028: The Dream Trilogy, or SoraRabbit Geeks Out Over Freddy

Ever since I was a young bunny, I have been a fan of horror movies. One of my earliest memories is seeing a commercial for the movie It’s Alive… and that commercial terrified me when I was four or five. I got the nerve to watch it when I was an adult and found the movie laughable. Enjoyable, but laughable. I can remember sneaking peeks at Creepshow when I was five. At six I watched Creepshow and An American Werewolf in London. When I was nine, I saw Nightmare on Elm Street 2, and I was fully hooked. I started watching every horror movie I could get my hands on.

70’s and 80’s horror is my favorite… those movies really made up my adolescent years and well into my 20’s. There have been good horror movies since then— and bad ones— but these decades were lightning in a bottle. No matter how hard filmmakers try, they can’t recapture the magic of those date-night cheaply-made B and C horror movies. The studios churned them out and the audiences flocked to them. I still look back at these movies fondly. They’re fun, they’re comforting, and they bring me back to my childhood. I have had many happy times binging movies until late at night… following the stories of Michael Meyers, Leatherface, Chucky, Jason… but among them I have always had one favorite. One that rose above all others.

When thinking about what to do for this Halloween, I knew I wanted to talk about something special. The first thing that came to my mind was Freddy Krueger.

Freddy is stylin’. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Admittedly, Nightmare on Elm Street 2 was not the best movie of the franchise in the opinion of many fans. The spirit of the series is there… although not executed as well as it could have been. Still, the character of Freddy and the concept of dying in real life if you die in a dream intrigued me. I started writing horror short stories after that. My first was a story called ElfKill, which was a silly and over-the-top story about a disgruntled North Pole elf that wanted revenge on Santa due to a grisly toy-making machine accident that left him armless and disfigured. He replaced his arms with knives and started slaughtering everyone who got in the way of his vengeance. It was ridiculous and gratuitous. I think I did, like, ten of them before losing interest. (It actually isn’t an entirely terrible concept… not bad for a nine year old, anyway!)

Anyway, for my twelfth birthday my mom got me Nightmare on Elm Street 3 and 4. I watched those movies over and over again. It wasn’t until later that I saw Part 1. For some reason I missed out on Part 5 in the theater, but I did see Part 6 on the big screen… 3-D and all! Out of all the Nightmare movies, however, my favorites were Parts 3-5, or as some call them, “the Dream Trilogy”. All three have the word “Dream” in the title, and they all continue off of each other with recurring characters to tell a loose story. These are the three films I am going to discuss in this post. We have a lot of ground to cover, so let’s get started.

Just two slight warnings before I get started. As I am describing R-rated horror movies, some of the descriptions and images may be disturbing, depending on your tastes. So please proceed with caution. (I do keep things fairly tame, though.) You know your comfort levels, so utilize that knowledge to determine if this post is for you. And as always, full spoilers will follow, so if you would rather not have these movies spoiled for you, come back after seeing them.

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors was released in 1987 by New Line Cinema. It was written by series creator Wes Craven, among others, and directed by Chuck Russell. The music was done by Angelo Badalamenti, well known from his work on Twin Peaks and other David Lynch creations.

Some background: The first movie in the series was extremely dark and moody. Freddy was obscured in shadows for much of the movie, rarely talked, and didn’t crack any jokes. A Nightmare on Elm Street was meant to be a standalone movie— Wes Craven never wanted it to become a franchise. But since it did so well, the studio released Part 2 without any assistance from Craven. It did poorly with critics and fans of the series by changing the established rules of the first film and bringing Freddy into the waking world. After the divisive reception, New Line knew they needed a course correction for Part 3. They went back to Craven for a new concept and his idea was that the souls of his victims had made Freddy too powerful to be stopped by a single person. It was going to take a group of dreamers this time. This film brought the series back to its roots while still heading in a new direction. In this film Freddy becomes more darkly comedic, a role that fits him like… well… a glove.

As a brief recap, Freddy Krueger was a child murderer in the small town of Springwood, Ohio that was let off on a technicality. The parents of Springwood took issue with this and cornered him and burned him alive. Years later he returned as a dream spirit, haunting the children of those who killed him. He would stalk them in their dreams, killing them in their sleep with his glove that has knives in the fingers. The hero of the first movie, Nancy Thompson, managed to turn the tables on him, taking away the fuel for his power… fear. She declared she was not afraid of him and Freddy lost all his power. Then he dragged her mom back into the house, so obviously it didn’t work. In Part 2, Freddy returned to haunt the dreams of a teen boy named Jesse, using him as a portal to kill again. This brings us to Part 3, which takes place six years after the events of the first film, one year after Part 2.

This was back in the dark ages when opening credits happened at the beginning of the movie. The movie opens with a blonde teenager named Kristen making a house out of paper mache and popsicle sticks. It turns out to be Freddy’s house on Elm Street, the house Nancy lived in in Part 1.

5 Minute Crafts has gotten weird. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Why is Kristen doing this? Well, she keeps seeing the house in her nightmares and is afraid to sleep. She is trying desperately to stay awake and so she’s crafting, washing down instant coffee grounds with Diet Coke, and listening to loud 80’s rock. Her mom gets tired of this because she’s trying to get laid and tells her daughter to go the hell to sleep. Kristen does, quickly finding herself in a nightmare. (There is very little transition between waking and sleep in these movies.) There are creepy kids wearing white playing outside of Freddy’s house. (These kids show up in all the films and represent his previous victims from when he was alive.) Kristen follows one of the little girls into the house and runs from Freddy through a labyrinthian maze of hallways and rooms. The floor turns to muck and the little girl becomes a doll.

Don’t worry Kristen, this is what I see in the mirror when I first wake up too. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

At this point we get another of the series’ staples— a fake out false waking. Kristen is attacked by Freddy in her bathroom, the faucets turning to hands with knife fingers. She is found in the bathroom by her mother, seemingly having slashed her own wrists with razor blades. (But we all know it was really Freddy.)

