Thanksgiving on Elm Street Part 3

For my last post, I discussed my memory issue with bad movies. I forget the ones I don’t like and forever remember the ones I enjoy. Aside from the original film, I recall the most from the third installment in the Nightmare on Elm Street series.

A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 3: Dream Warriors

1987 sure was a good year. Only that particular point in time could have produced this epic entry, which features an equally epic song by Dokken. If I were to imagine the perfect 80’s moment, it might very well be the leader singer belting “We’re the Dreeeaaam Warriorrrrrsss!” Aside from the hair band awesomeness, Part 3 is just a solidly entertaining movie. Freddy’s back with a new viciousness and a sick sense of humor. Creative kills, some gore, decent EFX, and macabre exposition brought all the elements that many missed from Part 2. As much as I enjoy Freddy’s Revenge, I must say that I am thankful Dream Warriors realigned the rails and put the series back on track.

Two cherries on top of this victorious sequel sundae: Wes Craven and the cast. Craven returned to work on the story, offering his most excellent skills to craft a tale that recaptured the successful features of the original while offering something new. Freddy’s back story is a welcome addition to the lore of the Nightmare films. Plus, the son of 100 maniacs has a ring to it. Craven and the other writers also did an excellent job of recreating the confusing fantastical world of the subconscious. Natural law is replaced by terrifying dream logic. The second winning component of Dream Warriors is the cast.  Firstly, we get the return of Heather Langenkamp. Her cute face is always welcome on my television screen. It’s always nice to see where our main character’s end up. In this case, Nancy is helping teenagers who have sleep disorders. Way to go movie, this actually makes sense. Thanks! Nancy’s father, played by genre-favorite John Saxon, also jumps in on the fun towards the end. To top this off, we get Patricia Arquette as the Final Girl. She seems destined to play roles that require lots of screaming, mental disturbances, and she generally portrays someone with a messed up life. Throw in Laurence Fishburne and you got yourself a pretty impressive cast for an 80’s sequel. 

For this post, I thought I would we could relive my three favorite kills together. Not only is it fun (and maybe a tad sick) to pick favorites, but it will help me remember the deaths in the future. One of my goals in doing Thanksgiving on Elm Street was to resolve the confusion in my brain over which kills happened in which movie. So let’s begin the murder rundown.

 Phillip:

Poor Phillip. He has to have one of the most painful deaths I’ve ever seen. His veins are ripped out of his wrists and used as strings to puppeteer him off the roof of the hospital. Ouch!!! I think this may be my favorite of the three. The first kills are often some of the best.

Jennifer:

In the grand tradition of killing characters off in ways that relate to their weaknesses or desires, Freddy shoves this aspiring actress straight into primetime. I’m always happy to get the snide quips from Mr. Krueger as he’s murdering helpless pre-adults.

Taryn:

If needles make you cringe, then you won’t like this. Taryn, an ex-addict, is stabbed with 10 hypodermic needles. While it is simple and not necessarily gory, it is quite effective.

Conclusion:

Dream Warriors is awesome. 'Nuff said. Depending on how the rest of my retrospective on the Nightmare films goes, this will probably be my favorite of the sequels.