Scary stories in scary spots in Clark County

Bring on the scary clowns!

This is the year for it. Creepy clowns are everywhere. Or anyway, reports of them are everywhere. Make that rumors of reports. Well, anxious speculation about dubious rumors about mostly nonexistent reports.

But are there any actual clowns up at the Clark County Scaregrounds, or traveling the Trail of Terror, or haunting Halloween Hall in Ridgefield? We’re not telling. You’ll have to go find out.

There’s a lot to find out. Each haunted spot has a backstory. That’s befitting an age where we spend so much of our time role-playing and binge-watching. You can’t just scatter a bunch of ghosts and goblins around a house and call it haunted anymore. We need a sophisticated understanding of the gore. We need to star in our own Netflix original series.

That’s why the Clark County Scaregrounds — known as the Clark County Event Center at the Fairgrounds during the other 11 months of the year — now includes four completely different freak-out scenarios.

In Area 51, you and your team of researchers must go in and investigate a secret government base full of weird laboratories and lethal specimens. There’s also a Lost Colony where some settlers once tried to hunt down the local witch, but only succeeded in unleashing her curse. There’s a mad scientist’s Asylum. And, there’s a mazelike world of Night Terrors in 3-D — the “Otherside” where all of this world’s darkness and evil goes to simmer.

Good luck making it out of any of these horrible places alive. (The website says each one takes something like 15 minutes.) Each one is crowded with professional fiends and creatures who auditioned into this underworld. No amateur horrors here.

Also, no touching. These creatures want to scare you silly — but they themselves are terrified of liability. They may get in your face, but no one will lay a hand on you. This operation is staged by Vendetta Productions, a local event company with a long track record of building — and populating, when appropriate — everything from haunted mazes and Christmas villages to sound stages for movies, TV productions and video games.

But are these Scaregrounds truly scary? Absolutely, its makers promise. Dozens of actors were carefully selected for their unpredictable and disturbing talents. They’re deployed across 18,000 square feet of labyrinths and chambers, where they’re lying in wait for you. Expect them to give it their all.

Corn evil

Here’s how a bad economy results in terror. Hurt by the recession, an old traveling carnival finally broke down on this abandoned farm up on Northeast 72nd Avenue. To pull themselves through the winter, the carnival family got ready to host one final extravaganza, featuring the usual assortment of rides, games and animals.

But other inhabitants of the farm — like giant spiders in the woods, giant pumpkins on the land — transformed the carnival into a “corn evil.” Still, the show must go on. You’re invited.

Because this is a carnival, you’d be wise to expect — dare we say it? — clowns. But not too many and not too scary, Trail of Terror mastermind Heidi Hongel said. She’s been wary of the recent scary clown trend, she said. “I just didn’t want to get into that,” she said.

Heck, her website makes the Trail of Terror sound sort of homey. Don’t miss the nice fire where you can just “hang out and drink coffee,” it says.

No clowns here

Even friendlier is the Ridgefield Art Association’s Halloween Hall, aimed at families with children. Only the kindest pirates, witches, ghosts and monsters will staff this event. “Non-bloody” costumes only are welcome.

There’ll be music, a maze, concessions in the haunted dining room — and hourly live re-creations of Michael Jackson’s classic “Thriller” video, featuring the young ghouls of Dance Fusion NW and the ghost of the Gloved One himself.

But no clowns. Not even one. Halloween Hall is an official clown-free zone. “We thought we’d better throw that in there,” said Art Association president Patricia Thompson. “It’s been a weird year.”