This week marks the triumphant return of one of the great horror icons of our time: Frederick Krueger. While we are all abuzz over the release of the Platinum Dunes remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street, even we horror maniacs are cognizant of the fact that Freddy’s career has suffered some major shortcomings. Throughout its surfeit of sequels, the franchise has had more inept entries than respectable ones, and there are some moments in the disappointing sequels that scar its reputation more than the burn marks on Freddy’s face. Rather than repress these less-than-remarkable dream sequences, I decided to shine an irreverent spotlight on those moments where even the master of nightmares jumped the shark…or would it be sheep?
FreddyVision — A Nightmare on Elm Street 3
In a concerted effort to promote reading and your local library, Freddy dispatches a troubled teen with the proverbial boob tube. What makes this particular dream sequence so lame is its blandness. Though dressed up with a few lackluster special effects, this is essentially a Jason-esque kill of smashing a head into a television set. Not to mention the terrible accompanying one-liner: “Welcome to prime time, bitch!”
The Freddy Worm — A Nightmare on Elm Street 3
A good number of Freddy’s dream sequences involve the special effects guys finding newer and weirder metamorphoses of his physical appearance. In the third installment, an effort was made to interpret Freddy’s identity as a homicidal predator into the literal sense. Either that, or somebody on the effects team happened to really love watching snakes eat. Whatever the case, this dopey Freddy transfiguration comes off far more silly than it does scary.
The Ultimate Wet Dream — A Nightmare on Elm Street 4
The fate of Johnny Depp in the original film would suggest a formidable precedent for the series regarding bed kills, right? Wrong! In the fourth installment, or as I refer to it, “the gateway to the suck,” Freddy proves that not all dragged-into-the-bed scenes are created equal. Not only does drowning someone in a waterbed lack the punch of Depp’s demise but the fact that the kid owned a waterbed in the first place is far scarier than the kill itself.
The Roach Motel — A Nightmare on Elm Street 4
If there is one thing people automatically associate with A Nightmare on Elm Street, it’s Franz Kafka. In part 4, Freddy transforms a girl into a cockroach, traps her in a roach motel, and then squashes her. Never mind the fact that it makes no sense and serves only to disgust, the fact is that the makeup effects are fairly unrefined. When the girl’s arms break, for example, it looks less like a compound fracture and more like someone cut open a Stretch Armstrong doll.
Spicy Meatballs — A Nightmare on Elm Street 4
A great many acts perpetrated by Freddy Krueger could put one off their appetite, but none so much as the juvenile and disgusting pizza dream sequence from Nightmare 4. Freddy often demonstrates a propensity for showing off the souls he’s harvested from those he’s killed previously in the film. But his method of display in part 4 is to deliver a pizza to the film’s heroine, replete with sausages bearing the faces of those he’s murdered. It reaches new heights of repulsive and is only scary to those of us who don’t favor pepperoni.
The Freddy Cycle — A Nightmare on Elm Street 5
Teenagers are all about speed, so the inclusion of a motorcycle into Freddy’s murderous dream toolbox makes perfect sense. However the execution of the boyfriend in A Nightmare on Elm Street 5 leaves much to be desired. The boy is systematically fused with the motorcycle like something out of a budget-less Matrix until he ends up looking like a bad rip-off of Ghost Rider. All of this is underscored by a barrage of some of Freddy’s absolute worst one-liners.
Freddy vs. Comic Book Guy — A Nightmare on Elm Street 5
As a comic book nerd myself, you’d think I’d be a fan of this character and his transforming into a superhero to fight Freddy. The problem is that the kid is so whiny and insufferable that the ten-minute dream sequence leading to his death was more than he deserved. I honestly enjoyed the beginning of the sequence because the production designer went to great lengths to make everything except the milquetoast teen look black and white, using paint and makeup. But then Freddy starts skateboarding and the obligatory one-liners start flying, and suddenly the fast-forward button looks very inviting.
Freddy’s Feeding — A Nightmare on Elm Street 5
It’s always sad when we lose a teenager to Freddy; it’s even more sad to lose a 29-year-old woman playing a teenager. The victim is apparently a model whose mother is always on her case about her weight, so Freddy kills her by force-feeding her until she chokes. It’s truly reprehensible and the makeup effects are God-awful. There is, however, an interesting parallel to this sequence, as the girl in the dream is having food forced down her gullet in the exact same fashion that New Line was jamming sequels down the throats of audiences year after year.
Nightmare on Nintendo — Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare
Remember Breckin Meyer from Road Trip and … Garfield? Well even he gets his chance to be murdered by the Butcher of Elm Street in The Final Nightmare. This film happened to be released in 1991, right at the height of the popularity of the Nintendo Entertainment System, and the screenwriter thought it would be fun to instantly date the film by adding a dream sequence in which Freddy traps someone in a game. The problem is that the graphics look more like an episode of The Simpsons than an actual game. Meanwhile, real-world Breckin begins jumping straight up and down and speeding around the room with the supplement of Hanna-Barbera sound effects to rob the moment of any legitimacy. Oh, but don’t forget the power glove!
The Fred-A-Pillar – Freddy vs. Jason
I love Freddy vs. Jason, but even it is subject to terrible dream sequences. The absolute worst has to be when Freddy transforms himself in order to seduce and ultimately slaughter the stoner character. In an obvious — and long-overdue — nod to Lewis Carrol, Freddy turns himself into a giant, CG caterpillar brandishing a bong and smokes out with the K-Mart version of Jason Mewes. The moment stands out as especially goofy, even in a film fraught with goofiness. But it does lend some insight as to the writer’s potential state of mind when creating this scene.
And yes, they made a toy of this crap….
