WEEKEND THOUGHT: What Really Happened to The New Franchise of A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET and Where's The HORROR GENRE Heading?

 

FOR MORE WEEKEND THOUGHTS AND ARTICLES CLICK HERE     In 2010, one of the most prolific and perhaps iconic, of Hollywood's horror monsters was rebooted for the 21st century and scores of fans were happy for the news. The movie came out and then, just as quickly vanished. So what am I talking about, A Nightmare on Elm Street and what happened to Freddy Krueger?   Four years have now passed since the release of the reboot. This is an eternity in terms of building franchises, with the exception of certain movies, but generally it may spell the end for anyone hoping to see yet another Freddy Krueger offering. In the 80's, however, Hollywood kept churning out sequels almost annually and this equated to quite a few movies in the space of just a few years making the exploits of our infamous dream invader.   Perhaps one of the main reasons for Freddy not having a comeback response as expected may be due to the turn which the horror genre has taken thus far through the 2000's. One such turn has been the twisting of horror to a more grounded feel, if one may call it that, with the Saw franchise. Watching a sadistic serial killer getting people to do extremely bloody and messy things to themselves and others became very popular and Saw continued through 7 movies.   The Saw franchise was ultimately booted from it's throne by an entirely new style of horror, the found footage style, consisting of a more supernatural antagonist in the form of the Paranormal Activity movies. Another reason these movies became popular was the fact that they cost so little to make and the returns are extremely high. This year marks of the making of the 6th Paranormal Activity movie with an interesting addition of Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones as well as a Japanese version of the horror with both movies tying up to the original movie.   Horror fans have clearly made their choice for the type of horror they will pay to see these days. Next we were emerged in haunted houses and haunted people courtesy of the creator of the Saw movies in the style of The Conjuring and Insidious movies, showing that horror had gone back to it's original roots with obvious nods made to golden oldies like The Exorcist and The Amityville Horror.   In the early 2000's we also saw American horror takes on reboots of Japanese original movies such as The Ring and The Grudge with a link to the unseen and stories that delve into people being cursed and horror coming out of nothing.   We got to see the demise of the Vampire era with the last of the Twilight movies which had affected so much of modern pop culture including television. Some may argue the real value of these movies, apart from a financial standpoint, were not anything remotely close to what horror movies should be. A simple comparison would be to compare Twilight ( or any sequel thereof ) to Stanley Kubrick / Stephen King's masterpiece The Shining. Could the 2 even be compared? How about looking back towards the works of someone such as Alfred Hitchcock, has any movie over the past few decades come to the same level these geniuses of the genre brought horror to?   The Vampire era then gave way to the Zombie fad, with huge movie stars jumping on the wagon such as Brad Pitt in World War Z and smaller features like the bittersweet Warm bodies or Danny Boyles take with 28 Days Later.   We also recently saw movies such as Sinister and The Purge relate positively to audiences across the globe and spawning sequels that are currently in production such as The Purge: Anarchy which is going to be released very soon.   Sam Raimi, the king of horror himself, made Drag Me To Hell and had his own movie rebooted in the form of Evil Dead and what an excellent job that was.   The horror genre has spilled over it's influence to TV shows also with Sleepy Hollow, True Blood, The Walking Dead and American Horror Story successfully proving that Horror is something viewers want to see more of.   Now let's go back to where this article started, where are our beloved 80's horror monsters? My best guess is best left in the loving memories of those of us who grew up during the 80's and 90's and though we get nostalgic from time to time, it may be for us to realise that they may be best left alone. Another case in point may be Rob Zombie's take on Halloween and the Michael Myers story and even the remake of Friday The 13th, which in my biased opinion was an excellent take on the original story.   Face facts now, we may never see any more scares or frights from our old friends but rest assured that through the masses of so-called horror these days, there are true gems and looking towards the future, the excitement it bears is the curiosity of what may scare us in future as opposed to what scared us previously. Take consolation in knowing that it may be a bumpy ride to finding new favourites but at the end of the day, these will be new scares and new frights...