Do you like escape rooms? Haunted mazes? Free merch and alcohol? How about all of it at once, themed to a big-time superhero TV show? That’s exactly what you’ll find on J Street in San Diego at the DC Studios’ Lanterns Training Headquarters as part of San Diego Comic-Con.
For the past several years, large-scale activations have become the norm at Comic-Con. People line up for hours to experience something fun that they can’t do anywhere else, and these experiences always vary. Sometimes it’s a set you get to explore. Other times it’s a game you get to play. But it’s usually rather short so everyone who wants to do it can do it. Lanterns Training Headquarters isn’t short. The experience takes about 30 minutes in total, and that’s after what could be a very long wait if you weren’t lucky enough to get a reservation. Warner Bros. invited io9 to attend so we didn’t have to brave the sun or a frustrating reservation process, but either one would have almost certainly been worth it. Once you enter, you’re broken down into four groups of about 10 people each. You’re instantly immersed as a person posing as a kind of drill instructor type sits you down and explains how everything is going to work. You are to complete two missions and, if you do, you will be made worthy of taking the Green Lantern oath.
