This will likely be as unpopular as my review of NOES 2 but this show was just fun. While corny and much lower budget than the movies it became a cheeky sort of Twilight Zone with more horror tones to it. Other than the first episode and its series sequel Freddy is merely a narrator, ala the Crypt Keeper but this allows the show to be something different and show a hell of Freddy's creation without being just another Freddy act. The show had great, creepy atmosphere (something helped by the cheesiness of it, much in the style of the 80's Pet Sematary) and it had a dreamy feel which every movie sequel after the second one slowly lost. Judge against the mostly junk coming out these days and this one was a charming epitome of its time and though it tried to be mostly silly actually had a creepiness about it despite itself. This is more the equivalent of what it would be like if Freddy mostly just toyed with you and trapped you in your own head without showing up himself in most cases. It's a must watch for fans of horror with a lot of faces to spot and recognize from future roles. Maybe I'm overly nostalgic and remembering recording with my big, clunky VCR and editing out the commercials via my little corded VCR remote control but if you trust the opinion of a long time horror fan then treat yourself to this series at least once!
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crowes-1886527 October 2020
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alexanderdavies-993829 September 2017I'm not surprised that there was a television series of Freddy Kruegar. After all, out of him, Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees, Kruegar was the only one with any personality. Hence, why he had his own series. There was some potential but the low budget, the lack of talented actors (except for Robert Englund) and poor storytelling all ensured that the results would be disappointing. The sets in the episodes look so bland and non- descript, they don't resemble anything from real life. Robert Englund is billed first and that was the correct decision as he is the one who sells the series. Each episode begins with Freddy introducing the story from his boiler room and makes an occasional appearance during the episode. For obvious reasons, Freddy's evil behaviour is toned down for television audiences. I don't really like the episodes that I have seen. The only one I can think of that was remotely watchable, was the opening one when Freddy tells his own story about how he ended up the way he did. The show does have a dark and macabre sense of humour which is made bearable by Robert Englund. He is great to watch but the rest is poor.
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Of course, the fact that it is different than that series is both good and bad. This one is more of the "Tales from the Darkside" type of storytelling to it, and it actually had something to do with the movie. The Friday series had nothing to do with the movie, but had a nice running story. Freddy starred in this one, but a lot of the times he was more the host of the show rather than an actual participant. However, he did appear as the star of some of the episodes...think "Tales from the Crypt", but with the crypt keeper occasionally doing some of the dirty work himself. The stories varied in type and such as I remember one about survivors of a plane crash or something becoming cannibals and I also remember one involving Freddy and a cop, kind of a look back on how Freddy became Freddy. In the end a bit of an unnecessary show, there were already plenty of shows like this at the time that were superior in storytelling, the only thing new this one brought to the table was having the famous Freddy Krueger as a host.
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twisted_sista11 September 2001Its not as good as the movies but its watchable. I enjoyed Sisters Keeper the best as it was a good story and it has a truely disturbing end! If there's nothing on TV to watch then go rent this its not as awful as it sounds.
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chrislawuk27 October 2019Very similar to other series of similar nature like Tales from the Crypt and Hitchcock earlier. Roles within relationships and the familiy within a capitalist culture are common themes the scripts revolve around. Vanity and power struggle often central, ultimately leading to the premature deaht of the characters. From this perspective theyre is a moral values, christian in nature, twist to the series. Freddy take on justice for a social Faux pas is a comically grotesque death served up with one of his infamous cheesey one liners.. I only saw a few episodes when I was young and am now really enjoying the full series I recently got hold of. They are fairly well written but its really a nostalgic journey for me back to the 80s. What can you say, the 80s was a strange time, when even grisley fictional charaters like Freddy Kruger could become a cultural icons.Its part of being an 80s baby lol. Its hard to find a series as emblematic of the 80s as this, from the culture struggle of social identity, to the hair cuts, music and sets. Having a morbid sense of humour was also an essential social must.
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safenoe26 September 2021Definitely nostalgic, and I liked the bridge between the first segment and the second one through a minor character in the first segment having more prominence in the second one. Sure, some episodes lacked the Freddy element, but still worth reflecting upon.
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mpstjohn16 January 2009I'm a bit conflicted over this. The show is on one hand awful, the acting is terrible (even when we get actual name actors like Brad Pitt and Bill Moseley in one episode), the dialogue is moronic and the premise/moral of each episode feels like something lifted out of a 50s educational short. There's no way you'll be scared for a moment from any of these episodes, and Robert Englund's cameos are short, pointless and corny in a sort of a Bob Saget on America's Funniest Home Videos kind of way.
