Chadzilla ROARS!!! (The Official Blog of Chadwick H. Saxelid, Writer)

A Nightmare on Elm Street #8: Double Shift (One Shot)

"Would you think I was crazy if I told you I saw someone murdered in a dream?"

Poor Dean is trapped, working one double shift after another at Springwood's Burger Heaven franchise location.  He has become so fatigued by overwork that he has started nodding off on the job.  While asleep he is plagued by terrible nightmares about working long, brutal shifts at Burger Heaven.  Only in his dreams Dean's manager is some sadistic creep named Mr. Krueger.

And it's over.  Wildstorm's A Nightmare on Elm Street comic book series comes to a close with a weird, wacky and suitably surreal attack from the genre's favorite "Bastard Son of a Hundred Maniacs".

I think just about everyone can relate to Dean's employment plight.  There is not a person with any kind of work history that does not have at least one Job From Hell on his or her resume and, at one point or another, we all suffer a bad dream about some nightmarish day at work.  

Double Shift nicely exploits those easy to relate to experiences and anxieties, which gives some interesting twists to the traditional Freddy Krueger story that is unfolding around Dean.  During his nightmares Dean sees Krueger's victims (all nicely anonymous) being prepared in the Burger Heaven kitchen.  Freddy is clearly enjoying the change of scenery that Dean's dreams allow him.  He also performs his duties as Boss From Hell with great relish.

But as much of a Boss From Hell as he is, Freddy is a far better boss than Dean's waking life one.  At least Freddy remembers Dean's name.  In a really nice touch, Dean's waking boss calls "the boy" in to have a conversation regarding job performance, but the man doesn't even listen to what Dean is actually saying.  That odd and almost surreal conversation only adds to the surreal nature that bleeds into the story and blurs the line between dream and reality until, by the end, it becomes invisible. 

Which brings me to the story's ending.  

Anybody that wants to read an A Nightmare on Elm Street comic book will already know Dean's tragic fate long before he or she has even finished reading the story's first panel.  With a franchise like Elm Street, it really isn't about originality.  It's all about the presentation.  Writer Chuck Dixon (aided nicely by Kevin West and Bob Almond) not only serves up a nice and nasty Bucket of Grue at the story's end, but does so with an interesting flourish.  One that makes for a tasty final meal on Elm Street.

A Nightmare on Elm Street #5 - 7 (The Demon of Sleep)

"He's an urban legend.  We've all heard of him."

Freddy Krueger focuses his murderous attention on Springwood High's "Advanced Learning Group", but these kids refuse to be caught napping.  (Although one is, just to prove a point and to provide a kill.)  One brainiac in particular has a maniacal plan to fight fire with fire, by unleashing an Aztec Dream Demon upon Krueger.

All the group needs is a sacrifice...

Last year, I think, I was listening to Dread Central's Dinner For Fiends podcast as "Uncle Creepy" and the gang ranted at great length about Platinum Dunes (justifiably) maligned remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street.  While I agreed with most of what the group had been whining about, there was one particular comment that had me do a literal double-take at my computer.  That comment was when "Uncle Creepy", and I am paraphrasing just a tad here, said, "If Platinum Dunes could not get a simple enough property like Friday the 13th right, how the hell are they going to manage an intellectual one like A Nightmare on Elm Street?"

While I have been a genre fan since I was a small boy, and there was an extremely brief period of time when I might have even dared to argue that the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise was birthed by a legitimate auteurist vision, I have matured enough to recognize that the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise is pretty much the intellectual equal of the Friday the 13th series.  Neither franchise is smart.  They are just a hell of a lot of fun to watch.  Big difference.

While it is certainly true that Wes Craven's original A Nightmare on Elm Street did get the Freddy Krueger franchise off to a fine and frightening start.  A start that was far more frightening than any Friday the 13th movie could ever hope of being, truth be told.  Yet even Craven's debut film had its laugh-out-loud moments of stupidity, such as having the mysterious and nightmarish figure of Freddy Krueger being kind enough to write his name inside of his hat, so that Nancy can identify her dream stalker in a time and cost saving manner.  If you think I am nitpicking about that bit, it was that very thing that turned the movie into the funniest unintentional comedy of the year for a close friend of mine.

My biggest problem with the Elm Street franchise, though, was how it locked Freddy Krueger into the town of Springwood and refused to make him a threat to the rest of the dreaming world.  While shackling Krueger to a particular character or location made a certain kind of narrative sense in the first and third film.  (As long as one doesn't think too much about it, because all nightmares, cinematic or not, dissolve into irrational nonsense when thought about in any great detail.)  Doing so became a hindrance and completely derailed the fourth film.  Which just so happened to be the entry that not only catapulted Freddy Krueger into the pop culture stratosphere, but that also turned him into a parody of himself.

Writer Chuck Dixon does an admirable job of getting around Krueger's far too constraining environment by having the "Advanced Learning Group" kids summon up an Aztec Dream Demon named Nahuaquez to protect them and to banish Krueger from their corner of the dream world.  It's a great concept, one that is far better (and smarter) than anything dreamed of (pun intended, of course) in the post Dream Warriors movies.  Dixon also manages to throw in some unique twists to the Krueger Formula and, I have to point out, Freddy's sarcastic take on Nahuaquez's name makes for a great joke.

