite out of Ozzy’s head.
Her response was brilliant.
“There’s lots of bats, everywhere, always.”
Sharon was also at Halloween Horror Nights on opening night to experience the maze for herself. It was her first time walking through it, although she admitted that horror isn’t exactly her favourite thing.
“I’m a wuss, when it comes to anything like this, I’m such a wuss.”
I kept thinking about that as I watched Sharon prepare to experience The Prince of Darkness Maze.
For me, as someone who is essentially a stranger to Ozzy, the maze had already been incredibly emotional. But for Sharon, walking through those different versions of Ozzy must have been something else entirely.
These aren’t just random scare actors dressed up to look like a rock star. They represent different periods of Ozzy’s life and career, meaning Sharon would have been confronted with familiar versions of the man she spent her life with throughout the experience.
I couldn’t help wondering what must have been going through her mind.
And eventually, I kept coming back to the same thought: this is exactly what Ozzy would have wanted.
He would have loved the spectacle, the theatrics and, of course, the sheer ridiculousness of having his head bitten off by a giant bat.
I’m sure he would have been laughing.
The Prince of Darkness feels like another part of Sharon’s lifelong mission to celebrate Ozzy and keep his incredible legacy alive. It captures the madness, the humour, the darkness and the theatrical side of a man who was never exactly ordinary.
And perhaps Sharon is right.
Maybe Ozzy really is in there somewhere, looking down on everyone, watching the screams and enjoying every second of his own scare maze.