On the other hand this is one of the funniest things to ever be on television. The 80s fashions, the soft focus makes the actors look like their on the set of The View at all times, the premises lend the material more to self-parody than scares, so we're left with an episode where a high school kid is afraid if he fails his SAT's his girlfriend will dump him and his parents disown him, another is afraid she'll be locked up in prison because she's a substandard mom (her husband is played by Brad Pit), another is afraid that all the parents in the world are in league against him when he runs away from home, another is afraid she'll be confused with her socially-retarded twin, another is afraid if he doesn't break up his mom and step-dad he'll get killed for having a party at his house. The list goes on and on.
Being that these are dreams I suppose you could look past the ludicrous plot points and devices, but they're so out of left field that there's no opportunities for the writers to actually scare the audience. You have characters dressed like something out of a 80s-themed nightmare wandering around delivering bad dialogue in very hammy fashion and making illogical decisions that serve no other purpose but to move the story to the next weird plot point (typically watching as a peripheral character does something uncharacteristic of a sane person while our main character stares aghast and too shocked to do anything about it).
If you're looking for something that'll scare you stay away. If you're looking, on the other hand, for one of the funniest things to come out of the 80s ever. Watch it.
Its been showing on Chiller TV lately (pretty much every day) and I've been watching, earlier out of morbid curiosity, and now just so I can get a good laugh in each day. With Arrested Development and Extras off the air this is officially the funniest thing on television right now. -
I like Freddy so i was stoked when this was finally abailable to watch...corny as hell and most episodes were like a bad soap opera it started with some semblance of promise and them just went downhill...i get it was on tv so it couldnt be rated r for violence but give me something...ive been watching it syraight through to finish it and only have a couple episodes left but ive just been on my phone mostly.
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RHGifs20 September 2014I remember being a kid and seeing commercials for this show but, since it was on late at night, I never had the pleasure of watching it. Chiller TV ran marathons of this 7 or 8 years ago and, being the low budget, schlock loving individual that I am, came to enjoy this series greatly.
Season one shines far brighter than season two with episodes such as "It's A Miserable Life", "Sister's Keeper", "Do Dreams Bleed" and "Identity Crisis" standing out amongst the pack. Almost all of the episodes are cheesy as all get-out but still just kind of have that weird 80's vibe compounded by random and bizarre stories that make them enjoyable nonetheless.
I'd love to see this series get a full release on video. It's a classic among schlock mongers and utilizes standard 80's stereotypes that would likely be considered weird by those born long after the series originally aired. -
shaundowning136664 September 2023Let's get the big elephant in the room out the way.
If you, let's face it it is, to continue on from a Nightmare on Elm Street there is maybe a handful.
The real connection to series is slim. For the most part the only connection is Freddy who introduces the episodes and that's it.
There's one that deals with his trial and he's starred in 1 or 2.
But for the most part the stories could stand easily on there own.
Even if they took Freddy out the show is good enough to stand on there own.
When I first heard of a series I hoped it would touch base with Freddy's past.
But with the except of the trial episode nothing.
I felt short changed it very gratuitous just to shovel Freddy in for higher ratings. -
bbjzilla22 June 2021Admittedly I've only watched 2 episodes but you don't have to eat a whole plate of spaghetti to find out if it all tastes bad.
While not terrible in itself, these are exercises in wringing every last drop of imagination, constantly reinventing a fairly wafer thin scenario (burger joint stick up/ hospital admission/ track and field star) replaying the same events and reusing the same few cast members over again in a way that stretches their meagre budgets into something so thin it's becomes a chore. If each one were distilled into a 3 minute rock video they wouldn't seem out of place.
Each episode (or half episode as it appears sometimes 2 narratives are spliced) is bookended by Freddie himself, obviously phoning it in, wisecracking so maliciously you miss his presence from the remainder of the tedium, only accentuating the poor production value.
At 44 episodes this is an exercise in brand recognition the same way McDonald's use Disney films to promote Happy Meals. -
hoversj30 December 2005I still have grainy, late night, no-cable, cheap VHS dubs of this show from waaaaaayyyy back when, late-night-commercials and all, when I would stay up to whatever weird hour they would slap this show on -- just so I could tape it.