If only the Nightmare on Elm Street movies had been as good as this story arc, I might not be so quick at doing double takes when someone dares to call the series "intellectual".

A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)

The all new A Nightmare on Elm Street isn't all that different from the Nightmares of old, really.  It introduces a group of young and disposable characters for the viewer to watch fall asleep.  Every time one of the group falls asleep, the victim begins to dream and is then promptly cut to ribbons by a scar faced madman with a penchant for snarky one liners named Freddy (Krueger).  The disposable group is whittled down to a Final Girl that, somehow, manages to figure out Freddy's weakness (it differs from film to film) and vanquishes him.  Until the sequel, that is.  Then Freddy returns to, more often than not, vanquish her and an all new group is introduced, only to be whittled down until...

A forty-two year old man finds himself sitting in an almost empty theater, wondering if there could ever be a time when a movie featuring Freddy Krueger could actually be scary again.  Watching this listless and pedestrianly made excuse for a horror movie, I decided that the answer had to be never.  The "new" Nightmare simply recycles the same tired concepts that were introduced in the numerous sequels to the original film (of which this new film is a remake) and dares to pretend that they are somehow fresh and interesting.  They are not.  Neither is the film.  It is just a jumble of noise and ludicrous plot twists that are already fading from my memory, like a bad dream.

Maybe there will come a time that I will manage to forget the film ever existed, not unlike the cast of disposable amnesiacs in the film that somehow managed to forget about their traumatic experiences with the flesh and blood Krueger, back in the day.

Already this new movie is fading into a montage of odd images that don't really fit together and echoes of sudden and loud booming sounds breaking a prolonged moment of quiet.  Then again, it was like that while I watched it.

Two stars out of four.  (For watching Jackie Earle Haley earn his paycheck, at least.)

Freddy vs Jason vs Ash: The Nightmare Warriors #1 - 6 (of 6)

Round two of the battle between the forces of evil (Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees) and the force for good (Ashley Williams) teams the Chosen One (Ash) with the Nightmare Warriors (the numerous survivors from the entirety of the Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street franchises).

The Nightmare Warriors story starts in the depths of Crystal Lake and ends in a blood drenched White House.  Whether or not the first family actually survives the attack from the forces of evil (the Congress is not so lucky) is never revealed, but Freddy Krueger does do a mean imitation (figuratively as well as literally) of former President George W. Bush while sitting in the Oval Office.

As you can tell from the above descriptions the second Freddy vs Jason vs Ash story is truly epic in both scope and cast.  It takes place (literally) all over the map and is cluttered with a survivors cast that, at first, is a tad hard to identify.  (It has been quite awhile since I last watched an entry in any of the trio of series that The Nightmare Warriors draws its inspiration from.)  Some of them didn't even survive their second run in with either Freddy or Jason before I had the chance figure out who was who and before the inevitable gathering where everybody introduces themselves to each other takes place.  The fact that none of them look all that much like the actors that portrayed their characters in the films, a matter of legality, I am sure, certainly does not help.

It is probably needless to say, but The Nightmare Warriors is silly and so over-the-top that it drifts in and out of self-parody on several occasions.  Nonetheless the story also has a meanstreak to it that will remind the reader that, regardless of Ash's snarky comments and the broad camp of Krueger's persona, this is part of a horror series.  One that, despite the "definitive" ending, is more than capable of continuing if the book sales so demand it.  

I am sure that they will.

A Nightmare on Elm Street #4

"I'd dream about her...if I ever slept."

Little Lacey Powell, a third grader at Springwood Elementary, has mastered the dream world and begun tormenting Freddy Krueger.  The bastard son of a thousand maniacs is forced to enlist the aid of one of his potential victims to go out and "get" little Lacey Powell.

This one-shot epilogue to the Freddy's War storyline is...cute...and funny, but in a good kind of way.  There was just a certain kind of something about seeing Freddy driven to so much distraction by little Lacey Powell that he couldn't even find the interest/energy to dispatch of the random victims that have dreamed their way into his boiler room of torture and death.  "I don't have time for this."  Heh.

But when he finally does, little Lacey Powell shows up and gives him a cartoonish what for about it.  The artwork used to illustrate little Lacey Powell's unique weaponry during that battle has a playful childlike quality to it.  It acts as a nice counterbalance to the darker, nastier tone of Krueger and his world.

Once again writer Chuck Dixon has managed to craft a solid, and even happy, ending to his story; albeit one with an open door in it for other creative teams to enter through, should they choose to do so.  I even appreciated the somewhat illogical irony of the last line of dialog.  Then again, us parents have always been a tad clueless when it comes to our kids.

Freddy vs Jason vs Ash #1-6 (of 6)

Five years after the events of Freddy vs. Jason.

Christmastime is here and the town of Crystal Lake is not only preparing for the holiday, but for the ceremony that will officially change the name of their community to Forest Green.  (But haven't they already done that?)  Will and Laurie, survivors of the bloody brawl between Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger, return to the battleground - now dubbed Crystal Cottages at Forest Green - to double-triple-quadruple-check that the two titans of terror are if fact truly dead.

