Nerdy Fun in the San Fernando Valley

5/9/26   -   The Universal park has a slew of events, but FanFest is here and nerdy fandoms are happy! Here are a few of my favorite moments, as a professional Game Master who attended last night!

5. Sailor Moon

Full disclosure... I have no affinity for the girls and/or their magicality. I just didn't grow up with it! But I saw it making some beautiful people very happy, so I'm happy to watch people love it.

4. The Mummy

The Mummy lives at the park year-round, but its life is not as I remembered it. Seriously, I remember it being incredibly tame and slow-going in a big dusty room. I don't know if they turned up the speed or there were just too many lights on during my previous runs, but it's a proper roller-coaster now! And all packed neatly into a tiny little box.

3. Jurassic Park

Another persisting feature of the park, Jurassic World (having fully transitioned now from its early 90s Jurassic Park childhood and unspeakable millennium adolescence into a more marketable adulthood) deserves a proper stroll. An unused corner was cleverly transformed into a display space for vehicles and setpieces from the films, and the nitro-charged-log-ride that is "Jurassic World - The [Nitrous Addled Log] Ride" remains an animatronic experience despite some added projection elements. Just be ready to get damp - save this one for later in the day, unless the sun promised to dry you out quickly.

2. D&D Experience

I've set up some beautiful and immersive tables over my years running D&D and other tabletop RPGs, but there's nothing quite like walking into a true villain's horde created by expert propmakers and set-dressers. Mountains of gold coins and what-does-that-crystal-do in every corner of your vision really stays with you - I'm going to be certain to highlight future sessions just how slippery it must be to walk around on a hillock of tiny gold hazards.

The experience splits a room full of parkgoing adventurers into four groups, each group playing one of the D&D classes. The experience is light, humor-heavy, and keeps a big group on rails.

Tabletop RPGs are deep in my heart - deeper than a witch-king's blade in Frodo's shoulder. And I think that's why it only ranked second; the thing I love about D&D, the thing that makes tabletop RPGs special, is getting people around the table. The moments we create together are why I do what I do! I love sharing these games and stories with seasoned adventurers, and I love bringing rookie players into the game even more!

1. The "One Piece" Grand Pirate Show!

Tabletop RPGs may be closest to my heart, but I'm a sucker for a re-skin and I'm a sucker for high-effort fandom. The original stunt show is already impressive, but the IP is exhausted - my companion loved the original stunt show and wasn't even aware it was based on a movie. And then some beautiful soul decided to flip the whole thing and redesign it around One Piece for FanFest! And it was clearly done with adoration for the anime. Even minor moments I recognized from the original stunt show got new vibrant life with details from the anime. Boat chases, multi-story stunt falls, and pants-on-fire martial arts will grab attention, but some dead-simple floating arm puppetry is the thing that's been lingering in my mind all day. Someone who adores One Piece put that in the show, and money-people let them.

God, it's so simple.