The series wasn't really ABOUT Freddy Kreuger - only the first couple of episodes actually involved him as anything but a Rod Serling-esquire announcer. Instead, each episode was a distinct nightmare, using the traditional horror themes of horrific childhood, dating, cannibalism, dating, money, death, dating, and... hmm... dating.
From the episode where a teenage boy accidentally says "I will love you forever" to the wrong girl, and is stuck with her (literally, at least for a moment, they grow together...), to the one where a young stewardess goes home with a strange man, only to find herself in his cabin, where he has a trophy room full of other stewardesses, and one I only vaguely remember which compared blind dates to hockey (and the injuries and penalties that go with it) - dating was definitely the scariest thing in the series.
One episode had Jeffrey Combs (Re-Animator, etc.) as a motivated pizza merchant with a tasty new secret ingredient. Not original, but still creepy and fun....
Even so, some of the episodes were great. My personal favorite was "It's a Miserable Life" where a young man is trapped working in his parents' burger joint, when he wants to go off to college. Stuck talking to himself and doing little puppet shows with old cheeseburgers - until one late night when a weird guy comes through the drive through and suddenly his life is not the same. No, not Freddy, just a thug with a gun - turns out the whole mind-blowing episode is just that - the last thoughts that pass through the kid's head... along with a bullet.
The second half of the same episode (many of the Freddie's Nightmares episodes were essentially two vaguely connected short stories) followed his girlfriend, who was also wounded, but not killed in the drive-by, and who is taken to "the hospital from heck" - they cram in all the most creepy hospital nightmare clichΓ©s, and then some - from accidentally having your mouth sewn shut - or waking up during an operation - to having your dead boyfriend try and lure you into the morgue for a little cuddle.
Again, that was my favorite.
Some of the episodes were much dumber, like ALMOST ALL OF THE ONES THEY'VE MADE AVAILABLE ON VIDEO. They put the crummy ones out as representative of the series, and then nobody likes them, thinks the show stunk, and then they don't put any more on video. It's a Miserable Life is only available on PAL DVD in England - but I'm still gonna buy it. -
gwnightscream3 June 2022This horror anthology series features Robert Englund as burned, child killer, Freddy Krueger from the "Nightmare on Elm Street" films conjuring up his own twisted nightmares taking place in the town of Springwood. This is bizarre, it has a "Tales from the Crypt" vibe, I agree that the acting is bad most of the time, but Englund is entertaining as Freddy and the series also features younger stars like Brad Pitt and Mariska Hargitay.
I'd still check this out if you are a fan of Freddy, the films or horror anthologies. -
gin277227 February 2009Personally I think this show looks pretty cheaply made. Some of the actors are terrible. They over do it & seem fake. I can always tell how it's going to end within the first 10 minutes or less of watching because they make it so transparently clear. It's not very well written either. I love to watch it to laugh at it. You know the saying "It's so bad that it's good?" Well, that saying applies to this show. I also like to watch just to see if I'm right when I guess how it's all going to end. So far I've been right every time. It's like a little game that I play. It's nice when you are bored & you feel like laughing at something.
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TelevisionJunkie26 June 1999I remember the Freddy's Nightmares series very well (and recently looked into some videos that were released years ago). True, they did sell out after the third movie and turned Freddy into a cartoonish character, but the cartoonish character was perfect for the small screen. The first episode, "No More Mr. Nice Guy," mistells the story in every way (you'd think Tobe Hooper would've watched the first movie before he shot the episode), but after the show took off, the stories became more entertaining. The sequel to "Mr. Nice Guy," "Sister's Keeper," was one of my favorite episodes (though I haven't seen it in years). Some shows had little-known guest stars (such as Brad Pitt) and some featured old favorites (such as Tony Dow). Most Elm Street fans say this show was a huge disappointment (and in a way it was), but it gave Freddy another medium to wreak havok in, so I applaud their efforts.
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damian-ray117 November 2018This show seems to a be less scary and less funny version of Tales From The Crypt, except The Cryptkeeper is replaced with the less witty Freddy character.
How did this show last two seasons? Other than Freddy being the star or host of the show, it is completely unoriginal in the way it is done. It gets boring. -
Wow. Simply awful. I was a fan of the original movie, and begrudgingly sat through part 2, 3 was and improvement. 4,5 and Freddy's Dead were pretty bad. But NOTHING is as bad as Freddy's Nightmares. Freddy acts as a Rod Serlingesq host of this anthology series.
