Posted in: Lionsgate, Movies | Tagged: lionsgate, The John Wick Experience

The John Wick Experience Takes You To The Continental

While in Las Vegas for CinemaCon, Lionsgate invited us to check out The John Wick Experience, which just opened last month.

Las Vegas is becoming a hub for movie-themed, high-quality experiences. We got to experience the SAW-themed escape room a couple of years ago for the SAW X junket, and others that have been done include IT and The Blair Witch Project. Those are all horror, though, and if you're not into horror, you may have felt a bit left out, at least until The John Wick Experience opened last month. While attending CinemaCon, Lionsgate invited us to try the experience in honor of Ballerina, which is coming out in June.

The John Wick Experience is a little bit of everything for people who are into this sort of thing. It's part walk-through experience, part LARP, and part escape room. You're brought into the world of John Wick as you make your way through the many rooms of the Continental, with different employees trying to help you along the way. Whether that means the manager giving you a chance to run for your life, rolling the dice, or applying for a desk position at the switchboard, it's all here. And with the added benefit of no phones, no one will be pulling out a selfie stick, and you won't unwillingly become part of someone's vacation vlog.

Most of the experience is interactive, and you can touch a decent portion of it. Not everything is, and they do a good job of reminding you not to try to open a door that isn't open or yank open a drawer that doesn't open on the first try. If you've spoken to escape room employees, they all have horror stories of people breaking down doors or taking apart a prop that was not supposed to come apart at all.

We went through the experience as a group of twelve, and that might have been the biggest downside to the entire thing. The group felt too big, and while the actors did a good job of making sure everyone interacted on a one-on-one basis at least once, there were times when everything was very crowded. If you look at the ticketing, it seems the minimum for private packages is six, which is a pretty good number. I would say closer to eight or nine might be more comfortable in terms of making sure nothing feels too overcrowded.

You also have to be willing to do a little LARP-ing or live-action role-playing. If you don't think that is something you'd be into, this might not be the thing for you. Then again, why would you go to something like this if you're not willing to RP at least a little? This is one of those experiences where once you enter, people aren't going to break character, and they are going to roll with whatever stupid thing you or your group might come up with. That might include how badly you're flunking a challenge. One member of our group was having a hard time starting off, but it didn't seem to penalize us too much. If anything, the group shame element seemed to encourage the one messing up to get their crap together.

The price of admission might be a bit of a barrier to entry for some. A general admission ticket is $59.99, while the VIP experience is $89.99, and the ultimate VIP admission is $109.99. The difference in the tickets will vary depending on how you end up going through the experience. A regular GA ticket means you're going to be with a group of up to 12 people you don't know. A VIP admission, a minimum of six, means you have private access, so no random people can join your party. The ultimate VIP is where you start getting bonuses, which include "one (1) Specialty Cocktails, one (1) Collector's Cup, and 20% Off Merchandise. Non-alcoholic options available." I had one of the mocktails, and it was pretty good. As someone who doesn't drink due to medicine interactions, sometimes places will drop the ball on mocktails, but they very much did not here.

The bar itself is open to the public without a ticket, but it's not exactly on the strip. If you're in the area, then it might be worth your time, but considering how expensive ride shares are these days, it isn't worth the journey on its own. If you're in Vegas and you already have a car for whatever reason, that's a different story.

As someone who goes to Las Vegas on a fairly regular basis and very much enjoys the city and also loves this sort of thing, if Lionsgate hadn't invited me to check out The John Wick Experience, I probably would have done it anyway. The price of admission is pretty steep, though, and if I was going to spend the money on the attraction, I would have wanted the VIP, and I wouldn't have six people I could book with. So there are some kinks for people who want a smaller, more personal experience but don't have six friends in their immediate vicinity.

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