Kill the TV, Before it Kills You.

When I was but a wee lass around the age of 12, my best friend, Beth and I had a Saturday night ritual. We would hole up in my bedroom, stuff our face with junk food, and watch our three favorite shows. Monsters, Freddy's Nightmares, and Tales from the Darkside. It was bliss for my 12 year old horror loving heart!

Flash forward to the 33 year old horror vixen I am today. Just recently, I "acquired" season one of Freddy's Nightmares. This was the short lived series based on, what else, The Nightmare on Elm Street movies. Watching it now that I'm older I spot the people who are famous today like John Cameron Mitchell, Mariska Hargitay, Bill Moseley, Brad Pitt and Bob Goen. I also realize that my 12 year old self's taste in horror wasn't nearly as "refined" as my 33 year old self's taste. Some of these could be called crap if they aired today! If you haven't ever had the privilege of viewing this show it's basically Tales from the Crypt with Freddy serving up tales of his torment in dream land. He's terrorizing everyone in Springwood and we get to watch.

Now, 1988 was banner year for horror television! Not only did you have the three shows mentioned above, we also had Friday the 13th: The Series, which had nothing to do with Jason Vorhees and everything to do with cursed antiques. Another awesome horror anthology show!

This really got me thinking. Why don't we have great horror television like this anymore? We have our The Vampire Diaries, True Blood & Supernatural but these aren't truely horror. The Vampire Diaries are nothing more than this neutered vampire fluff that is so popular. True Blood is soft core vamp porn, granted much better than the fluff but too much boinking and not enough killing. Now I have to give props to Supernatural. It's not really fluff and it has some cool story lines but it's not really what I would love to see in horror television.

The last good horror show, in my opinion was Masters of Horror. But really, how can you top something like that? All the greatest horror directors & writers given free reign to create amazing tales of terror. It was like giving this fat girl the keys to the horror candy store!

Mmmm horror candy...

If you were to ask me what my top 5 horror tv shows were I guess it would break down like this:

5. Monsters
4. Freddy's Nightmares
3. Masters of Horror
2. Tales from the Darkside
1. Night Gallery

I know most people would expect The Twilight Zone but it wasn't just horror, it was also fantasy & Sci Fi. Night Gallery in my opinion held true to the art of telling tales of horror & suspense.

Maybe one day I will get my horror anthologies returning to the tube. Till then it's my Tales from the Darkside dvds and a glimmer of hope.

It all felt like a bad dream

OK first off I need to offer my sincerest apologies. My life has been CRAZY these past few and I have been watching movies just not any worth writing about. I know I promised 3 reviews WAAAAAYY back when that I never got around to I'll probably post the reviews soon now that my life has somewhat normalized.

And now for something completely different, and yet very familiar...

I have been dreading this since I read that my arch nemesis, Michael Bay was producing the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street. I'll tell you why.

I was different from all my friends when I was a kid. They all had pictures of New Kids On The Block and the teen star de'jour. Me? I had a life size door poster of Freddy Kruger. I would cut out pics of him from Fango. I was enamored by this monster! A Nightmare on Elm Street was my movie.

I wept openly when I heard of the remake.

Tonight I swallowed my pride and decided to just go for it. I'm not sorry I did. I mean it could have been worse. Billy Bob Thorton was rumored to have been offered the role of Freddy.

"I think your soul would be good with some biscuits and mustard. Maybe some of those french fried potaters. MMM HMMM"

That could have been a DISASTER. Thank heavens for small miracles. Like magnets. It's fuckin' magic. Anyway, back on point.

Freddy Kruger 2.0 was directed by Samuel Bayer. This is Mr. Bayer's first feature. He has mostly been involved in the fine art of music video directing. His directing isn't bad. He's no Wes Craven. Then again, who is? I'm just glad it wasn't edited like a music video. It's scenes are seamless and it flows quite well.

The acting isn't horrible but it isn't stellar either. In the original we got Johnny Depp, in this one we get Kellan Lutz, Thomas Dekker, and in Johnny's role as Nancy's boytoy, Kyle Gallner.

Someone bring Johnny back. None of the guys were memorable. Just eye candy & gore fodder.

The girls in this were better. Rooney Mara played Nancy very well. Meek and unassuming in the beginning and kicking some nightmare ass in the end. Well played indeed. Katie Cassidy was Kris, Nancy's BFF (Tina was her name in the OG ANOES). I must admit she pulled Kris/Tina off as well as Rooney did Nancy. The bedroom scene, while not as intense as the OG was still very good.

Now the big one. Jackie Earle Haley. The man who took over the role as my beloved Fred Kruger. He had some mighty snarky shoes to fill. Robert Englund gave life to the role. He was Freddy. I was terrified that no one could ever play him like Robert did. I was right. Sort of. Haley was a Kruger of another color. Completely different than Robert Englund. He was more creepy with a side of snark. I know that is gonna tick a lot of people off. The reason is we got used to the later incarnations of Freddy. From Nightmare 3 we were given the "Welcome to prime time, bitch" Freddy. This was the beginning of the smart ass Kruger. Lest we forget that he was indeed more creepy and less snarky in parts 1 and 2.
Haley was genius. He was so creepy I sort of felt uncomfortable. Like I needed a shower. He played up the child molester aspect and played down the revenge. You kinda have to over look the voice. If I look away or close my eyes I see Rorschach in my head.

The effects in the movie were pretty good. I was a bit disappointed in the CG Freddy over Nancy's bed. They should have went the OG route and did it with a wall of latex. Much freakier. Freddy's makeup however was SPOT ON. Less wrinkly than Robert Englund's more serious burn victim. Not a ton of gore. Some cuts and open wounds, a few bouts of impalement here and there. Nothing too gory until... well, we'll leave that as a surprise.

All in all not a bad remake. (Curse you Michael Bay. Curse you.)

RATINGS:

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GORE:

HUMOR:

OVERALL: 1/2