They aren't, but - in true slasher sequel fashion - both Will and Laurie soon are...

It's a good thing that the customer service in the Housewares department at the brand new warehouse sized Super Mega Ultra-S-Mart in Crystal Lake is terrible.  This means that S-Mart's top rated Senior Housewares Domestic Engineer is coming all the way from Detroit to set things right.  His name is Ashley J. Williams and he is the Chosen One...

Ah, the Freddy vs. Jason sequel that never was.  Damn you, Sam Raimi!  (Of course, some of you out there just might be thanking him for pulling the plug on the project...hope y'all enjoy that bad ass Evil Dead 4 he's always talking about but never, ever seems to get around to actually making.)  At least we have this goofy, bloody and oh-so-awesome comic book adapted from that shelved project.  Judging by what I read, I have to risk a guess that Freddy and Jason's round two would have been a bigger, better and, depending on who was behind the camera, bloodier smackdown than their first.

It would also be funnier...because this is a story that knows better than to take itself too seriously, if at all.  Neither Freddy or Jason have been all that frightening for the last 25 or so years (Jesus H. Christ, have they been around for that long?  I am getting old!) and The Evil Dead series (what with its barrage of Three Stooges homages) was never all that frightening to begin with.  But I was having too much fun reading the book to waste time whining about how not serious it was.  We're pretty deep into King Kong Vs Godzilla territory by this time, folks.  As long as you are okay with that kind of thing, then I think that you should be okay with this book.

One thing in particular that I was very okay with was just how deeply rooted the story is in the various mythos of each of the series.  Best of all was the call backs to each of the series films that came before this particular outing.  Remember how the Book of the Dead and various props from the Evil Dead movies were scattered around the old Voorhees place in Jason Goes to Hell?  So did the team of writers for Freddy vs Jason vs Ash and that is the thread they use to weave together the different storylines.  The Necromonicon Ex Mortis is still buried in the basement of the old Voorhees place (The team of artists did some decent research, because when I saw the first drawing of the old Voorhees place, my first thought was, "Hey that's the old Voorhees house from Jason Goes to Hell!") and Freddy wants it so he can harness its power and bust out of his dream world prison and warp reality to suit his insatiably evil desires.  Who better to trick into getting the old tome than Mrs. Voorhees favorite son, Jason?  That is where Ash comes into the battle, for wherever the Necromonicon Ex Mortis is, Ashley J. Williams, Chosen One, is sure to follow.

The addition of the character of Ash is where the most of the humor comes from, because the Chosen One sure does love to shoot off his mouth.  His presence also keeps the story from padding itself with unnecessary running in circles (a narrative trap that Freddy vs. Jason fell into) because it allows for more varied showdown carnage.  Jason fights Ash, then Freddy fights Jason, then Ash fights Freddy, then Jason fights Freddy, and then Ash fights Freddy and Jason, then Freddy and Jason go at it again, then Ash joins to make sure both stay down for the count...until the number of tickets sold (or books, in this particular instance) create a demand for yet another rematch.

But there were one or two things I was not okay with.  First was a glaring continuity error in issue four, wherein a Necromonicon possessing Freddy Krueger demands that Ash fetch the Necromonicon for him.  Uh, you already have it, Freddy.  So why are you demanding it?  If anything, Ash should be demanding that you turn it over to him.  Then there was the all new, all powerful Freddy whining on at less two separate occasions about how he would rather be someplace else instead of fighting with Jason and Ash.  If he can now move freely from dimension to dimension, why bother hanging around?  Just leave and return at a later date to dispatch with whoever has managed to survive the battle.

But these kinds of entertainments were never known for their strict adherence to the rules of logic.  In fact, my definition of horror has been boiled down to a very simple and to the point description:  The intrusion of the irrational into the rational.  The nature of the irrational, be it rooted in the supernatural or the simply natural, is irrelevant.  All that matters is how the characters in the story react and interact with the intrusion, that is where the drama, or some plain old fashioned fun, is found.  While there is certainly a lot of fun to be found in Ash's reaction to and interaction with Jason and Freddy, the cast of supporting characters that Ash interacts in between those, uh, interactions are a rather bland and one dimensional lot.  With the exception of a clipboard wielding S-Mart Night Manager that takes his job way too seriously and the requisite love interest for Ash, it was impossible for me to figure out who was who.  Their sole reason for existing seemed to be as grist for the slasher mill.  Then again, that same criticism could be leveled at just about any film in the Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, or Evil Dead series.  So one could very well ask what the hell was I expecting when I cracked this book open?  Something akin to Shakespeare?  Mamet?  Albee?

No, all I was expecting (and hoping for) was a "fun read" and that is exactly what I got.  I had so much fun reading it that my inner child almost threw a temper tantrum over the fact that would never, ever be a Freddy Vs. Jason Vs. Ash movie to watch on any given evening.

At least there's this book and for that I am truly grateful.

Freddy vs Jason (2003)

"Welcome to my world, bitch!"

