The Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master

I sure do love the Nightmare on Elm Street movies. Sure, there's nothing better than the first one, but all of the sequels are the cinematic equivalent of cheese doodles -- junky, bad for you, and nutritionally devoid...but OH.SO.YUMMY.

Anyway, here we go again. They couldn't get Patricia Arquette from Freddy 3 to come back and play Kristen, so they got Tuesday Knight instead. She sings the opening song, and looks kinda like Patricia Arquette, so it's all good.

In Freddy 4, everyone's out of the mental ward that they were all dying off in during 3. Joey and Kincaid are still hanging around, but everyone else is dead. Kristen's got a hottie boyfriend (Rick) and a best friend (Alice - Rick's sister) There's also hot Dan running around for most of the movie...lots of eye candy in this one.

So of course, Freddy's back. A dog peeing fire brings him out from the hole he was buried in and miraculously fuses together, and IT'S ON. We've got a waterbed scene very reminiscent of the first movie, Freddy as a shark, Freddy wearing some hot Wayfarers, and Freddy sucking face with a nerdy asthmatic chick. There's a body builder chick turning into a bug, human heads on pizza slices, and some funky karate moves. There's all kinds of hot 80s music in this, including the Dramarama hit, "Anything Anything", which I proceeded to download immediately.

As with all the Freddy movies, teenages start dropping off like flies in all kinds of crazy ways. They really must have had a huge special effects budget after the first three, because they're dreaming up every little 80s-style effect that they can. Sadly, Alice is watching all her friends peace out, but somehow she's absorbing all of their skills and personality traits, natch. And of course, the end is kinda lame and in no way final, since we have to leave that opening for 5, Freddy's Dead, New Nightmare, and Freddy vs. Jason!

I like this movie...it's one of the better Freddy sequels, especially those after Wes Craven and New Line had a falling out. And like junk food, it made me crave more and more Freddy, so I'm probably going to be stocking up on some "Nightmare" for a snowy day.

Grade: B (decapitating Mrs. Voorhees in Friday the 13th, kinda fake-ish, but still fucking awesome)