An underrated favorite

With 86% of the vote, Medusa was eliminated this week after making it to the “final four” of Six Flags Survivor. Matched up head-to-head with its sister, Nitro, the purple and yellow monster stood no chance to advance to the championship round. But this got me thinking about how underrated this ride really is.

Tucked away in the back corner of often-ignored Frontier Adventures, this prototype coaster has been steady and reliable since day one. The ride has never had an extended period of downtime and save for its first season and certain exceptionally crowded days…there rarely is a wait beyond fifteen minutes. To put it simply, Medusa gives you the most bang for your buck (well, that is if you had to pay on a per-ride basis).

I know many of you share my sentiment, but many more tend to look past this ride to understandably more thrilling coasters in the park; Kingda Ka still holds two world records, El Toro is the park’s current shining star and Nitro is in a class by itself. But Medusa packs seven inversions into a long and enjoyable layout and basically launched a hugely popular new coaster style. The ride bolstered a long-neglected and far-from-thrilling part of the park and though its themeing is suspect, Medusa certainly is nothing to sneeze at.

Though we may never see Medusa in the championship round of Survivor, it will always have at least a few fans who quietly view it as the park’s best…or at least their sentimental favorite.

More on The Dark Knight, plus some other odds and ends

* In my entry yesterday I forgot to mention some other aspects that we have learned about The Dark Knight from Six Flags New England’s approval to the Agawam Planning Board. Since the plans for all three coaster will be the same, here’s more of what we can expect:

The queue may have some extensive themeing done to it, working up to a pre-show video of some kind to set the story in motion. Also, the station will be themed as a Gotham City subway station. The exterior of the building will be designed to appear like smaller city buildings, mimicking the fictional Gotham City of Batman fame. The drawings on file in the Planning and Community Development office show Gotham City Hall, Gotham Police, and the Wayne Industries tower. A billboard proclaims "Harvey Dent for Mayor," which references Gotham's new district attorney.

* I came across an update at xtremecoastin.com featuring fresh paint being applied to Medusa at SFDK. It’s amazing how good the fresh purple paint looks and it just makes you wonder when our version well get the TLC.

* It looks like Scream Machine will be this week’s victim in Six Flags Survivor, giving the game a final four of El Toro, Nitro, Kingda Ka and Medusa…which seems about right. There are three rounds left, the next of which will feature Nitro against Medusa to determine the Group A champion. The Round 7 voting should be up sometime tonight.