Due to this attempted suicide, Kristen is admitted to Westin Hills Psychiatric Hospital where we meet her doctor, Neil Gordon. Neil is a compassionate psychiatrist who wants to help the troubled teens of Springwood who are all suffering from chronic nightmares, sleep deprivation, and suicidal tendencies. His coworker Doctor Simms is not nearly as compassionate… she thinks the kids just need a good night’s sleep. Nightmares, after all, can’t hurt anyone. They have called in a consultant who arrives just as Kristen is having a fit over needing to be sedated. The newcomer calms Kristen down by repeating Freddy’s nursery rhyme. (“One two, Freddy’s coming for you… three four, better lock the door… five six, grab your crucifix… seven eight, better stay up late… nine ten, never sleep again!“) The new consultant is none other than Nancy Thompson, the survivor from Part 1!

Neil and Nancy. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Dr. Gordon fills Nancy in on the situation. The kids will do just about anything to stay awake. One kid even cut off his own eyelids. Nancy understands their plight, having gone through it herself. Apparently she’s been studying dreams in college. We also learn she’s taking something called Hypnocil, which Gordon looks up later and discovers is an experimental drug designed to suppress dreams.

After this Nancy and the audience are introduced to a few of the teen patients. Phillip is a sleep walker, and he makes marionettes. Kincaid has anger issues and ends up in solitary a lot. Joey is an awkward teen who doesn’t talk and has a crush on a blonde nurse.

Kristen has multiple talents. They just all have to do with Freddy’s house. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Kristen nods off while sketching Freddy’s house and the little girl’s tricycle wheels into her room, trailing blood. It melts and she finds herself back in Freddy’s house. It’s a spooky, dilapidated house that really looks like it’s been abandoned for decades, not six years. (It could just look like this in nightmares, but in Part 4 we get to see it in the waking world and it’s just as much a wreck. I assume it was defaced by residents of Springwood.) Still, it’s a cool, haunting atmosphere. Flies, cobwebs, rotting food… and a snake with Freddy’s face!

The majestic Freddy snake. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

As the Freddy Snake starts swallowing Kristen whole, she calls out for Nancy, who falls asleep instantly, falls through her chair, and lands in Kristen’s dream. Nancy stabs Freddy Snake in the eye and he recognizes her. They run and get away, waking up. The next day, Kristen explains that she used to pull her dad into her nightmares to protect her. As she grew up, she thought she’d imagined it. Seems like a pretty useful power, but like many things in the Nightmare series, it’s not explained any further. I figure it’s some sort of psychic ability. Nancy calls it a gift.

In a group analysis session we get to meet the other kids. Will is into role playing games. He’s in a wheelchair after a failed suicide attempt. Jennifer wants to be an actress. Taryn is a recovering drug addict. After this Nancy and Gordon have coffee together (back then having coffee was not a euphemism, it was actually drinking coffee) and get to know each other. Nancy reveals his mother died in her sleep, which answers the long unanswered question of exactly what happened in that twist ending of Part 1. They discuss the possibility of using Hypnocil on the kids but Gordon is against the idea. It could be dangerous.

And now we have arrived at the time of the first murder! After an amusing role-playing session between Will, Joey, and Taryn, it’s lights out time. The kids sleep in shifts and Joey takes the first shift, promising to wake Will at the first sign of a nightmare. However, the problem is in another room. Freddy takes the form of one of Phillip’s marionettes, cutting himself loose from his strings and growing to full size. He cuts Phillip’s tendons, walking him like a puppet through the hallways and onto a ledge. The tendons or Freddy, of course, are not visible to anyone who’s awake. Not that anyone notices him lurching through the hospital.

Side note, this was always the most interesting part of the Nightmare movies. Freddy is not just a mindless killer like, say, Jason or Leatherface. He puts some thought into his murders, creatively dispatching his victims. There were some hints of this in the previous two films, but in this one they really doubled down on the gimmicky kills and Freddy’s snarky one-liners. I doubt the series would have been so enduring without these qualities.

Freddy the puppet master. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Joey notices Phillip on the ledge and wakes everyone (kind of an odd choice to choose the mute as the lookout) and everyone crowds around the window just in time to see Phillip fall to his death. Freddy is shown cutting his strings, but no one else sees that. The hospital staff believes that Phillip was just sleepwalking again or it was suicide, but his friends know better. They could see the panic on Phillip’s face. He was terrified, and not in control. They know it wasn’t suicide, it was murder.

As a result of this, Dr. Simms states that everyone’s doors will be locked at night and all the patients will be sedated. As expected, this doesn’t go over well. Kincaid goes wild and lands in the quiet room. Gordon decides they will need to try the Hypnocil after all. He still doesn’t fully believe in Freddy, but he wants what’s best for his patients and the nightmares have them petrified.

Sadly, the killing spree has already begun. It’s another night and Jennifer convinces the kindly orderly Max (who looks suspiciously like Laurence Fishburne…) to let her stay up and watch TV. She says it’s research for acting, but really she just needs something to occupy her mind to keep her awake. She also burns herself with cigarette butts. Sadly, her efforts are in vain and she nods off watching a talk show in which Freddy kills Zsa Zsa Gabor. She goes to the staticky TV and hears the Freddy nursery rhyme.

What’s on TV? Oh, just Freddy. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Freddy grows metal arms from the sides of the TV and grabs Jennifer. His head pokes from the top (with the rabbit ears still on) slams the terrified Jennifer’s head into it, saying it’s her “big break in TV”.(Ba dum dum.)

At Jennifer’s funeral, Gordon meets a white-robed nun Sister Mary Helena, who he’d glimpsed earlier in the movie. She explains that the only way to save the children is to lay the unquiet spirit to rest. It is an abomination, she says, to God and man. When Nancy walks up, Sister Mary Helena is nowhere to be found. That night, Nancy gives Gordon Freddy’s backstory, explaining everything to those of us in the audience who may have missed the first movie. She shows Gordon her dream totem, which is a doll that is meant to keep bad dreams away.

