10 Horror Movies Ruined By Fan Overhype

6. Wes Craven's New Nightmare

Us Dahlia
New Line Cinemas

A Nightmare on Elm Street helped defined the 1980s as the decade of the slashers. Due to Wes Craven's solid direction and Robert Englund's performance as the wise-cracking dream demon, Freddy Krueger, the series quickly became a horror staple.

However, Craven moved onto other projects after the first instalment, leaving other directors to take over the sequels. Although the follow-ups have their moments, none of them come close to reaching equalling the original.

So, when the sixth entry, Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare seemingly killed off the overarching villain, it looked like the franchise had nowhere else to go.

Out of nowhere, Wes Craven suddenly announced a new Nightmare movie called... well... New Nightmare.

Rather than churning out the same old shlock, New Nightmare was a meta slasher, starring Wes Craven, Robert Englund, and the original Final Girl actress, Heather Langenkamp, playing themselves. This time around, the cast and crew of A Nightmare On Elm Street find themselves being hunted by a demonic entity who's taken the form of Freddy Krueger.

With Craven on board and a bold new direction, it looked like this sequel would be Nightmare On Elm Street done right.

To everyone's horror (not the good kind), New Nightmare was full of tired tropes, bad special effects, and underwhelming scares. Just to add salt to the wounds, Freddy's redesign was awful.

Although you have to commend Craven's ambition, New Nightmare wasn't the return to form we were hoping for.

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James Egan has been with Whatculture for five years and prominently works on Horror, Film, and Video Games. He's written over 80 books including 1000 Facts about Horror Movies Vol. 1-3 1000 Facts about The Greatest Films Ever Made Vol. 1-3 1000 Facts about Video Games Vol. 1-3 1000 Facts About James Bond 1000 Facts About TV Shows