The adults of Springfield, Illinois have finally managed to get rid of the nightmare that was Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) by making the children of Springfield forget about him entirely.  (Although the kids having no knowledge of Freddy whatsoever didn't stop him from attacking them in previous movies, but I digress with my needless attention to that foolish thing called "logic.")  Down but by no means out, Freddy hatches a unique attempt at a comeback.  He dispatches Camp Crystal Lake killer Jason Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger) to Elm Street with the hope that a few gruesome kills will stir up some unpleasant memories, and thus give Freddy a portal through which he can return.

Trouble is, once Jason starts, he doesn't stop and Freddy doesn't want some brain dead Momma's Boy hacking through his kills...

"This is a meat and potatoes movie," I told my son last night, while rewatching Freddy vs. Jason for the sake of writing this review.  "There's no veggies in it whatsoever."  That's right, forget all about things like characterization and plot.  This movie is all about watching two of the most popular (if not the most popular) 80s horror icons tear into each other like the vicious dogs that they are.  That Freddy vs. Jason is so unapologetically what it is, and that it does what it does with a tremendous amount of gusto, is probably the nicest thing I can say about the movie.  When it comes to Freddy fighting Jason, the movie delivers the goods and, whenever Freddy or Jason are on screen doing what it is that they do best (which is slaughtering one dimensional stereotypes), the movie holds the forgiving viewer's attention quite well.  But when either of the two characters are not around, oh boy.  Even the most forgiving viewer will be counting the minutes until they do show up to either thin down the cast or smack each other around a bit.  Then again, what other reason would there be for watching a movie called Freddy vs. Jason?

A Nightmare on Elm Street #s 2 & 3: Freddy's War Parts 2 & 3 (of 3)

"I can do this."

Jade, failing at avoiding sleep, tries to find the identity of the little girl that keeps appearing in, then disappearing from, her dreams.  Things don't go all that well...

The middle chapter of Freddy's War is middle of the road stuff, nothing more.  As was the case with every film in the long running series, the nightmare sequences are the issue's high points.  The rest is just a redressing of the routine "hunting for clues and/or weapons to use against Krueger in the next dream" filler that has padded out the middle section of every single A Nightmare on Elm Street movie since the very first one.  Writer Chuck Dixon does manage to twist the formula into taking some interesting paths, but it really isn't enough to elevate the story above the level of average.  That doesn't happen until the third and final chapter.

"I rule the night here, Dad!  I RULE THE NIGHT!"

Jade and her father attempt to battle Freddy in the Dream World...

And what a battle it is!  Freddy's War comes to a satisfying and action packed close with a payoff that was worth every panel of its overly familiar build-up.  Although your results might vary, the story's conclusion caught me off guard.  I didn't see it coming.  Then again, I wasn't looking all that hard for a "shocking twist" to begin with.  I was just enjoying all the carnage as Jade and her dad emptied every weapon they could dream of at Krueger.  That part of the book had me grinning ear to ear.  I was also happy with how well the ending managed to blend the vicious with the gentle.  Another thing that I liked was how the finale page left the door open so that the few surviving characters could return, if needed, to liven up a future story arc.  But whether or not I will even bother to read that next arc is a decision I have yet to make.

A Nightmare on Elm Street #1: Freddy's War Part One

"He kills children - teenagers - to get back at Springwood."

The Arnstrum family has relocated to lovely Springwood.  Jade and her brother Bradley don't even have a chance to finish unpacking before Freddy Krueger shows up to carve himself some fresh meat.

Wildstorm's first issue of its A Nightmare on Elm Street series certainly doesn't waste any time getting to the wet stuff, Freddy offs yet another Springwood teen on its very first page.  Writer Chuck Dixon doesn't bother to slow the breathless pace of his script down one bit after that, shoving his characters into the dream world and killing them off before the reader even gets a chance to know who they are, or how they relate to each other.

The book does do an excellent job of capturing the surreal feel of Wes Craven's original film and its numerous sequels, moving in and out of reality with the same almost seamless fluidity.  But, with a fuzzily sketched out heroine as it focus, the book becomes nothing more than a senseless jumble of over-the-top nightmare sequences with no thread to hold it all together.  I can't help but find it more than a bit ironic that the book based on the most simplistic and repetitive of splatter series, Friday the 13th, is the one that is weaving together an atmospheric and character driven story, while A Nightmare on Elm Street is doing the exact opposite.  Hopefully issue two will resolve that storytelling flaw.

A Nightmare on Elm Street: Fearbook

"How can I unwind if they have all the kiddie's doped up?!"

Things are quiet in Springwood once again.  All the kids are sleeping peacefully, thanks to a steady supply of Hypnocil.  Springwood Slasher turned Dream Demon Freddy Krueger is far from happy with the situation, of course.  Good thing a car load of violent criminals shows up at the local pharmacy to get some cash and raise some hell.  The robbery goes wrong and becomes a hostage situation.  Bad news for Springwood's finest, but a blessing for the bastard son of a hundred maniacs.

The visiting creeps will have to go to sleep sometime...