In the next group session, Nancy tells all the kids about Freddy too. The teenagers in the room are the last of the Elm Street children. Nancy suspects that since Kristen has a power, maybe they all do. Dr. Gordon hypnotizes them all. At first they think it didn’t work, and Joey wanders off, following the blonde nurse he has a crush on. They soon realize they’re in a dream. (This is a bit disorienting, which is well done. There was no transition between waking and sleep, and Dr. Gordon and Nancy were in the dream too… I assume Kristen dragged everyone into the same dream with her power.)

In the dream world, they all do have abilities. Will can walk and he is the “Wizard Master”. Kristen is acrobatic. (She gets two powers? No fair!) Kincaid is super strong. Taryn says she’s “beautiful… and bad”. (Basically she has a weird hairdo and switchblades. Which, granted, is not much in the way of a super power, but hey, it’s her dream.) I’ve always wondered… had Phillip and Jennifer survived to this point, what would their powers have been?

Meanwhile, Joey is having a wet dream in which his nurse wants to have sex with him. This quickly turns bad as she uses her many monstrous tongues to tie him to the bed and turns into Freddy. Joey is trapped above a fiery pit and the others are trapped in their group therapy room. The room burns and shifts. Before things can get too bad, Dr. Simms breaks into the room and finds them all asleep. She hits the roof. Joey is in a coma and she blames the Hypnocil. Dr. Gordon and Nancy are fired.

As Gordon takes his box out to his car, he sees the sister again. He breaks into an abandoned wing of the hospital with a rock and speaks with her. She explains the abandoned building is where the criminally insane used to be locked up. A girl by the name of Amanda Krueger was accidentally locked in over the holidays and was assaulted by the inmates. When she was found, she was barely alive, and pregnant. Freddy was the bastard son of a hundred maniacs. She goes on to explain that Freddy’s body was never found after he was killed by the Elm Street parents. His remains must be located and buried in hallowed ground. It’s the only way to stop his rampage.

Well, that’s pretty clear. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Nancy sits with Joey and gets a message from Freddy carved into Joey’s chest. (This was back before email.) (I always wondered if this was actually carved into his chest or if she was hallucinating. She probably nodded off. It’s not explained.) Nancy knows they will have to go into the dream realm in order to save Joey. Gordon wants to follow Sister Mary Helena’s clue about putting Freddy’s body to rest. While they’re discussing this, Kristen goes bonkers upon learning that Nancy has been fired. The ever-lovable Dr. Simms orders her sedated and put in the quiet room. While this is happening, Nancy and Gordon meet up with Nancy’s dad, who’s drunk in a bar. (He also appears to have been demoted or fired. In Part 1 he was a cop, in this one he’s a security guard.) Nancy’s dad doesn’t want to help, but Gordon basically kidnaps him. While the guys are off on their side quest, Nancy rushes back to the hospital, having found out Kristen is in danger.

While Nancy convinces Max to let her talk with the kids, Gordon steals holy water and a crucifix. (You would think taking these things without permission would negate their holy powers, but I guess I’m not sure how that works.) After warning them of the danger, Nancy puts everyone under and they find themselves in the quiet room with Kristen. The Dream Warriors are assembled!

Before they can go off to find Joey, Freddy attacks and they’re all separated. In Kristen’s nightmare, her mother is beheaded by a dapper Freddy in a tux. She uses her acrobatics to escape death. Taryn is not so lucky.

Her hair makes her fighting more aerodynamic. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Taryn finds herself back in Drug Alley, but she’s not alone. Freddy appears and she puts up a good fight. Freddy offers to get her high, his fingers turning into needles. Little mouths appear on her arms.

Breaking Freddy. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

This distracts Taryn long enough for him to kill her. He stabs her arm mouths with his needle fingers and she overdoses. (Did I really just type that sequence of words?)

Will also does not fare so well. He’s alone in a dark hallway and Freddy has turned his wheelchair into a torture device, taunting him. Even though he can walk in dreams, when he wakes up, he’s trapped.

The… um… Wizard Master. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Will transforms into the Wizard Master and fights back, destroying the wheelchair. He turns his powers to Freddy, who is temporarily thrown off guard, like when Taryn fought back. His powers ultimately don’t work against Freddy, who unceremoniously stabs him with his glove. (I get the feeling that if they had all been able to attack Freddy at once, they may have stood a chance, which is why he separated them to pick them off one by one. For all his bravado, Freddy is a bit of a coward.)

The surviving Dream Warriors, Nancy, Kristen, and Kincaid meet up. They go through a dream door and continue their search for Joey. In the meantime, Gordon and Nancy’s dad (Donald Thompson. I should just call him by his name) arrive at the auto junk yard where Freddy’s bones rest in the trunk of a junked Cadillac. Jumping back and forth between the two groups, the Dream Warriors are now in Freddy’s boiler room. (The boiler room in the waking world is in the factory where Freddy worked. He would take his victims there.) They battle Freddy, but they’re not making much headway. (At least they manage to free Joey.) Freddy reveals the souls of his victims make him more powerful, showing a bunch of little monstrous screaming faces on his burned chest.

Freddy realizes his bones have been located and starts haunting the auto yard. He apparently has limited power over the waking world now (due to the soul power? It’s not explained) and he causes a carvalanche.

Neil, he’s just a skeleton. You could take him. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

In a display of fantastic special effects, Freddy possesses his own skeleton and attacks Gordon, knocking him out and killing Donald. Back in the dream realm, Freddy torments the others with his ghastly reflections in a room full of mirrors. Joey reveals his dream power: a sonic scream (like Black Bolt in Marvel comics) which breaks the mirrors. They believe Freddy is stopped. (Which is a completely delusional conclusion.) Donald appears to them as a ghost, telling Nancy that he’s passing over. He then fatally stabs Nancy, revealing that it was Freddy in disguise.

