Come face to face with each of the seven deadly sins.

For the first time since the event started, Thorpe Park increased the size of its maze offering, introducing Se7en in 2006. This represented the first time a maze was built in a marquee tent for Fright Nights (previous mazes were permanently standing inside buildings across the park), and was also a big step for extending the event.

The premise for Se7en was simple: guests would venture through seven different scenes, each one based on one of the deadly sins. Some of these were quite obvious, others a bit more abstract, but they were all there. This meant there was a consistent nature to the maze – in many ways, Trailers is a new version of Se7en!

Perhaps the most striking thing for Se7en at the time was its theming and effects: it was far better themed than the park’s other two mazes of the time, despite its temporary nature. It also featured more effects than others mazes, including very good smell pods in the “Sloth” scene (which still stick in the minds of people who went through almost 20 years later!). The level of theming and effects is a lot more normal for mazes these days, but at the time, it was unprecendented.

The premise for each sin / room was:

Wrath: A padded ‘cell’ room which had a low ceiling, with an actor going crazy and showing their wrath.

Sloth: A living room with lots of rubbish and a broken TV and static, filled with lots of strong smells.

Gluttony: A room filled with an excess of food; much of it rotting. Again, filled with strong smells of rotting meat.

Envy: A room with posters of celebrities and three doors. All doors are fake, and the exit to the room is hidden away.

Lust: A room filled with BDSM-style equipment and an actor dressed in leather.

Pride: A dentist’s surgery, with the dentist taking pride in the pain they inflict on patients.

Greed: A room filled with cages, to collect materialistic things.

On paper, some of these rooms may sound basic or boring. But Se7en was also a maze of its time, and this level of storytelling and theming was uncommong in the UK scare industry. And each scene served its purpose very well, and was themed consistently all the way around.

Se7en did have a rocky first couple of years – the first year in particular the attraction was poorly received. This was in part due to the maze being built very late and Fright Nights not lasting as long, meaning actors had very little chance to get used to the maze. However, over time, the maze performed better, with its best year arguably being its last.

The maze was housed in The Arena for most of its life, except its last year, where it was moved to the larger side of The Beach (now The Launchpad) to make room for Experiment 10.