Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th

*Nightmare on Elm Street* and *Friday the 13th* are two horror movie franchises that focus on serial killers that mainly target teenagers and often deal with supernatural elements. They were originally stand-alone franchises, but after New Line Cinemas acquired the *F13* license and included a cameo of Krueger’s glove at the end of *Jason Goes to Hell*, the two would officially duke it out in the 2003 film *Freddy vs. Jason*.

## **Summary:**

The first *Friday the 13th* was released on May 9th 1980 which told the the story of a group of teenage counsellors trying to reopen an abandoned summer camp by the name of Camp Crystal Lake, but are killed off one after the other by Pamela Voorhees (Betsy Palmer), the mother of a disfigured boy who drowned in the establishment’s lake due to teenage negligence. Reviews were heavily mixed, but it was a smash box office success thanks to its sheer graphic violence. On April 30th 1981, *Part II* was made where Jason Voorhees (played by Steve Daskewisz and Warrington Gillette in this film) comes back from the dead to kill even more Crystal Lake counsellors. The film never planned to have Jason as the plot catalyst since F13 was originally planned to be an anthology series, but audiences loved the first film’s surprise ending so much, they had to capitalize on it. While reviews were still mixed and the box office wasn’t as good as the first movie, it was still a success financially speaking. On August 13th 1982, *Part III* was released in theaters with a 3D gimmick. It was negatively panned by critics, but was such a huge box office success, it managed to dethrone *E.T.*’s number 1 spot for one week. The movie is well known for being the first film where Jason (played by Richard Brooker in this version) donned the iconic hockey goalie mask he wears throughout the following films along with his weapon of choice: the machete. Several more films were released throughout the years with *The Final Chapter* (1984) where Jason (Ted White) is seemingly killed off, *A New Beginning* (1985) where an imposter (Dick Wieand and Tom Morga) goes around killing people, *Jason Lives* (1986) where he (Whitney Rydbeck) comes back from the dead, *The New Blood* (1988) where a psychic girl named Tina (Lar Pink Lincoln) must face off against the undead serial killer (Kane Hodder in his first film), *Jason Takes Manhattan* (1989) where he hitches a ride to New York City, *Jason Goes To Hell: The Final Friday* (1990) where Jason’s body is detonated by the FBI yet his spirit possesses the coroner who continues his killing spree, and *Jason X* (2002) where you guessed it; he ends up in space with a cybernetic redesign. A reboot of the franchise was made in 2009 which was basically a re-imagining of the first four films and featured Derek Mears as the hockey-mask killer. While negative reviews were par for the course, this *Friday the 13th* remains the second highest grossing film in the franchise to date. No new movies have been made since then.

On November 9th 1984, Wes Craven released a film that would change both the slasher flicks and the genre itself as we know of today. That movie is *Nightmare on Elm Street*; the story about an undead serial killer named Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) who has the power to kill teenagers in their sleep using a glove with four metal blades, and its up to Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp) to stop him. The film received rave critical reviews and was a box office success. More sequels would be made with Englund reprising his role, decent profits, and mixed reviews. As the series went on, the franchise started to lose some of the somber darker tones that made the first movie so impactful and became more campy with cheesy one-liners spouted by the Springwood Slasher and bizarre death scenes (getting turned into a roach or comic book character, getting sucked into a video game, etc.). Regardless, the series includes *Part 2: Freddy’s Revenge* (1985), *Part 3: Dream Warriors* (1987), *Part 4: The Dream Master* (1988), *Part 5: The Dream Child* (1989), *Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare* (1991), and *Wes Craven’s New Nightmare* (1994) which involved Freddy being brought into the real world, haunting the cast & crew responsible for his films, and brought him back to his dark and menacing roots. A reboot in 2010 was released with Jackie Earle Haley as a grittier Freddy Krueger and it made back its budget, but was panned by critics and fans for being “way too dark” and derivative of the original like with the *F13* remake. No new *Elm Street* films have been made since then.

On August 15th 2003, a crossover film that featured the Springwood Slasher and Camp Crystal slayer against each other was released with the title *Freddy vs. Jason*: the last instalment in their respective franchise before the reboots and the last film to star Robert Englund as Freddy (he would reprise his role for a 2018 episode of The Goldbergs) and Jason would by played by Ken Kirzinger. The story in this film is that once he becomes incapable of haunting Springwood teens in their dreams, Freddy resurrects Jason and manipulates him to causing panic and fear so he can return again. But his plan backfires as Jason kills too many kids and causes Freddy to start a war against each other while the teens caught in the crossfire try to survive. The film was met with mixed reviews, but it remains the highest-grossing film in the *Friday the 13th* series and the second highest-grossing film in the *Elm Street* series.

## **Action Figures:**

Even if their franchises are no longer alive, Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees are still the biggest faces of horror as they spawned many comic books, video games, television series (*Friday the 13th*’s, however, did not feature Jason), and toylines. Some of them like Ljn’s were marketed towards kids back in the 1980’s, though a majority of the ones produced nowadays are primarily for adults. These are just some of the ideas that were put to sleep before they could fully awake:

* LJN Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees Water Guns
* NECA Toony Terrors

## **References:**

1. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friday\_the\_13th\_(franchise)
2. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A\_Nightmare\_on\_Elm\_Street\_(franchise)
3. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddy\_vs.\_Jason