Stabby stabby. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Freddy turns his attention on Kristen. With her dying breath Nancy pounces on him, stabbing him with his own glove. while he’s distracted, Gordon has recovered and kicks the bones into the grave. He uses the crucifix and holy water, which burns the dream version of Freddy. He buries Freddy in the consecrated group, which makes the dream monster evaporate into holy light. Kristen cradles a dying Nancy, sobbing and promising that she won’t let her die. She’ll dream her into a beautiful dream forever.

I doubt anyone was shocked by this reveal. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

We cut to Nancy’s funeral, where Neil Gordon sees Sister Mary Helena one last time. He follows her to a gravestone where she vanishes, seeing that she was Amanda Krueger all along. (A twist that literally everyone saw coming.) That night Gordon sleeps peacefully. On his nightstand are Nancy’s dream totem and Kristen’s paper mache Freddy house. The lights turn on in the model, hinting it’s not over. This is a classic horror trope— always leave it open for a sequel.

Thoughts: Dream Warriors is my all-time favorite, partly for the nostalgia factor. It has likeable characters, a good story, and the effects are not as cheesy as those you would find in other horror movies from this era. (The skeleton and the Freddy Snake were especially good.) This film really elevated the series, recovering from the missteps of Part 2 and heading off into a new direction that, although it became formulaic, worked. The murders were creative, and Freddy showed his full range as a sinister but somewhat comical villain. Great direction, good acting, a cool soundtrack… this movie had it all. Everything considered, it’s an enjoyable experience that has never gotten old for me, regardless of how many times I’ve seen it. (I couldn’t even venture a guess at this point. I watched it two more times for this review.)

Casa de Freddy. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 4: The Dream Master continues the story. This film was released in 1988 and was directed by Renny Harlin. Wes Craven’s pitch for the movie (something to do with time travel in dreams) was turned down, so the studio went its own way with this installment. One thing of note: Kristen’s actress (Patricia Arquette) decided not to reprise her role as Kristen, so the role was recast. It’s a little jarring and I didn’t completely like the new actress, but Kristen is a vital character to the plot, so I understand why they had to recast her.

That’s pretty good, kid. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

A year after the events of Part 3, Kristen, Joey, and Kincaid are trying to get back into the swing of their normal Freddy-free lives. Kristen has a nightmare involving Freddy’s house and a bunch of kids in white singing that old, familiar nursery rhyme. She finds her way to Freddy’s boiler room and in her panic, she pulls Joey and Kincaid into the dream with her. They are less than pleased.

Kincaid, New Kristen, and Joey hanging out in the boiler room. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

The former Dream Warriors are both convinced that Freddy is dead and gone and they want Kristen to move on. Kincaid’s dog somehow ended up in the dream too (did Kristen pull him in also, or did he follow Kincaid?) and he bites her, waking them all up.

The next day, Kristen goes to pick up her other friends for school. Her friend Alice Johnson is a mousy quiet girl. Alice’s brother is Rick, who also happens to be Kristen’s boyfriend. Their dad is an alcoholic and the siblings avoid him whenever possible.

I like this effect. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

At school, we meet the new gang of characters and their quirks. Debbie is afraid of bugs and is tough. Alice is a daydreamer and has a hopeless crush on Rick’s buddy, the football player Dan. Dan is unburdened by any sort of personality. Sheila is a nerdy girl who likes studying and has asthma. We all should be able to identify these tidbits as foreshadowing. Joey and Kincaid are still annoyed with Kristen. Also Joey can talk outside of dreams now.

After all this setup, Rick has a karate montage. (Another foreshadow.) We see a bit more of the Johnson family’s dynamics. Their dad is chronically late from work, Alice does the cooking, and Mr. Johnson is ungrateful and way too hard on his kids. In a daydream Alice lashes out at him over his anger and alcoholism, but she’s unable to say anything out loud.

We cut to Kincaid dozing off in his room. (His dog’s name is Jason, a fact I find hilarious because at the time Friday the 13th franchise was the Nightmare series’ biggest rival.) Kincaid has a dream where he’s in an auto yard. Jason is in the dream as well, digging at something in the dirt. He lifts his leg and pees fire.

I titled this screenshot “FIREPEE.PNG.” (Credit: New Line Cinema)

A red glowing chasm opens up and Freddy’s bones are revealed. They reconnect and Freddy recomposes. I don’t know if that’s a term, but it’s the best explanation. He backwards rots. Soon enough, Freddy is restored to his former grotesquely burned glory, standing before a shocked Kincaid. That’s right, the black guy is the first to die. 80’s horror!

A tender moment/murder. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Kincaid has clearly kept his dream power and drops a car on Freddy. He celebrates way too early, assuming he killed Freddy with a single car. The cars all around him start to explode into sparks and he runs, finding himself blocked at every turn. The cars honk and the lights flash. Kincaid cries out to Kristen to warn her and Freddy quickly dispatches him. Krueger is not messing around. He’s after revenge right now, wanting to get back at the remaining Dream Warriors.

And now it’s Joey’s turn. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Freddy wastes no time. Joey is reading a Rolling Stone Magazine, listening to headphones, and watching MTV. Basically teening it up. His bed starts bouncing and to his shock, inside his waterbed somehow is the naked blonde woman from his poster. She swims away and Freddy bursts through, slashing Joey. “How’s this for a wet dream?” Freddy asks, displaying the usual Freddy wit and timing.

Alice and her mirror. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

The movie cuts to Alice’s room where we see her mirror is covered with photos of her friends. Rick jokes that she can’t see herself in the mirror and Alice responds that she doesn’t want to. They talk about their dad… he got worse after their mother died. Rick insists that Alice needs to learn to defend herself. He teaches her how to jump kick and her weak attempts at karate are honestly adorable.

Meanwhile Joey’s mom finds him dead inside his water bed. It seems to be sealed up, which is odd… again I ask, how much power does Freddy have over the waking world? The next day Kristen is worried about Joey and Kincaid since she can’t find them. (Remember this was before there was such a thing as text messaging.) Alice and Kristen have a conversation about dreams. Alice loves to dream… dreams are all she has. She’s not afraid of nightmares. Her mother taught her how to handle them. She taught Alice about the “Dream Master”, which Alice says is a rhyme. It’s all about controlling your dreams and dreaming about someplace fun.