With its third story, Avatar's A Nightmare on Elm Street series finally shows some signs of life.  While Freddy's shtick isn't anything new (one dream is even a retread of one from the Paranoid story arc, to which Fearbook serves as a sequel) and the characterization doesn't rise above the level of stereotype, it is the story's ending that seems to open the door to a promising new direction.  I won't spoil the ending here, but I will say that it shows how Freddy can be made to serve a rather unique purpose for Springwood.  Under the right circumstances, that is.  I can only hope that future stories will explore the concept a bit more than this one shoot did.

I also think that the series would be greatly improved by giving Freddy a plucky Dream Warrior adversary to play off of.  One similar to the first film's Nancy, or the later film's Dream Master character, Alice.  Just an idea that came to mind while I read Fearbook.

Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994)

"Someone's coming."

Although it has been ten years, actress Heather Langenkamp (portrayed by Heather Langenkamp herself) cannot put her most famous starring role, playing Nancy Thompson in the hit thriller A Nightmare on Elm Street, behind her.  One unbalanced fan has taken to calling and teasing her with the famous Elm Street Rhyme, while speaking in Freddy Krueger's voice.  If that weren't enough, a series of strong earthquakes has started rattling the greater Los Angeles area.

After making a talk show appearance, Langenkamp gets a call from New Line Cinema.  It seems that Wes Craven (playing himself) has had a rather unique idea for another Nightmare sequel and he and Robert Shaye (New Line Cinema chieftain Robert Shaye) wants Langenkamp to take the lead role...

The Nightmare on Elm Street series not only broke new narrative ground with its final entry, Wes Craven's New Nightmare, it broke through the fourth wall entirely.  Not only does the audience watching the movie get to experience the nightmares, but the cast and crew of the movie itself experience them as well.  The whole movie is about the making of the movie you are watching.  For better or for worse, and I hold the latter opinion, I think that Wes Craven's New Nightmare is pretty much responsible for starting the whole post-modern/self-aware approach to horror movies that saturated the genre in the 1990s.

In my review of the first A Nightmare on Elm Street movie I touched upon one of Wes Craven's narrative trademarks, the effect of a threat - be it natural or supernatural - upon a family unit.  Wes Craven's New Nightmare is no different.  On the literal level, Heather Langenkamp, her husband, and her child all come under attack by an ancient evil that wears Freddy Krueger's face.  On a more metaphoric level, Langenkamp has a work family as well...the cast and crew of both the original film and the one yet to be made.  Robert Englund, Wes Craven, Robert Shaye, and John Saxon (to name just a few) all play themselves in the film.  The literal and metaphoric meet, meld, and become one in the character of John Saxon...who, when playing himself, is presented as a father figure to Langenkamp, but also has moments where he is in character as Nancy's father.

While Craven's core concept is definitely a smart one, the method in which he handles it succeeds as often as it fails.  The film alternates between moments of subtle dread, where it is most effective, and over the top silliness, where it is not.  It also goes overboard in the aggrandizing of screenwriter Wes Craven's creative process, hinting not too subtly that making this new movie is necessary in order to save the world from Ultimate Evil.  It's a bit much for a simple little thriller to ask its audience to swallow.  Despite its weaknesses, the final gasp of the Nightmare on Elm Street series turns out to be a fitting conclusion to one of the more original horror film series of the 1980s.

Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991)

"It might be your dream, but it's my rules."

Ten years have passed since Freddy Krueger began killing the children of Springwood, Ohio in their dreams.  Now Springwood has no children, save for one.  Krueger has spared this teenager's life so that he can venture outside of Springwood and bring back the one person capable of unleashing Krueger upon the rest of the world.

Freddy Krueger's daughter...

It has been fifteen years since I last subjected myself to Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare and upon revisiting it, several thoughts came to mind.  1) It isn't nearly as bad as I remembered it to be.  (A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child was much worse.)  2) Several plot elements were clearly recycled and expanded upon by screenwriter Michael De Luca in his next script, for the far, far superior In the Mouth of Madness, directed by John Carpenter.  3) The character played by Yaphet Kotto would have added more to the film if he had been played by Craig Wasson, who then would be reprising his role from A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors. 4)  Allowing flash in the pan celebrities like Tom Arnold and Roseanne Barr to make comic cameos is distracting and annoying.  5)  The only really effective nightmare sequence involved Tracy's (Lezlie Deane) being forced to once again suffer the sexual advances of her own father (Peter Spellos).  All the others were cartoonish comedy routines, lacking suspense, surprise, or shock.  6) The 3-D finale added nothing to the movie and was clearly a desperate attempt to sell more tickets.  It worked, Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare had the largest opening weekend of the series, until Freddy vs. Jason came along, that is.  7)  Film studio's need to stop putting the word Final in their franchise titles.  It's false advertising.

A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Child (1989)

"It's a boy!"

Dream Master Alice (Lisa Wilcox) and her boyfriend Dan's (Danny Hassel) planned romantic trip to Paris is ruined when Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) begins pulling Alice into the nightmare realm once again.  This time it's different, because the dreams aren't Alice's.

They're the dreams of Alice and Dan's unborn child...

