I promised Armand I’d post a review of a Nightmare on Elm Street movie while he was away, and even though he’s now back, I know he’d be upset if I didn’t follow through, so here goes.

I’m a big fan of horror films. I like the actually scary ones (The Shining, The Exorcist, Ringu…) and the gory ones (Hostel, Saw, Braindead…). Recently I decided to watch some horror franchises in order – god only knows why, but I started with Final Destination (1 ok, 2 better, 3 terrible, if anyone’s interested), and then moved on to the Nightmare on Elm Street series. This is my review of A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy’s Revenge.

I have a bit of a problem with Freddy Krueger as a character. He’s just not scary. He wears a ridiculous jumper and looks a bit funny more than anything else. I’d only ever seen him in Freddy vs Jason before and in that he is quite clearly a figure of fun, but it turns out that he’s a bit rubbish in his early days too.

This is a terrible film. The first one at least tried to tell a coherent story and explain that Freddy could only hurt people while they were asleep; Freddy’s Revenge seems to completely change Freddy’s powers and doesn’t make the whole dream thing clear at all. The main character is seen taking some tablets to keep him awake, but no effort is made to explain how or why he thinks he should take them.

There’s a half decent bit where Freddy breaks out of the main kid’s body and his fingers split open, but apart from that, avoid.

Sadly, I am going to continue watching all the way up to New Nightmare, and then I might give the Friday the 13th films a go. Wish me luck.