A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2: Freddy's Revenge User Reviews

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It's amazing that the Nightmare on Elm Street series lasted so long when you see just how far it had fallen by the first sequel. A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge goes pretty seriously off-track. To begin with, Freddy isn't really getting revenge on anyone this time, the subtitle would have been more appropriate for the first movie where he actually was taking his revenge on the people who killed him by attacking their children, but this time he's just attacking some random new kids with the only connection being that one of them happens to live in Nancy's old house (the titular Elm St. address).

In fact this seems to be more like a haunted house film ala The Amityville Horror or something, complete with apparitions, malfunctioning appliances, and general household mayhem most of which (but not all) is presumably the work of Kruger. This tramples all over the premise of the first film wherein Freddy is incapable of striking at people except when they're dreaming.

In this film Freddy is trying to get a proxy, a teenager named Jesse, to be his hands in the real world - though even that concept doesn't make any sense given the fact that it's already been established in this film that he can already affect events in the real world.

So, in other words, plot-wise at least, this film is a mess. There's just a ton of things that happen that make no sense, like a parakeet suffering spontaneous combustion, and a gym teacher who catches Jesse in a bar one night and forces him to come back to school in the middle of the night to run laps(!?!)

The closest thing to a saving grace here is the effects, which are in fact superior to the first film - and no doubt the reason for it's success. Although that's a pretty flimsy hook to hang your fedora on.