What a difference a year makes.  In 1988 Freddy Krueger and the Nightmare on Elm Street series were on top of the world, looking down on creation, when A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master became the series largest money maker yet.  But 1989 saw the pop culture phenomenon come to an abrupt end when A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child became the lowest grossing film in the series, until Wes Craven's New Nightmare came along in 1994, that is.  The fan's showed up on opening weekend, they just didn't come back the following one, with friends in tow, for a second, or third, viewing.  Considering what New Line Cinema was offering to them, who could blame them for staying away.

The Dream Child's central concept, drafted by the 80s splatterpunk writing team of John Skipp and Craig Spectre, is an intriguing one.  If the movie had paid any attention whatsoever to it, then The Dream Child could have joined Larry Cohen's mutant killer baby epic It's Alive and Roman Polanski's classic thriller Rosemary's Baby as one of the few genre films to explore (or simply exploit) the universal fears that stem from pregnancy (planned or not), the birthing process, and becoming a parent.  Leslie Bohem's (Dante's Peak) script ignores that unique opportunity, barely touching upon even the most obvious of its thematic elements.  Stuck with a script with no emotional heart to give his movie life, the only option for director Stephen Hopkins (Predator 2) is to amp up the nightmare sequences to a whole new level.  They're bigger, flashier, and louder than ever.  Yet the gruesome cacophony feels hollow and cannot keep The Dream Child from looking like the slapped together rush job that it is.

This child is stillborn.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master (1988)

"FREDDY'S BACK!"

The surviving Dream Warriors, Kincaid (Ken Sagoes), Joey (Rodney Eastman), and Kristen (Tuesday Knight, in the role filled by Patricia Arquette in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors), have been released from the mental hospital and are, once again, attending Springwood High School.  Although Kristen tries to keep Freddy in the past, where he belongs, she keeps having nightmares, and pulling Kincaid and Joey into them.  Something the boys do not appreciate.

Then Kincaid has a nightmare of his own.  One with Freddy in it...

After starring in three hit movies in almost as many years, Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) had gone from being a frightening horror movie monster to a pop culture phenomenon.  The release of A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master found the "bastard son of a hundred maniacs" at the very apex of his popularity.  It should come as no surprise that The Dream Master went on to be the highest grossing film in the series, until Freddy vs. Jason came along some fifteen years later.

Having struck box office gold with A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, New Line Cinema wasn't the least bit interested in rocking the creative boat too much.  Why run the risk of drowning the Golden Goose?  Thus Nightmare 4 gives viewers more of what they got in Dream Warriors, only bigger, louder, and flashier.  Director Renny Harlin, having gotten the job due to his modest success in directing the horror movie Prison for the financially collapsing Empire Pictures, doesn't take any chances with the Nightmare formula.  He bedazzles the viewer with glossy dream sequences and music video set pieces, all delivered at a slick pace that favors fun over fear.

While A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master is fun, a lot of fun, in fact, it isn't the least bit scary.  The frightening bogeyman that stalked Nancy Thompson in the first A Nightmare on Elm Street had now become a thing of memory.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987)

"YOU."

It has been six years since Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp) did battle with the dream stalking Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund).  Now a grad student specializing in the study of night terrors and related sleep disorders, Nancy has been called in to assist Dr. Neil Gordon (Craig Wasson, Body Double) to try and halt a rash of nightmare induced suicides in the town of Springwood.  It seems that, in her absence, the "bastard son of a hundred maniacs" has been busy killing off the remaining Elm Street kids.

Only a handful have managed to stay alive.  Then Nancy learns that one survivor (Patricia Arquette, True Romance) has the unique ability to pull people into her dreams...

The Nightmare on Elm Street franchise rebounded nicely with A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, a direct sequel to the original film that pretty much ignores the first sequel.  (I don't think any film in the series ever makes reference to the events in Freddy's Revenge.)

Ostensibly continuing Nancy's story, Dream Warriors also provides some memorable background detail about Freddy.  With this film Krueger became the "bastard son of a hundred maniacs," as well as the vicious murderer of twenty Springwood children.  (That was twenty when he was alive, now that he's dead it's a whole new ball game.)  Dream Warriors, like many a third film in a burgeoning franchise, cements the visual style and plot structure of the series and becomes the template for the films that will follow.  Warriors introduced bigger, more visually impressive dream sequences, it had Freddy Krueger step out of the shadows and becomes more of a jester showman than frightening bogeyman, and it expanded upon the concept of "Dream Skills," introduced to Nancy by her boyfriend Glen in the first Nightmare on Elm Street.  Each of the surviving Elm Street kids has a unique ability (or persona) that could prove useful in doing battle with Krueger, if they join forces, that is.

Wes Craven's involvement in crafting the story is clear to see.  The returning characters have grown older and wiser.  Nancy is now an adult, albeit a professionally inexperienced one.  The other adult characters act like real people, with real lives and personalities, and not as the comical oafs that are typically seen in the youth oriented genre.  The relationship Nancy and Neil share is a particularly nice touch.  While it never crosses the line into an actual romantic sub-plot, there is an obviously strong emotional connection between the two.  Unfortunately, Wes Craven walked away from the series after this entry and, while the sequels that followed kept director Chuck Russell's visual contributions, they were quick to sink into self-parody.  In the next three films, Freddy Krueger wouldn't be the least bit frightening, or intimidating.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors is a smart, funny, and scary thrill ride of a movie, and is my pick for the best of the Nightmare on Elm Street sequels.