When Kristen gets into class she sees that Joey and Kincaid’s desks are empty. She knows immediately that Freddy killed them. She panics and hits her head on the wall, instantly knocking herself out.

Kristen awakens in the nurse’s office with a nurse that looks suspiciously like Robert Englund. (Okay, I’m joking. It is Robert Englund, Mrs. Doubtfire-ing the hell of the scene.)

Freddy reveals himself, saying he wants to draw her blood. Kristen awakens with a start, seeing the actual nurse hovering over her.

After school we visit Alice at work at the diner. (It’s called the “Crave Inn” which I honestly did not even realize was a pun until this viewing.) Alice is still pining over Dan, and Rick arrives with a distraught Kristen in tow. They leave the diner with Alice and Dan, visiting Freddy’s house. In this movie Rick acts as the backstory vehicle, explaining to Dan (and the newcomers in the audience) what happened with Kristen in Part 3 and who Freddy is. Alice remembers the first part of the nursery rhyme. “Now I lay me down to sleep, the Master of Dreams my soul will keep.“ Kristen warns them all that her days are numbered. Before they leave Alice sees the chalk drawing from the opening credits for a moment, but when she looks back, it’s gone.

In a charming appearance, Kristen’s harsh mom arrives, demanding Kristen goes home. Back at home, the wretched woman spikes her daughter’s water with sleeping pills. She’s falling back on the adult’s usual role in a Nightmare movie… “all you need is a good night’s sleep“. In a savage moment, Kristen’s last words to her mom are “You murdered me. Take that to your god damned therapy!“

Kristen desperately fights sleep, but loses the struggle. She attempts to phone Alice before falling asleep. the last thing she thinks is Alice’s advice: “Dream someplace fun“. So she finds herself on the beach. Freddy’s glove shaped like a flaming shark fin cuts through the water, coming ashore. Kristen runs, but sinks into the sand. Freddy pushes her down with his boot and has a blast doing it.

Beach bum Freddy. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Kristen is back in Freddy’s house, crawling on the ceiling. She runs into the basement since she clearly has never seen a horror movie before. The basement is Freddy’s boiler room and he’s waiting for her. Freddy points out that she’s all alone and that she should call one of her friends. Kristen tries to resist, but accidentally calls Alice. This is what Freddy wanted all along… a bridge to new victims. Since Kristen was the last of the Elm Street children, Freddy was unable to find new victims. Kristen rushes Freddy, trying to defend her friend and he just straight up tosses her into the furnace.

Farewell New Kristen, we hardly knew ya. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

With her dying breath, Kristen cries out that she’s giving Alice her power. White light shoots from Kristen into Alice. Alice awakens, finding a postcard from Freddy on her mirror. She knows Kristen is in danger and drags Rick to her house. They’re too late, of course. Kristen is dead already, on fire in her bed. Alice now knows for sure that Freddy is real, but Rick refuses to believe. He blames himself for his girlfriend’s death. Alice is more outspoken… she has felt different since the dream. She feels like part of Kristen is with her all the time now.

The next day, Sheila is exhausted. She stayed up all night studying for the Physics test. She also made a soundwave device for Deb to scare bugs away. As the teacher is handing out the tests, Sheila coughs and uses her inhaler so the audience remembers she has asthma. Everyone should be able to see what’s coming. Alice nods off in class, using Kristen’s power to accidentally pull Sheila into a dream with her where Freddy attacks. After messing with her a bit, Freddy sucks all the air out of poor Sheila, leaving her deflated. Alice awakens to find that Sheila is having a fatal asthma attack and her inhaler is not helping. Alice receives Sheila’s power too, and for some reason takes the soundwave device from Sheila’s purse, slipping it into her pocket. (A premonition maybe?)

Everyone is broken up about Sheila’s death. Alice blames herself since she accidentally pulled Sheila into her dream. Rick is starting to believe something is going on. That night Alice takes Sheila’s picture down… something that continues as the movie goes on. Slowly her mirror is being uncovered.

Some time passes and Alice has been working double shifts and avoiding people. Dan shows some concern for her, and Alice is able to talk to him openly, showing her confidence is growing. Alice has figured out that Freddy needs her to bring him victims.

The next day in school, Rick is exhausted, having stayed up all night comforting his sister. Alice is in a boring class where the teacher just happens to be talking about controlling dreams in a monotone voice. He mentions the Dream Master who guards the “positive gate” of dreams, but there’s also a gate for bad dreams. Alice falls asleep and Rick (who is on the can in the locker room) is pulled into a dream where he’s swarmed by cheerleaders. Then he sees Kristen, who’s severely burned. Freddy turns the bathroom stall into an elevator and Rick is taken down to what looks like a Japanese living room? He’s in a gi and finds himself attacked by an invisible Freddy. At first Rick can’t do anything against him, but then is able to fight back, getting a few hits in and then kicking Freddy’s glove off, disarming him. Freddy’s glove moves on its own, however, stabbing Rick. Alice awakens screaming and the windows explode inward in the classroom. (I’ve never been able to figure out why that happens.)

At Rick’s funeral Alice hallucinates Rick as still alive, but she decides she’s done daydreaming. The only ones left now are Debbie, Dan, and Alice. Dan promises to pick up Alice at 8 so they can get a plan together on how to fight back. Debbie thinks she can kick Freddy’s ass because she works out. She gives Alice a spiked wristband, saying it’s good luck. Dan realizes that Alice is changing after each death.

Back at home Alice realizes she knows how to use nunchucks now. (Her brother’s power.) Alice’s dad begs her to stay home, so she misses her meeting with Dan. Later she sneaks out and goes to a theater. The movie that’s playing shows the Diner all dilapidated and she gets pulled into the screen. Alice’s future self is in the Diner, still working there and Freddy arrives to eat some “Soul Pizza” where his victim’s heads are the meatballs. He tells her to bring him more. The screen shows Debbie working out in her attic.

