Monster Jam 2014 product reviews

This was my second motoring show, and after the spectacle which was Top Gear Live, there needed to be a lot of impressing, and there was. Mainly because it was a totally different show not just from Top Gear Live, but anything else you see even on television. The show was held at QBE Stadium, which I felt was too small for the event, but the organisers did a marvellous job of accommodating for all the dirt, trucks and action.

The night kicked off with very loud roars of the 1000+HP engines and all the trucks on the track, which led onto an initial timed rally challenge. At any one time there would be two trucks on the track fighting it out and the slowest trucks being eliminated. While this was somewhat repetitive, something amazing being repeated is just great I didn't mind that at all. The trucks were so loud, you couldn't feel more part of the action than this. I could see a lot of people actually holding their ears, but I chose to deaf and get the full experience.

Between every stage of the eliminations and events there was other entertainment such as quad bike racing, getting the crowd loud and freestyle motocross stunt jumps which was amazing. They did a great job of keeping the crowd entertained while the trucks were readied for the next heat. Even times when it was just bobcat bulldozers on the track remodeling the jump ramp was entertaining.

After the rally event was finished, a free style monster truck challenge kicked off during which each truck got 90 seconds to do all sorts of jumps over ramps, bigger ramps and cars and whoever got more points won. This was my favorite part of the night, as it included a lot of jumps you just don't expect from huge trucks. Every time a truck flew into the air I was just as amazed as I was with the previous truck. There were crazy jumps, trucks crushing a car, monster truck wheelies and even a monster truck on two wheels! A few of the trucks did not make it out alive, which is pretty much what every one wanted to see.

While there were damaged trucks and couple cars being crushed, I was expecting more destruction judging by all the trailers online, but I can appreciated for the full monster truck experience you have to visit America. They had done an amazing job putting on such an event at a make shift dirt stadium. The night was loud, full of monster trucks jumping and racing, and over all an unforgettable experience. I am definitely looking forward to them coming back.

Now this was my first proper introduction to Monster Trucks beyond how they are portrayed in American television shows, so I was expecting more of a demolition derby, but Monster Jam provides a much cleaner show that focuses on "racing" and solo freestyling.

Starting off with the 10 Monster trucks all coming out at once surrounded by fireworks, circling the stadium, I immediately thought that this was going to be incredibly difficult to watch. The size of the vehicles limited the amount of space that they had to manoeuvre. But it quickly changed format to having a maximum of two trucks on the field at once, in head-to-head speed battles. While rather repetitive, the speed battle led to an elimination battles, where the top 8 trucks fought (metaphorically) to become the outright winner, and that is where the fun comes in. You can see how close these machines are, and it's not just a nicely choreographed spectacle. Each truck wants to win, and that competitive edge keeps interest flowing.

Between rounds there were several side acts, such as USA vs NZ quad races, and Moto X Jumps, to keep the crowd entertained while the arena was fixed up and remodelled.

After the best racer of the night was crowned, a stunt event began, with each truck taking turns to jump, do donuts, and wheelies, and try to outscore each other. Several trucks going above and beyond the capabilities of the engines and having to be towed offstage. But that's the fun. It's just like ordinary racing; the crowd loves the crashes more than the racing.

All-in-all, I saw 4 cars get squashed, and I was kind of hoping for more carnage. The racing was very stop-and-start, which made it difficult to keep my interest constant. If there was a way to keep the action going for longer, with less stops in between, I would be up and cheering. But the sporadic action meant I was far more reserved.

But for the small price? Well worth it. Seeing Monster Trucks with horns, and spikes, and flamethrowers attached...I want to be a Monster Truck driver now.

I have never been to anything like the Monster Jam nor have I ever really been interested but when I was offered two tickets to the Saturday night show I figured it was something I should go to at lest once, especially since it was free and when we were given a third ticket we thought it would make a perfect parents/child date.

Parking was good, plenty of free parking (it wasn't anywhere near as busy as I expected it to be) and just a short walk to the stadium, we found our seats and settled down for what we hoped would be a fun night, it takes a little time to get used to the noise though and the seats were hell on my back, but back to the show! We started off meeting all the ten monster cars, they were huge (the tires would be as tall as I am, if not slightly taller) and my son is now telling everyone "the wheels are as big as dad!" I wasn't really feeling the excitement of the crowd and found the first races with the trucks to be rather dull but my son was loving the flames. There was also some quad bike races, which, again, I didn't enjoy a lot but they got the crowd going with one knocking the other off his bike.

The second half I enjoyed a lot more. We had motorbikes doing a few runs and a few jumps, I enjoy watching the tricks they perform whilst in midair and I could have done with another good 10-20 minutes of it, my favorite part by far but also felt like the shortest part. Last but not least was the trucks getting to go freestyle, getting scored buy their moves etc. and I really enjoyed this as it wasn't a set route, they were going around the outside, driving over a couple of junk cars, going up both the small and big hills, so some great jumps, especially when they didn't nail a perfect landing and bounced about.

My seven year old didn't really show outwardly what he thought, but assured me that he was enjoying it. The flames shooting out from the front of a truck really caught his eyes, as did the flames on the underside of the trucks and enjoyed being able to watch on the big screen what we couldn't see (due to the hills). His first vocal enjoyment of the show came in the freestyle when Madusa did a huge jump and it was a very loud "wow!" and then the exclamations didn't stop and he really really got into it. His favorite car was Max-D, he loved the spikes on it.

This was a fun night out, I didn't really enjoy it until the last half but my son enjoyed the entire night. Going to the evening show was great, especially as it made the flames and fireworks have much more effect than they would have during the day. I have to say, that at the end of the day I wouldn't pay to go to this, I just didn't enjoy it enough, but if I won tickets... then it would be a fun night out.