A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985)

"Kill for me."

It's five years later and the Walsh family has moved into the old Thompson house on Elm Street.  Their son Jesse (Mark Patton) is having horrible nightmares about a burned man wearing a red and green sweater, and who has knives for fingers.  This man wants something from Jesse.

His body...

The theory of diminishing returns is proved true with this quickie sequel, as everything that made the first A Nightmare on Elm Street so effective is completely absent from A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge.  None of the nightmare sequences, or subsequent attacks by Krueger, generate any fear close to what was in the first film.  Freddy Krueger's purpose is reinvented into something that is the complete opposite of what came before, the homosexual subtext is so blatant as to be laughable, and, unlike the first film, Jesse's parents are nothing more than ineffectual oafs for the largely teen audience to laugh at.

Director Jack Sholder (Alone in the Dark, The Hidden) tries to wring a modicum of suspense from the meandering script by David Chaskin (I, Madman) but he succeeds in generating tension only in a handful of dream sequences.  I did like the one where Jesse opens his younger sister's bedroom door and watches her skip rope and chant that famous Freddy rhyme..."One, two Freddy's coming for you.  Three, four better lock your door..."  That was the only moment in the film that actually felt like it belonged in a Nightmare on Elm Street movie.  Less effective, however, is the scene where one victim is tormented by having various balls thrown at him, then dragged into a shower and swatted on the fanny by a towel.  The actor's embarrassment with the proceedings can be clearly seen on his face and it ruins whatever spell Sholder and Chaskin had hoped to create.  Besides, after all the gruesome punishment that Krueger dealt out in the first film, seeing some poor schmuck pelted with basket balls, footballs, and tennis balls seemed kind of lame.

While A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge did well at the box office, it was so poorly received by Freddy fans that it was ignored by the sequels that followed, making it the only film in the series to take place outside of its soon to be established continuity. 

A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

"Whatever you do, don't fall asleep."

Nancy (Heather Langenkamp) and her boyfriend, Glen (Johnny Depp, in his first film role), agree to spend the night with Tina (Amanda Wyss), a female friend that has been troubled with extremely vivid nightmares.  Nancy is more than a bit surprised to learn that the same spectral figure, a man in a red and green sweater, and who has knives for fingers, that had appeared in a nightmare of her own, is the very same one that had been in Tina's.

Later that night, Tina dies a gruesome death while in the grip of yet another nightmare...

Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street is, arguably, one of the most frightening, if not one of the more influential, horror films made in the 1980s.  It was also the last horror movie to really terrify me, its skin crawling effect has yet to even be equaled by any horror movie made in its aftermath.  Not that it will have the same effect on someone viewing it for the first time today.  Freddy Krueger has now been absorbed into the popular culture and, as a result, has become an entertaining plaything for the masses.  The Ultimate Bogeyman is now nothing more than a wise-cracking Halloween decoration.

That was not the case back in 1984.  A Nightmare on Elm Street, unlike its numerous sequels and imitators, goes for the viewer's throat with no mercy.  It wants to terrify more than entertain.

Writer/director Wes Craven wisely focused on the same universal thematic elements that made John Carpenter's Halloween so potent.  (At least back when it first came out, before its numerous sequels and imitators drained away that film's power to terrify in much the same way as A Nightmare on Elm Street.)  Like Haddonfield, the anonymous small town in Nightmare (I didn't notice anybody saying Springwood during the film's running time) is haunted by a gruesome tragedy in its past.  Like Myers, Freddy Krueger has returned to the scene of his crime to claim the town's next generation of children.  (Inexplicably targeting teens instead of the children he preferred during his original killing spree.)  Unlike Carpenter's simplistic thriller, Craven's digs a bit deeper.

Wes Craven's approach has always been to examine the impact of horror, be it natural or supernatural, upon a family unit.  Because of this, the parents of Nancy, the primary character, played by Ronee Blakley and John Saxon (who received top billing) aren't treated as ineffectual oafs in the story.  (Something I appreciate more today, as a parent, than I did as a teen back in 1984.)  In fact, Marge Thompson, Nancy's mother, has a closer link to the story's events than Nancy, and the viewer, think.  Better minds than mine can discuss the thematic richness of Marge's alcoholism, her denial of what is happening right in front of her, and her fierce need to protect her young from both her secret and what she believes to be her child's runaway imagination.  (That she at least seems to understand enough to suspect that her repressed guilt over her past actions might, in large part, be responsible for Nancy's plight is just one example of how smart Nightmare is at its very core.)  Even the parents of the supporting characters come across as more realistic than in your average slasher film, where they're usually entirely absent, or nothing more than passing cameos.  The post nightmare talk that Tina has with her mother rings true, as does the conversation Glen's parents have about Nancy on the porch.  How they handle Nancy's late night phone call to Glen is another of Craven's brilliant touches of naturalism within the film.