Alice awakens and meets up with Dan, but they’re stuck in a repeating time loop. (Freddy affecting the real world again? Or was she asleep the whole time? Things are getting pretty blurred around this time.) Debbie is lifting weights and Freddy pushes down on the weights, snapping her arms at the elbows. Bug arms start coming out of her broken arms and she runs, finding herself sticking to the floor. She’s in a roach motel. Her face gets stuck and poor Debbie goes full Kafka. Freddy squishes the roach motel and her power goes into Alice.

Free from the time loop, Alice drives Dan’s truck into Freddy, smashing it and landing Dan in the hospital. So that shows that part was real, increasing my confusion on the extents of Freddy’s powers. How could she see Freddy in the waking world? Was she maybe in a half-asleep state? Or was she sleep driving? It’s hard to say because at this point the movie has fully blurred the line between reality and dream.

What really matters at this point is that Dan’s at death’s door. Alice is informed that Dan will be put under for surgery in 15 minutes, so time is short. Alice rushes home to prepare for a final confrontation with Freddy. She removes the rest of the photos from her mirror, wraps Rick’s headband on her hand, Debbie’s bracelet on her wrist. She grabs the nunchucks and soundwave device, and takes sleeping pills. Meanwhile, we see that Freddy is Dan’s doctor, showing that they must have put him under. Alice hears his cries for help and dives into her mirror, using it as a portal (a good dream portal?) to his nightmare. The two of them run into a cathedral. Dan is bleeding, his surgery going south in the waking world. He vanishes when they bring him to, leaving Alice all alone.

With his nursey rhyme playing, Freddy arrives, welcoming Alice to “Wonderland” because you just knew they’d have to make some sort of unnecessary reference to Lewis Carroll. Freddy taunts Alice and she fights back, doing some karate at him. (She can fight now thanks to Rick’s power.) Freddy makes reference to the dream gates, saying he’s been guarding his gate for a long time. (This actually could be considered foreshadowing to Part 6 if you want to get deep into the lore. In Part 6 there is an actual Dream Gate guarded by the Dream Demons.) Alice does a sweet backflip that would make Mac jealous (couldn’t resist slipping in an Always Sunny reference) and starts kicking and punching Freddy, which he thinks is hilarious. She blasts him with Sheila’s sonic device, blowing a hole straight through him. Freddy heals it instantly, saying that he’s eternal.

Alice is on the ropes and Freddy is done messing around. At this critical stage of the fight, the children appear and sing Alice’s Dream Master rhyme. They remind her of the rest of the rhyme that she had forgotten. “In the reflection by my side, evil will see itself and it will die.“ She grabs a piece of the stained glass window they broke when they arrived and shows Freddy his reflection.

Too much Soul Pizza. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

The souls Freddy is so proud of showing off that are imbedded in his body start coming out of him. Alice demands he lets them go and they rip Freddy apart. All the souls he’s been hoarding float up into the sky and are set free. There’s a lot of them, so I’m assuming it’s all the victims from the past four movies. Alice is victorious.

Flash forward an unspecified amount of time later and Dan and Alice are now a couple. Dan seems to have recovered and is sleeping through the night now that the trouble is behind them. But in typical horror movie fashion we get a hint that Freddy is still around. Alice sees his reflection in the fountain briefly before the coin Dan tosses in clears it away.

Thoughts: I love this movie almost as much as Part 3. It has its own feel, and I really like the character of Alice. The sets and effects on this movie are fantastic. Some of the acting is a tad cheesy and there are some weird dubbing issues where it was clear they dubbed the actor’s voices in. The Dream Gate/Dream Master stuff could have been more fleshed out. (It’s undeniably hacky that the teacher just happened to mention the Dream Master in his lesson.) But overall I feel this film was well done and creative. A worthy continuation. I especially like the character development Alice went through and her final battle with Freddy.

A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 5: The Dream Child ends the trilogy. It was released in 1989 and directed by Stephen Hopkins. Fun fact: This was actually one of the final horror movies released in the 80’s. The end of an era!

This movie picks up a year after the events of Part 4 and begins with a tasteful sex scene between Alice and Dan. Afterwards, Alice’s body double takes a shower. (Well Alice is there too, but just for the non-naked parts. This shower is a team effort!) The drain backs up and the shower fills with water. Alice goes under and finds herself in an asylum. She’s dressed as a nun and her nametag states she is Amanda Krueger. She is forced to relive the time that Amanda was locked away with 100 maniacs. (One of them is Robert Englund, which I think is a nice touch. We get to see Freddy’s actual dad?) When she wakes in bed it’s another one of those false wakings and Dan becomes one of the maniacs before she wakes up for real.

The next scene is their High School graduation where we meet the new kids. (I guess Dan and Alice made a new group of friends to replace the ones they lost in Part 4.) You know the drill— we get their names and a basic personality trait that will factor in later. Mark is the clown who’s into Greta. Greta has an overbearing mom who forces her to diet so she can be a model. Yvonne is a swimmer and volunteers at a hospital. She sets up a pool party for the grads.

Alice is worried… she doesn’t think Freddy is back but she’s confused as to why she had no control over her dreams. Dan is planning a trip to Paris for the two of them over the summer. There’s also some stuff about Dan’s parents being overbearing and not liking Alice. We learn that Alice’s dad is in AA and has turned his life around after the events of the previous movie. He’s become loving and supportive of his daughter. After all this, Alice walks home through a park, hearing the haunting melody of Freddy’s nursery rhyme. She’s suddenly in a dream, without seeming to have fallen asleep… she was upright and fully conscious the entire time. (Don’t worry, it makes sense later.) She follows a younger version of Amanda into a hospital that looks like it belongs in Silent Hill. She’s having a breach birth and when they see the baby, they’re all horrified. Amanda tells them the baby is no creature of God.

