Billy Bob's Wonderland

Current logo featuring Billy Bob Brockali.

Billy Bob's Wonderland is a Fun City Arcade restaurant and arcade operating in Barboursville, West Virginia. It is one of 3 remaining public exhibitions of The Rock-afire Explosion. The others being at The DreamFactory, and Gulliver’s World. There are also shows at Gulliver's Kingdom and the Volo Auto Museum, however, they are both unavailable to the public through the winter months.

As of October 2024, Billy Bob's Wonderland is under the control of Fun City Arcade owner Mark Hoffman.

History[]

Billy Bob's Wonderland dates back to 1989, with its first location being in East Barboursville. A former Showbiz Pizza Place location, BBWL was rebranded and redecorated to avoid any corporate interference from Showbiz Pizza Time Inc. The rebranding allowed BBWL to avoid the Concept Unification conversion.

BBWL also maintained a location in Ashland, KY which would open in 1997. Ashland's BBWL would be almost the same as East Barboursville’s BBWL except their show was missing Antioch and would be on a single large stage instead of a normal 3-Stage. The location is still abandoned as of November 2024.^[1]

The current location, where Ashland and East Barboursville relocated, opened in 2003 and is much larger in size than the previous locations. Both shows from the old locations were brought to the current location, but only the Ashland, KY show was used on stage. The stage was similar to Ashland’s stage. The stage was on one big stage and was missing Antioch, Sun, and Moon.

Restoration Attempts[]

359672805 1326100258311143 4391702457798243953 n — Current BBWL front.

At some point around 2004 through 2008, Looney Bird’s mask was swapped out for the mask from the East Barboursville Location. In 2008, Billy Bob and Mitzi would get their masks swapped out for the masks from East Barboursville. Eventually, Aaron Fechter attempted to restore the show, but he only gave Rolfe, Mitzi and Billy Bob new masks and cleaned Mitzi’s MAC valves because they had water on them from air compressor sweat. Aaron was involved in a dispute with the owner and he didn’t get to fully restore the show.

Around 2010-2011, Rolfe got a David Furguson mask. In 2012, Beach Bear, Mitzi, and Billy Bob would get their masks swapped out for the East Barboursville masks. They would also add Sun and Moon because they weren’t already installed. The Sun and Moon mechs would be the ones from Ashland, KY. In 2014-2015, the show was (somewhat) restored by David Ferguson of DSF Robots company and Goofy Gas Fillin' Station private collection. Most of the broken movements were repaired, the TiVo show controller was replaced with David's signature BlueBox, and the cosmetics were also replaced except for Rolfe, Choo Choo and Earl. Though the show did get fixed, most of the parts and cosmetics were bootlegs and did not last very long (this was mainly caused by air pressure being too high, which caused the animatronics' masks to rip/melt and some movements to break).

In 2017, a lady purchased Beach Bear's cosmetics so from 2017-2018, beach Bear had a garbage bag put over his mechanics and he would not move at all. In January 2019, the show was in very poor condition. The characters’ masks were melting, Mitzi Mozzarella had a broken arm, Beach Bear wore a walkaround head and didn’t move at all, and Looney Bird didn’t function at all. The show underwent a mechanical and cosmetic restoration by Braylon Giles and Anthony Ybarra until they were fired in late 2019. Since their firing, the condition/quality of the RAE in the location began going downhill. In November 2019, Mitzi’s head mech would get replaced with the East Barboursville mech head, and Billy Bob would get new cosmetics.

In Early 2021, the center stage was completely shut down to give Rolfe DeWolfe, Billy Bob, and Looney Bird a larger amount of air pressure.

In late 2021, Braylon Giles came back to Billy Bob's to finish restoring the show. In November, Dook would be replaced with the East Barboursville mech and would get new cosmetics. Billy Bob and Looney Bird were reverted to the normal positions on stage, and Center Stage and Stage Left finally got grass added. Beach Bear was replaced with the East Barboursville mech. The Mech that was replaced was put in the front of the building (where Zoltar is now) alongside the East Barboursville Sun.

In late January 2022 restoration would be complete. The mask’s were again however unofficial though. The same month, the first Billy Con would happen.

In April, 2022 Billy Bob’s head frame mallowed out and the entire mech was replaced with the East Barboursville mech and got new cosmetics.

In July, 2022 the second Billy Con happened.

In October 2022, Mitzi would get a new mask and Halloween Costumes put on The animatronics.

In November 2022, the costumes would be taken off the bots and Mitzi would get a custom made West Virginia dress.

In December 2022, the bots would get Christmas outfits. Braylon Giles quit to go to college, causing the show to go downhill again.

In January 2023, Braylon Giles returned and attempted to fix/clean Fatz's organ and give Dook a new mask. He then started to replace Mitzi's wig and eventually succeeded later on.

In July 2023, Rex passed away, so the restaurant went under the control of Fun City Arcade and its owner, Mark Hoffman. Improvements were promised, the prize wall filled, and construction started on the interior for new party rooms. The band remained in excellent condition with maintenance performed regularly.

Around that time, Braylon would be accused of stealing Plaster molds, but it was later proven that Mark gave him those molds.

In early 2024, Braylon threatened Mark, which resulted in Braylon getting fired and prohibited from being within 20 ft. of BBWL. Zoey and Steve would also become techs after the incident. January 2024, Aaron Fechter claimed that he would partner up with Mark and completely restore the show, eventually promising that it would be done by Billy Con of 2025.

As of March 2025, the show remains operational, but not in the best condition. At the moment, almost all of the characters have rips or tears in their masks with Dook being the worst out of the whole band. Movement wise, Beach Bear’s leg is detached from his body and one of Mitzi’s eyes is broken. Two official masks have been ordered (most likely Billy Bob and Dook) according to Zoey, the technician at BBWL.

Additional Information[]

Billy Bob’s Wonderland also has spare Rock-afire Characters in three trailers behind the restaurant, with those animatronics being used for spare parts. These include the East Barboursville West Virginia Rolfe and Earl, Sun, Fatz, Choo Choo, Moon, and Looney Bird. They also have the Ashland, Kentucky Dook (which used to be on stage at the current location). And they have a whole MMBB from Parkersburg, West Virginia location which was a former CEC 3 Stage location that closed in 1998. The Ashland Mitzi (that was on stage 2003-2019 then was replaced) was stolen from out of the trailers and the Ashland Beach Bear (that was on stage 2003-2022 then was replaced) was sold. Currently, the open Barboursville's show uses Ashland Rolfe and Earl, Ashland Sun, East Barboursville Dook, Ashland Fatz, East Barboursville Beach Bear, East Barboursville Mitzi, Ashland Moon, East Barboursville Billy Bob, and Ashland Looney Bird. They used to have the Beach Bear that was replaced in front of the front of the building along with East Barboursville Sun, but Beach Bear was sold, and the Sun was put back into one of the Trailers They also have a storage room with decor and stuff that they aren’t using at the moment, and they have a Billy Bob (that was in stage 2003-2022 that was replaced) in there because it was water-logged.

The restaurant also has an outdoor amusement area with mini-golf and go-karts.

Fully restored stage 2022

Some merchandise sold by BBWL refers to the business as “Billy Bob’s Pizza Wonderland", an earlier name for the Barboursville location.

BBWL has hosted four “Billy Cons.” A fifth is planned for July 11-13, 2025.

Plans were announced to replace the laser tag arena in BBWL with an indoor bounce park. As of February 2025, the laser tag arena has been completely removed.^[2]