I can accept how Freddy became one punchline after another, but at least in the movies the appeal of Freddy carried the movies, but here these were so poorly made, they looked like high school productions of a horror series. The poor actors, if you really want to call yourself that after doing this show were obviously exactly what they paid for. I'm nearly certain this was a stopping point for two types of actors. Ones just starting on the Hollywood ladder, brand new willing to take any part that would put off their having to take that porn job they were offered last week, or seasoned actors on their way down the Hollywood ladder willing to take any part that would put off their having to take that porn job they were offered last week.
I half expected Dana Plato to guest star, but she was already dead by the time this was in production.
To paraphrase Nancy's line in the original Elm St,"What ever you do try not to fall asleep watching this." -
www-jabba8318 May 2007i know technically this isn't the greatest TV show ever,i mean it was shot on video and its limitations show in both the audio and visual aspect of it.the acting can at time be also a little crumby.but,i love this show so much.it scared the hell out of me when it first aired in 1988.of course it would i was 5 years old.but i recently purchased the DVD of the first 3 episodes,which unfortunately i hear is now deleted.and i also heard warner's aren't going to release any more due to the first DVD's bad sales.also the TV show didn't have the same feel as the movies,in fact i thought it had a more sinister tone.even though the colour palette is similar to nightmare on elm street 4(both that film and the TV show were made the same year),this has more of a serious tone whereas the fims were progressively getting more and more sardonic and jokey.not a bad thing,i like freddy as the clown wise cracker.but i think that was the strenght of this TV show,you didn't have freddy popping up every minutes cracking a joke before and after he kills somebody.in fact this has more of a dream feel to it,reinforced by the soft focus of the lense.im not sure if its deliberate on the part of the shows creators or just to the limitations of being shot on video. i love this show,and taken not as a companion piece to the movies can be very enjoyable.much better than anything on TV today.
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neverendfs12 May 2022I wanted to like it as I love the films. The episodes are really dull and the acting is so bad....so bad... being 48 minutes an episode I feel like there could be alot more going on. Clearly low budget and not the Robert Englund I remember Guess I was hoping for the films budget and special effects in a tv series. Don't expect much other than nostalgia over something you didn't know existed. I keep thinking I have to trek through 44 episodes to see it all and that's not a good feeling.
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brentmalone10 August 2008I don't see how you can say that Freddy's Nightmares is cheesy and a rip-off. You obviously don't know good TV when you see it. The episodes are packed with drama and blood. Freddy is creative in the way he kills people. I love Freddy's Nightmares and I hope to get all 44 episodes on DVD. The best episodes are: Saturday Night Special,School Daze, and Love Stinks. If you think this series sucked then you're entitled to your opinion but remember it's only your opinion and it means nothing. Freddy's Nightmares will always be one of the best series ever and you'll come to accept that fact soon enough. If you don't like it then don't watch it but don't deny it's brilliance.
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LadyDerpyCritic29 August 2021I am a huge ANOES fan and buying every movie of the franchise was a blast! Even watching it! But buying the episodes on DVD brought me nothing but disappointment. I was expecting a lot of horror in it but it feels like I am watching Tales from the Crypt and Goosebumps. (Which I love Goosebumps), just seeing the episodes reminded me on how cheesy they can be that you can't even follow it or you are left confused. This is basically Freddy's Nightmares for ya.
When I popped the first disk into my DVD player, I watched the first episode which I followed it well. The rest of the 4 episodes of season 1, I had to stop. I was 1, getting bored to the point of falling asleep. LITERALLY! 2, you don't see much of FREDDY! He is the main star! But no, he isn't. He is basically the Crypt Keeper; Being the host of the show by doing interludes. From time to time, he may show up as an episode's plot or intervene in dreams of it but he is just a host. I had to stop after episode 5 because I just couldn't sit there and suffer the dreams anymore! I don't know if I want to come back and watch it again because I am losing interest on it.
It is all but an anthology series. The plot revolves around Freddy haunting the rest of the Elm Street children for a good 2 seasons. That is it. Do I recommend it? Eh, not really to be honest but if you are a long time fan and are interested in the series, knock yourself out. -
G.Spider28 July 1999This series was started after the awful Nightmare on Elm Street 4. Freddy's original character was by now completely obscured by feeble wisecracks and, of course, the money-minded dross industry who realized they had a cash cow on their hands. Actually, some of the episodes in this series are better than some of the later Freddy films. 'End of the World' is an interesting and thought-provoking tale about the nuclear threat. There are also other strong episodes involving crystals which can turn daydreams into nightmarish reality, machines capable of watching dreams and the like. The pilot episode re-writes the Freddy myth but is still entertaining and well-made.
