Why The Original Freddy Krueger Thinks An Elm Street Reboot Should Start With The Third Film

Even as franchise revivals and 1980s nostalgia have become Hollywood's bread and butter, there's one horror series that hasn't been squeezed to diminishing returns. "A Nightmare on Elm Street," once a staple of slasher cinema, hasn't been awakened in the past 15 years and counting. 

Sure, the series' influence is still felt. Both horror films like "Black Phone 2" and TV like "Stranger Things" season 4 have included dream-haunting killers in the vein of Freddy Krueger. But why hasn't the actual "Nightmare" been touched for well over a decade? Series creator Wes Craven passed away in 2015, while Freddy Krueger actor Robert Englund feels he has aged out of the role. The last "Elm Street" movie was a remake of the original, released in 2010, which recast Jackie Earle Haley as Freddy. The movie was such a disaster that it may have dissuaded other filmmakers or studios from touching the franchise and trying to cast another Englund-less Freddy.

We at /Film have some ideas for how to bring back "A Nightmare on Elm Street," as does Mr. Englund himself. In a recent interview with Bloody Disgusting, Englund said a new "Nightmare" film shouldn't try to remake the original, but rather the third film, 1987's "Dream Warriors."

"I think if they were gonna reboot it, they should probably start with 'Dream Warriors,' because it has that great opening that's sort of like 'Previously on Nightmare on Elm Street,'" Englund said. "Dream Warriors" was a more direct sequel to the original "Nightmare" than "A Nightmare on Elm Street 2." Craven returned to write the script (though Chuck Russell directed), and star Heather Langenkamp returned as Nancy Thompson. Nancy had become a psychiatrist, and the film features her working with teens in a mental hospital who are being haunted and murdered by Freddy.

The opening scene of "Dream Warriors" features Kristen (Patricia Arquette) trying not to fall asleep due to some previous bad dreams. When she does, she's pulled into Freddy's realm and barely survives. The dreamscape is filled with creepy little kids and dead bodies representing Freddy's past victims.

"Dream Warriors" is unanimously considered one of the best "Elm Street" movies, but it's not the only option for a new "Nightmare" film. There's also potential, Englund said, in a prequel.

Freddy's backstory, as told in the original "A Nightmare on Elm Street," is that he was a serial killer targeting the children of Springwood, Ohio. After he was caught and tried, he got off on a legal technicality. Vengeful parents tracked him to his hideout and set it on fire, burning him alive. Freddy's return in children's dreams is him exacting vengeance on their parents from beyond the grave.

From 1988 to 1990, Englund starred as Freddy in the horror anthology series, "Freddy's Nightmares." The series mostly consisted of standalone horror tales, but the pilot, "No More Mr. Nice Guy" (directed by Tobe Hooper), showed Freddy's trial and execution. "They could do it as a prequel, like Tobe Hooper did on the series," Englund said. "Really do a backstory before, so you have the story of Nancy and Tina and Glen and everything going on, but you start even before that. That's what I would do."

Englund suggests "someone like a Doug Jones," the actor famous for playing made-up characters in Guillermo del Toro films like "Pan's Labyrinth" and "The Shape of Water," could play the next Freddy. If Jones can act while playing inhuman characters like a faun, acting with Freddy's burn scar make-up should be no challenge at all.