As though to prove it, Baby Freddy jumps away and crawls away like the baby from It’s Alive. Alice follows him into a cathedral that looks a lot like the one from the climax of Part 4. The cute little fella climbs onto the alter where Freddy’s sweater is waiting. He lets out a horrible squeal-howl and the floor rises. As it does, the baby grows into the Freddy we all know and love. It seems pretty painful. There’s an explosion and Freddy is fully reborn.

Who’s that Pokemon? (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Before he can attack Alice, Amanda appears, cursing him. She says he’s an abomination and must be stopped. He brought her back to be reborn through her after his death in Part 4. She’s there to kill him. Freddy, ever respectful, calls his mom a bitch and disappears. Amanda tells Alice that her earthly remains must be laid to rest and to look for her in the tower.

Alice finds herself in the diner, four hours of her time missing. Later, the kids celebrate at the pool and we get to know them a bit more. Dan has celebratory champagne for Alice. Greta’s mom completely runs her life. Mark draws comics and is afraid of the sight of blood. (Facts that we can be sure won’t come back later!) Alice calls to warn Dan that Freddy somehow got to her while she was awake. He rushes off to see her and Freddy arrives in his car, forcing him to drive too fast and blowing out his tire. Dan crashes into the pool, which is now empty. He steals someone’s motorcycle.

Dan thinks he’s Ghost Rider. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

The motorcycle is taken over by Freddy, who makes it speed up dangerously and melds it with Dan, causing him great pain. He crashes into a truck in the dream and Alice has a vision of Dan’s death. Dan awakens still in his truck, having fallen asleep. The crash happens right outside of the diner. There’s a nice fake out as the semi driver is wearing a fedora and a red sweater. (Side note: Alice’s ability to absorb her friends powers seems to have gone away… I’m assuming she lost it when Kristen’s soul was released at the end of Part 4.)

In the hospital, Alice tries to tell everyone that Dan was killed. Everyone thinks Dan was drinking and driving because of the champagne he was bringing Alice. The doctor reveals that Alice is pregnant. She’s kept overnight for observation and that night she meets a boy named Jacob who is worried about her and knows she’s sad about her boyfriend. Asking Yvonne about it the next day, she says there’s no little boy on her floor.

Alice explains Freddy’s backstory to her friends (we know this routine by now) but of course they don’t believe her. Yvonne points out that this couldn’t have been Freddy since she wasn’t even asleep. Alice says he must have found another way to kill. Greta says that if someone is trying to hurt her, he’ll have to go through them first. (Well, obviously he will… that’s Freddy’s M.O.)

Alice and her dad have a sweet moment where he tells her he’s not disappointed in her for getting knocked up. Meanwhile Greta’s mom has forced her to attend a stuffy dinner party. She doesn’t want to be there and lashes out at her mom, reminding her she’s in mourning after her friend’s death. Greta’s mom is angry that she’s not eating. You diet so you can eat at social events. Greta threatens to stuff herself and Freddy appears in a waiter getup to do it for her. He traps her and stuffs food in her mouth until her face is distorted.

Greta has a snack. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

In the waking world Greta is choking to death. Alice has another vision, seeing the food in her fridge rotting and the bloated Greta choking. At the dinner party Greta falls over, dead.

Yvonne and Alice go to visit Mark who is skateboarding in a warehouse. I guess he lives here? Mark is super upset and now receptive to this whole Freddy business since the woman he loved is now dead. Yvonne still is not having any of it. Alice stays with Mark. He’s drawing a character called the Phantom Prowler. She heads off to make him some coffee and he promptly falls asleep. Alice returns in time to see him wander into a sketch of Freddy’s house.

Alice does an art. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Alice hastily draws herself into the sketch so she can follow him into the nightmare. Instead of… you know… waking him the fuck up. Mark is falling into the pit she saw Dan falling into (Freddy’s Soul Hole?) and she drags him out of the pit. They try to escape Freddy’s house, but Mark notices his hands got cut up from the pit. He faints and wakes up, disappearing.

Alice sees Jacob, who looks exhausted and says he’s been having bad dreams. He’s here waiting for his friend. He knows about Greta. Jacob’s friend says his mom doesn’t want him around. There’s some clear dialog stating that Jacob is his unborn child but Alice doesn’t seem to get it. He says his friend has a funny hand and is calling him. Alice chases after the boy, but finds herself back in the waking world with Mark. She seems to have figured out at this point that Jacob is her baby (several scenes after the audience did).

Since Alice is worried about her baby, she goes to see the doctor and Yvonne. Alice asks if unborn babies dream and the doctor says yes. Babies can spend up to 70% of their time dreaming. (Hmm. Okay..) The doctor gives her an ultrasound and tells her everything is fine. The ultrasound glitches out and Alice is pulled in, seeing Jacob in the womb. Freddy is there too, feeding him the souls of her friends. As soon as Alice leaves the doctor makes a phone call.

Alice explains everything to her two remaining friends. Yvonne is getting pretty pissed at Alice’s Freddy talk, but Mark knows it’s true, having been to Freddy’s house. Mark casually suggests she could… not have the baby. Alice says she wants to keep him. At that moment, Alice’s dad calls her down. Dan’s parents are there and want to take custody of the baby. The doctor called them after Alice’s visit. Alice refuses to let them have the baby and her dad backs her up. This moment of drama and high stakes is never mentioned again.

Mark’s research shows that Amanda hung herself after Freddy’s trial. But they never found her body. The grave we saw in Part 3 was empty. Her soul is in torment because she committed suicide. This is why she needs to be laid to rest.

Freddy’s scared of his mommy. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Alice goes to sleep to try and find Amanda, leaving Mark to keep watch. Yvonne is at the pool and finds herself in one of Jacob’s nightmares. The diving board becomes claws and tries to get her. She barely escapes and Freddy taunts Alice but Alice stabs him in the face with a pool skimmer. Alice is a savage. They get away from Freddy, who’s scared to follow them because Amanda is nearby.

