That Willy Wonka Event Horrified Kids - But This Original Movie Scene Is Scarier
If you're terminally online, you're familiar with the "immersive" Willy Wonka "experience" in Scotland that went horribly wrong. If you're terminally online and a fan of the 1971 film adaptation of the (slightly differently named) Roald Dahl book, "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," you know that the film has a way scarier scene than anything at the Scottish exhibition.
As reported by several outlets like the New York Times, a Wonka-themed event — billed as "a universe where confectionary dreams are brought to life" featuring "mind-expanding projections, optical marvels and exhibits that transport you into the realm of creativity" — used AI-crafted posters to advertise the experience only to sorely disappoint parents and children who paid 35 pounds ($44 dollars) per ticket. Stuart Sinclair drove for two hours so that his three children could experience the universe and told the Times, "There were maybe 20 chairs, a couple of tables, and a half-inflated bouncy castle. The children got two jelly beans each and half a cup of lemonade."
Pictures of the experience then flooded X (formerly known as Twitter), presenting a bleak, blank warehouse, a seriously sad-looking woman dressed as an Oompa-Loompa, and one of the gloomiest rainbows you've ever seen. Per the NYT, at least one person attending the event called the Scottish police.
Real Wonka-heads know, though, that this scene from the 1971 movie is scarier than that pathetic warehouse.
The scariest thing related to Willy Wonka is in the 1971 movie
Nothing within that Scottish warehouse is as scary as the infamous "tunnel scene" in "Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory." Led by Gene Wilder as the enigmatic chocolate maker, the families visiting the Wonka candy factory grow increasingly terrified as their boat ride enters a darkened tunnel. Soon, they start screaming for Wonka to turn around, but he remains steadfast. (That's one word for it. Another is that he seems demonically possessed as he demands that the boat go faster.) Then, there's the song! After saying there's no way of telling where the boat is going, Wonka follows that verse with this horrifying rhyme: "Not a speck of light is showing / So the danger must be growing / Are the fires of Hell a-glowing? / Is the grisly Reaper mowing?"
Sure, everyone lives on after going through the tunnel, but Wonka's whole approach to the situation is unhinged. So, what did the Scottish exhibition do to try and compete with its predecessor? They introduced a character nobody had ever seen in the Wonkaverse before: The Unknown.
Some parts of the Willy Wonka installation were particularly puzzling
This entire situation has gone viral on social media — but the most unreal detail here is the character called The Unknown. X user @bene25_ brought the world's attention to The Unknown with a post that included a video of an actor dressed in a black cloak with a creepy mask popping out behind a mirror (and making several kids cry). "This Willy Wonka story is incredible," they wrote. "What's going on here? What part of the film was this haha..."
Paul Connell, an actor and comedian, was excited to play Willy Wonka at the event — until he realized it was awful. Within a TikTok he posted, he said it's obvious the actors' scripts were written hastily and probably also used AI. However, he memorized the script regardless and even read his favorite line in the video, which goes: "There is a man who lives here, his name is not known. So we call him The Unknown. The Unknown is an evil chocolate maker who lives in the walls."
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Connell then asks an apt question — is The Unknown making "evil" chocolate, or is he simply a bad guy who makes chocolate? Let's hope we never find out.