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

The weird one. A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985) ditches the original cast, loses Wes Craven, and has Freddy possessing a teenager instead of killing kids in their dreams — and we're covering it anyway for week two of So Many Scares.

Jesse Walsh moves into Nancy's old house, the title makes no sense (Freddy won last time — revenge on who?), horror gets a rare Scream King in the "final fella," Clu Gulager reps Oklahoma, the effects hold up even when the logic doesn't, and the Letterboxd crowd has thoughts about how sweaty Jesse is.

Ratings: Garrett 2, David 1.5, Josh 2. Letterboxd average: 2.8 — almost a full point down from the first film.

Chapters
00:00 — Welcome back to So Many Scares
00:41 — The Letterboxd synopsis
01:15 — Box office: $2.8M opening, $29.9M total
03:32 — No original cast, Craven walks away
04:26 — Garrett was wrong about Nancy
04:36 — Clu Gulager: another Oklahoman
06:22 — "Freddy's Revenge" — revenge on who?
07:41 — Re-learning lore in every horror sequel
08:50 — Reality is as weird as the dreams
09:25 — The effects hold up
10:41 — Craven's 1988 quote: "silly script"
11:51 — The "final fella" — horror's Scream King
14:43 — Freddy has a personality; Jason doesn't
18:12 — Jesse's only crime is living in that house
20:22 — Burnt weenie, smoker, midnight toker
21:09 — The Season of the Witch comparison
21:51 — The FU endings
23:42 — Our ratings: 2, 1.5, 2
25:27 — Letterboxd reviews
26:38 — The queer subtext + the sweaty movie club
28:00 — The score game — Josh wins by 0.1, again
29:31 — Almost a full point down from the first film
30:41 — Next week: Dream Warriors

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