Not that the movie is without its weak and wonky moments.  The biggest being when Nancy's booby trap setting, something that looks like it should have taken hours to do, is completed in a mere ten minutes.  But those moments are sparse and easy to overlook when placed next to the film's powerful subtext and frightening set pieces.  Even though time and over exposure have dulled Freddy's finger blades more than a little bit, Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street remains a potent horror film deserving of its accolades and the moniker of Classic.

A Nightmare on Elm Street: Paranoid #3

"I sentence you to eternal torment, after I murder you mercilessly, of course."

While Freddy claims another victim, Claire and Karl sift through the Springwood Police Department's files for any information about the Bastard Son of a Thousand Maniacs that could be used as a weapon against the dream stalking serial killer.

While A Nightmare on Elm Street: Paranoid limped its way to an over-the-top conclusion set at a Springwood High School Pep Rally, I could not stop from wondering what went wrong, not just with this particular book, but with the film series itself.  It just doesn't make sense.  The rules concerning Freddy are fuzzy, at best.  If knowledge of Freddy Krueger is required for him to gain access to dreams, then how the hell was he able to appear to those with no knowledge of him?  If he is limited only to Springwood, why not move out of his sphere of influence?  If not being afraid of him robs him of power, then how can he still torment and kill those unafraid of him?  I think all these "rules" were just a bunch of contrivances concocted from sequel to sequel to make an unstoppable supernatural killer appear to be stoppable, somehow.  With each new movie came a new rule until this confusing mess of a mythos was formed.

Then there were the questions this particular story raised.  What exactly was it that Krueger wanted with Claire?  Was his tormenting her just a way to torture her Dad, one of the cabal of parents that murdered him?   Why, if she knew he was monster, was Claire so willing to believe what Krueger revealed to her about her mother's accidental death?  Why did writer Brian Pulido have to carbon copy the ending of the first Nightmare on Elm Street movie?

Too many questions, not enough answers.  Zero satisfaction.

A Nightmare on Elm Street: Paranoid #2

"What if all this is just a nightmare?"

The Hypnocil shipment has been destroyed, so all the children of Springwood begin to dream.  Claire, being the good little memory virus that she is, infects person after person with the knowledge of Freddy.  After all, knowledge is power...

Sometimes too much logic can be a bad thing, especially for a story concept so thoroughly rooted in the surreal landscape of dreams.  If you have to know about Freddy to dream about him, then how can he appear to people that have no prior knowledge of him?  I mean, if he can do that, then why the ruse with Claire?  It's utterly pointless.  Also, if Freddy's sphere of influence is limited to just Springwood's children, why doesn't everybody with kids just move out of town?  Just turn the damn place into one of those "no kids" communities and be done with it.  I'm sure that would save more than a few lives.  This issue also irked me because the over the top prankster of the later Nightmare on Elm Street movies made an unwelcome return.  Goofy costumes and bad puns are spread across page after blood soaked page.  That's one part of the Freddy franchise I had wished would not make a return visit.

A Nightmare on Elm Street: Paranoid #1

"Bastard son of a thousand maniacs, the Springwood Slasher, they call me.  You gotta love my publicist."

Claire has one doozy of a nightmare.  One in which a fearsome specter calling himself Uncle Freddy reveals that he was the cause of several of her friends deaths, not the auto accident she had been led to believe.  It seems that the town of Springwood has run low on Hypnocil and Freddy is jumping at the opportunity to start another party...

Of the three franchise properties that debuted under Avatar Comics' New Line Cinema's House of Horror series line, the A Nightmare on Elm Street issue seemed to be the one with the most potential.  With a concept rooted in the boundless realms of the human imagination, and with each of Freddy's victims meeting a spectacular demise in a colorfully surreal set piece, I thought that the Nightmare story would have read better as a multi-issue arc.  The one shot special just felt crowded and rushed.  The same could not be said of the Friday the 13th and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre one shots.  Both of those managed to fit a complete story into a single issue with no problem.  Then again, neither of those series have the thematic richness and character depth that the Nightmare series requires.

Writer Brian Pulido surprised me with a fun three part Friday the 13th story, Bloodbath, but I have yet to finish The Texas Chainsaw Massacre's The Grind, so I haven't formed a final opinion about it yet.

Paranoid, like Pulido's other New Line Cinema's House of Horror work, perfectly captures the narrative feel of the franchise it is spinning off of.  The nightmarish murders that Freddy commits are gruesomely inventive, inspired by the dark secrets of his victim's own psyche.  The tension between Claire, the confused, frightened, and out of control teen that is the story's main character, and her father gives the tale a subtext that readers both young and old can relate to.  Sad to say, but Claire's father's attempts to help via dominance and deceit, a common mistake of well meaning parents everywhere, only push Claire farther away and closer to Freddy.

Speaking of Freddy, when reading his dialog, it is easy to hear Robert Englund's voice speaking the lines.  While Krueger does crack wise more than a few times, the story makes it clear that his jokes come from his sadistic glee at the suffering of his victims and not from an interest in making him a cultural anti-hero for the reader to cheer.  It's nice to have the monster of the first few  A Nightmare on Elm Street movies back in action, instead of the punning prankster of the later comedy laden films that killed off the once popular franchise.