Zombob's Zombie News and Reviews

Zombies! The Asylum and 13th Floor dare you to nut up or shut up (Denver, CO)

Zombies=never not cool.

Zombies have never not been cool as f*ck, but thanks to the insane popularity of The Walking Dead, anything and everything zombie is what all the cool kids are into this Halloween season, and two of Denver's premier haunted houses are feeding some bwains into the trend with the "Undead" trapped-in-by-zombies-farmhouse at the 13th Floor, and the "Zombieland" deserted-except-zombies urban landscape attraction at The Asylum.

13th Street is dead-ringing in its fifth-anniversary year with two new state-of-the-art monsters -- all cutting-edge computer/monster/animatronics technology, so much so that these monsters will be the focus of an episode of Travel Channel TV's Making Monsters premiering on September 30 and airing every Sunday in October (the air date for the episode featuring the 13th Floor is TBA). 13th Street is tag-teaming with Greeley-based animatronics company Distortions Unlimited, along with Microsoft and Intel, to pull this off, and it's pretty sweet that Denver gets to be on the vanguard of new, creepy monster technology.

And that's not all: 13th Street will also have a Yeti; a snow cave (hopefully all ice planet Hoth-tastic); a "Temple of Doom" with a rock cave, fossils and dinosaurs, improved and extended sewer scene, a laser swamp, Mayan tombs, shifting hallways, spinning tunnels....and zombies.

The new Undead attraction (included in the ticket price with 13th Floor) is in an old built-to-scale farmhouse, where guests will get to "fend for their lives" all Shaun of the Dead-ish as zombies try to get in.

The Asylum has been scaring the sh*t out of Denverites since 2002 with its circa 1800s-tastic insane-asylum vibe: electroconvulsive shock therapy, straitjackets, branding patients' heads with a red hot iron and all that good stuff. This year, haunted house-goers get a redesigned layout with new rooms, new facades, animatronics and forty actors whose sole purpose is to make sure you wet yourself.

The Asylum's Zombieland debuted in 2011, and it's back: an "abandoned city where all humans have gone and only zombies remain."

And for all the gift-shop addicts, there will be new souvenirs: zombie dolls, zombie attack kits -- not sure if real axes are included -- and zombie tees.

Here's the skinny-bones on both places: locations, dates, op-hours and ticket info.

13th Floor/Undead is located at 4120 Brighton Boulevard C2 (a couple blocks south of the Denver Coliseum); there's a free parking lot and street parking is also available. The season starts on Friday, September 28, and runs through November 3 (it's closed October 1-3 and November 1); hours of operation are 7-11 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, 7-midnight Friday and Saturday. Tickets Sunday through Thursday are $22 (for both 13th Floor and Undead); VIP Fast Pass to both haunts (no lines!) is $32. Tickets Friday and Saturday are $25 and VIP Fast Pass to both haunts (no lines!) is $35. Immediate door access anytime is $45.

The Asylum/Zombieland is located at 6100 East 39th Avenue (one block west of Monaco); there's a free parking lot and street parking is available. The season starts on Friday, September 28 and runs through November (it's closed October 1-3, October 8-9 and November 1): Hours of operation are 7-10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, 7-midnight Friday and Saturday. Tickets Sunday through Thursday are $20 (for both tje Asylum and Zombieland); VIP Fast Pass to both haunts (no lines!) is $30. Tickets Friday and Saturday are $22 and VIP Fast Pass to both haunts (no lines!) is $32. Immediate door access anytime is $45.

Tickets can be purchased at the door, by phone at 303-355-FEAR or online here.