However, there are also a lot of episodes which are no more than an excuse for a series of rather unimaginative surreal images and occasional unfunny 'jokes' from Freddy. These come across as very tedious. 'Saturday Night Special', for example, is just complete trash.
But if you can get hold of the better episodes then do so, as they make good viewing. -
jacobjohntaylor117 July 2017This a good TV show. It is kind of overrated. I would not say it is a 6.5. It is good but not that good. I give it 5. It does a great acting. And pretty good story lines. It has great special effects. It is better scary. Scarier then The silence of the lambs could ever be. Scarier then the reboot of Friday the 13th from 2009 could ever be. Scarier the Halloween resurrection could ever be. A Nightmare on elm street (1984) is better. A Nightmare on elm street 2 Freddy's revenge is also better. A Nightmare on elm street 3 the dream worries is also better. A Nightmare on elm street 4 the dream master. A Nightmare on elm street 5 the dream child is also better. Freddy's dead the final nightmare is also better. New nightmare is also better. Freddy vs Jason is also better. But this a good horror show. See it.
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fullenw18 April 2007This is one horror movie based TV show that gets it right. Friday the 13th the series had no connection to the movies. Poltergeist the legacy: I'm not so sure. It may have been loosely connected to the movies. It feels like they just throw a famous title on a show so fans will watch it.
It shows Freddy being burned by the Elm street parents(in the 1st episode I believe) and the amount of parents were disappointing. With all the kids he targeted in the 1st 3 movies, you'd expect there to be more parents. But oh well.
Freddy is basically the narrator for the show. He watches the actions of people in the real world sometimes getting involved somehow. Just like other anthology shows like Tales from the crypt, there's a supernatural or surprise ending twist involved.
The acting lacks but believe it or not: the violence sometimes surpasses that of the movie. This show lasted a couple of seasons and was made around the time of the 4th movie. i heard it was canceled due to protesting parents. I watched a lot of R rated stuff as a kid, so its a shame parents had to ruin it for everyone. 4 more movies came after the series , so it wasn't a total loss. -
Just as ex-New Line Cinema Head CEO & mogul Robert Shaye stated in the 5-hour NOES documentary, "well... the first 10 episodes we're pretty good... but after that..." and Shaye was spot on in his approximation, although, I personally feel that the last enjoyable, good quality and interesting episode was THE END OF THE WORLD, in which Mary Kohnert's dreams started affecting her waking reality & then even managed to narrowly avert WWIII.... FREDDY'S NIGHTMARES did start off pretty strongly all things considered, even its uneven tone and predominance of episodes lacking much of or even any Freddy involvement, still managed to entertain viewers with imaginative, appropriately surreal and nightmarish episodes that included plenty of in-jokes for those in the know, surprising guest stints from the likes of George Lazenby, Patty McCormack and the lamentable Susan Oliverπ’ and was even further complemented with a good sized built-in audience base eager to see next week's episode (hell, my grandmother was even watching it one evening when I arrived at her house, and she had never even been a horror fan!?!) Toward the latter half of the first season, there seemed to be a sudden shift in the look, over all tone, writing and the production values of the series, even Krueger's appearance changed quite noticeably (this was the time when, in response to Englund's severe dermatological skin problem due to the continuous application of the prosthetic latex makeup used to transform him into Freddy Krueger, Mark Shostrom or Howard Berger created an entirely different design and a new procedure was implemented, limiting the amount of time it took to apply the Freddy makeup, allowing the arduous daily process of its application to become far less intensive.π) There were a few moments later on that were able to break free and shine in a similar vein to the earlier episodes grandeur, such as LIFE STINKS, freddysomething, and especially the series' finale, IT"S MY PARTY & YOU'LL DIE IF I WANT YOU TO, which did successfully afford the show to end with a BIG, fat, noisy (and ridiculously dumb!π) BANG!! but for the most part, after THE END OF THE WORLD, the NIGHTMARES episodes always struck me as being some really bad, uninteresting, poorly staged, terribly written, uninspired and sadly, beyond lackluster, regrettably throw-away moments in truly awful television!! π’ But, boy some of them were just soooo good!! π