Take on me… take me onnnn! (Credit: New Line Cinema)

While the two of them continue to search for Amanda, Mark is reading comics. He finds one called Nightmares From Hell that depicts his friend’s murders. The last panel shows him reading the comic book. He is made into a drawing and pulled into the comic book. Mark is the only color in a black and white twisted version of the warehouse. Freddy rides a skateboard, slashing all the shelves, which fall all around Mark.

Blood drips from bloated Greta’s stomach wound and lands on Mark’s head. He seems to have gotten over his fear of blood and instead is enraged by Freddy’s treatment of Greta. Mark turns into the Phantom Prowler and starts shooting at Freddy.

Oh no, Freddy has become SUPER FREDDY! He has a cape and everything. Super Freddy is, of course, bulletproof. He drains the color from Mark and makes him into a two dimensional cartoon made of paper. Freddy shreds Mark and the comic book shows his death. Alice wakes to find Mark dead.

Alice sends Yvonne to the asylum to look for Amanda and Alice’s dad carts her off back home. While she searches, Alice goes to sleep to hunt Freddy down and distract him. Alice sees a gothed-out baby carriage and crashes it into Freddy, knocking him into the room with 100 maniacs. Freddy has one of his moments of genuine fear as they start tearing him apart. Unfortunately Alice loses control of the dream when Freddy’s ripped off arm turns into spiders.

Jacob and his friend with the funny hand. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

Freddy is playing with Jacob. Alice coaxes Jacob away and Freddy chases him through M.C. Escher stairs. Freddy takes the form of Dan to try and trick the boy, but it doesn’t work. Jacob says Freddy has been inside Alice, hiding. That’s how he found Jacob to begin with. Alice mutates into a Freddy/Alice hybrid, forcibly attempting to remove Freddy from her body.

While all this is going on, Yvonne locates Amanda’s remains walled up in the tower of the asylum. Amanda is praying and when Yvonne touches her, she vanishes, thanking her.

As Alice and Freddy struggle, Amanda appears, telling Jacob it’s all up to him. Jacob gets a baby version of Freddy makeup, tricking Freddy into letting Alice go, saying he wants Freddy to teach him. Amanda instructs Jacob to release the power Freddy gave him, and Alice’s three dead friends start to rip out of Freddy’s body, tethered with umbilical cords. Freddy struggles, but it’s no use. The baby Freddy is pulled out and grabbed by Amanda. The spirit version of Jacob becomes a normal baby. Baby Freddy goes into Amanda and baby Jacob goes into Alice. Amanda warns Alice to leave. Freddy’s glove starts to rip out of Amanda and she manages to lock the two of them away behind a metal door in the dream realm.

Time jump and Jacob has been born. Alice, baby Jacob, Yvonne, and Alice’s dad all share a peaceful moment in the park, but as the camera pulls back, we hear a familiar nursery rhyme being hummed by a little girl in a white dress jumping rope. The nightmare never ends.

Thoughts: This movie is among my favorites. I haven’t seen this one as much as Part 3 and 4, but it’s right up there with them in my mind. Again there are likable characters and creative dream sequences and murders. This one has the lowest body count of the series, with only three deaths. Downsides, some of the big revelations of the movie (Freddy using Jacob’s dreams to reach his victims, Jacob being the spirit of Alice’s unborn child) were telegraphed too obviously and then tossed away without the weight they deserved. The writing could have been tighter, basically. I don’t understand why Amanda had to be set free to begin with, since she just ended up hanging around and getting pregnant with Freddy for the third time. Also the whole bit about Dan’s parents trying to get custody of Jacob was… odd. It was completely out of place and went nowhere. Why even include it? That aside, I enjoyed this movie as much as the others. The final confrontations of the Nightmare movies are always tense and spectacular. And Baby Freddy was well designed. They should make dolls of him. (Only partly kidding.)

The three movies work well in sequence to tell a sweeping story of courage against a seemingly immortal foe. These three installments stand out for me in the series as the high points. As a whole, there are good points and negative points in the entire Nightmare series. Freddy is uber-powerful to the point that the heroes seem to stand no real chance. It kind of kills the tension knowing that whatever they do will only be a temporary fix. (As Freddy himself said… “I am eternal!”) There is no real clear indication of what his powers are and the limits of them. For instance, sometimes he can effect the waking world. The rules of their world seem to change from movie to movie. His weaknesses also keep changing and he can’t be stopped permanently. (Well, I guess what finally stopped him was Robert Englund retiring from the role…)

Freddy prepares to get killed by Alice. (Credit: New Line Cinema)

The positives are obvious. The entire concept of the series is creative and unique. The movies are entertaining. The characters are likeable and relatable. I love the fact that Freddy is almost always (with the exception of Part 2) brought down by a strong female hero. Freddy is a charismatic and effective villain.

Freddy is not just powerful due to the Dream Demons (See Freddy’s Dead for an explanation of this…) or because his victim’s souls power him up. Freddy’s true power comes in how well he knows his victims. He knows their fears and weaknesses and exactly how to unnerve them. He can exploit this knowledge to make his prey weaker and easily take them out. He has the confidence in knowing he’s immortal to a certain extent. Many times we’ve seen him thrown off guard, momentarily afraid or shocked by the curveballs his potential victims throw at him. He’s become used to his kills being easy, so when they’re not, he’s thrown for a loop. But he quickly recovers. He just takes some time to recalibrate.

The creative ways Freddy torments and kills his victims, his snarky one liners, the charisma that Robert Englund brings to the role, and his iconic look all work in tandem to make an unforgettable character. Freddy Krueger is a pop culture icon that has endured over the decades.

I have seen these films countless times but they never get old for me. I had a blast revisiting them and sharing my thoughts and feelings with you all. I hope you enjoyed this journey as much as I have. This is just a taste of the overall series. If this sort of thing interests you, I would suggest giving the Nightmare series a try. You just may have fun experiencing them for yourself. (Also if you would like to see more recaps like this I could easily edit this post to make it Part 1 of 3… just saying.)

Anyway, thank you for reading my tribute to the Dream Trilogy. I hope you have a spooky holiday, and good dreams. Just remember the advice of our friend Alice… “Dream some place fun!”