Freddy Krueger, is the main fictional character from the A Nightmare on Elm Street series of films. Created by Wes Craven and portrayed by actor Robert Englund in every film of the series, he is an undead serial killer who can attack his victims supernaturally from within their own dreams when they are in a state of sleep. Freddy is commonly identified by his burnt disfigured face, red and green striped sweater, brown fedora hat, and trademark metal-clawed leather glove. His full name has been listed as Frederick Charles Krueger.
Origins
A Nightmare on Elm Street creator Wes Craven returned to the Nightmare franchise
in 1994 with Wes Craven’s New Nightmare; giving audiences a new version of
Freddy Krueger. New Nightmare, which celebrates the first film’s tenth
anniversary, showed a darker and more sinister Freddy than what was presented in
the previous films. The story (which takes place outside the film continuity and
in the fictional “real world”) has Freddy haunting and killing the cast/crew
members of the original film. Wes Craven described this “new” Freddy as an
abstract ancient evil that had been captured in the Nightmare story. Now that
the films had ended with Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare, the evil (in the
guise of Freddy) had escaped to begin its reign of terror in the real world.
As the film plays out, Freddy targets Heather Langenkamp (the star of the first
film) and her (fictional) son Dylan; killing Lagankamp is its only means of
being fully released from fiction. While Freddy is preoccupied with killing
Langenkamp and her son, Craven writes a new script titled “New Nightmare” in
order to trap the evil again. By film’s end, Langenkamp manages to defeat the
Krueger entity, and saves her son in the process. Craven, in closing, completed
his script (which paralleled the film’s events) stating, “Freddy is back where
he belongs.”
The “look” of Freddy in this film is more in line with what Craven had imagined
for the character, allowing the jokester, clowning Freddy portrayed in the
earlier films to be cast away. It is also interesting to note that within the
film's credits, Krueger is credited as "Himself".
No More Mr. Nice Guy
The 1988 Freddy's Nightmares episode No More Mr. Nice Guy presented a less
gruesome interpretation of Krueger’s death. Due to budget constraints, many of
the series' original actors did not appear. Most episodes of Freddy's Nightmares
do not interfere with the established timeline, though a few episodes do present
dates that conflict with the film series' timeline of events.
Inspiration
Craven claims his inspiration for the basis of Krueger's power stem from a
series of stories in the LA Times about a series of mysterious deaths: all the
victims had reported recurring nightmares beforehand, and died in their sleep.
Physically, Craven's inspirations for Freddy included a homeless man who had
frightened Craven as a youth, and a bully at his school. The 1970s pop song
"Dream Weaver" by Gary Wright sealed the story for Craven, giving him not only
an artistic setting to "jump off" from, but the synthesizer riff from the Elm
Street soundtrack.
New Line vs. Wes Craven
As the Nightmare on Elm Street series progressed, director Wes Craven's original
vision of Krueger as a true personification of evil was altered several times.
Due to the enormous popularity of the films, the succeeding writers/directors
chose to develop Freddy into more of a sardonic, wisecracking and flamboyant
anti-hero of the 1980s horror genre.
Initially, Craven did not intend any sequels and wanted the first film to be a
stand-alone movie. When the original Nightmare became a mega hit, however, New
Line insisted on following it up — in spite of both Craven, and original
Nightmare heroine Heather Langenkamp ("Nancy") declining involvement. The second
entry, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge was released to box office
success — topping the profits of the original.
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors gave the series a new lease on life.
Craven wanted Dream Warriors to be the end of the series, but the studio refused.
Craven and New Line's relationship ended for a number of years as a result of
their conflicting visions for the Nightmare enterprise. Later, in Craven's
Scream a character would say that "the first movie was great but the rest sucked"
— a jab at the other films.
As the series progressed, Craven revisited his creation a second time with Wes
Craven's New Nightmare, a non-canon spinoff. This film departs from the other
entries by taking place in the real world and removing Krueger's previous
comedic undertones. It was the least profitable of the series, however. Once
again, Craven and New Line parted ways. It is stated at the Internet Movie
Database that Craven watched all of the previous movies before he filmed New
Nightmare, and that he could not understand the plot line at all.
Memorabilia
The Nightmare on Elm Street series spawned a huge merchandising collecting cult.
Even 20 years after the first film was released, the merchandising is still
ongoing, with sites like eBay listing hundreds of pieces of A Nightmare on Elm
Street memorabilia every day and new products rolling off the assembly line and
into toy stores around the world.
A private collector from New Zealand has established an online collection of
Nightmare on Elm Street and Freddy Krueger memorabilia spanning more than 20
years and featuring items from all round the world.
References
^ Rockoff, Adam (2002). Going to Pieces. McFarland & Company, 153. ISBN
0-7864-1227-5. ("In the original script, Freddy Krueger was a child molester, as
to Wes Craven, this was the worst thing possible. The decision was made to turn
make Kreuger into a child murderer in order to avoid being accused of exploiting
a spate of highly publicized child molestations which occurred in California
around the time A Nightmare on Elm Street went into production").
^ Listed in the short story 'Life and Death of Freddy Krueger', published in the
novel adaptation of A Nightmare on Elm Street, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2:
Freddy's Revenge, and A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors.[1]
^ In the film Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare, Freddy's past is tied with the
house that appears in every Nightmare film: 1428 Elm Street. In 1992, a
companion book to the film series, The Nightmare Never Ends, was released
containing a short hypothesis by author Andy Mangels regarding the inconsistent
appearances of the house on 1428 Elm Street shown in the Nightmare sequels.
Mangels suggests that Freddy's past shown in Freddy's Dead takes place at
another street number – though the film blatantly shows[2] the house number at
1428. A scene cut[3] from the film also shows the central character finding
Freddy's old lair behind a poorly sealed wall in the basement of 1428 Elm
Street. The article from The Nightmare Never Ends has created confusion for the
fan community, even though the shooting script[4] for the film and Director/Screenwriter
Rachel Talalay confirmed that Krueger's family lived in the house that would
become infamous. Andy Mangels himself had no part in the scriptwriting or
production of the film, so his theory cannot be considered canon.
^ Alice Johnson and her son Jacob appeared in the comic book series Nightmares
on Elm Street, published by now defunct comic book company Innovation Comics.
The six issue mini-series, which was released in 1992, was meant to bridge the
story gap between A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child and Freddy's
Dead: The Final Nightmare. The story focuses on Freddy trying to convince
six-year-old Jacob Johnson into using his psychic abilities to help him escape
Springwood. Innovation worked closely with New Line Cinema when crafting the
story, which leads it to be considered canon.[5]
^ Freddy vs. Jason scriptwriter Mark Swift indicated that various endings were
written for the film, with the final ending being thought of by Robert Shaye,
New Line's CEO. It's Swift's opinion that Jason indeed won the battle, though he
mentions, "We certainly didn't want a draw, but we wanted it to end up that both
sides could claim some sort of victory."[6]