I watched the second one tonight. I enjoyed it but did prefer the first one. The third looks OK, we will see, hope it turns out better than it looks and provides a satisfactory conclusion.
Finally caught up with Part 2 and then watched my advance screener of Part 3 yesterday morning. Part 2: 1978 is definitely an improvement but not by a lot. The camp slasher aspect is fun, but the one dimensional characters are still a big issue in this series and I just don't care about any of them. They at least eased off the over-zealous music licensing a fraction in this one and let the score provide more tension, which helps big time, but still when ol' sack face starts carving up the campers the impact is lost because of the bad character development. I did enjoy the Sarah Fier backstory more though and overall this was a fun time waster, but it's still nothing special. Thankfully Part 3: 1666 (which also contains Part 4: 1994 - Part 2) is an improvement over the previous parts. The 1666 story arc may be formulaic, but the big R.L. Stine twist is fun and it seems the most confident of the three "time period" stories. Also, taking place in 1666 we don't have any of that Top 40 needle drop music that took me out of both of the first two parts and the score actually provides genuine tension! I though using the 1994 characters as doppelgangers in the 1666 story worked as well. The 1666 part only accounts for a little over an hour of the movie and doesn't overstay it's welcome, then we get into 1994 - Part 2, which runs the final 35 to 40 mins and ties up the story arc and features the gang setting up some booby traps in the mall in a fun final set-piece while ending the town curse. They bring in a side character from Part 1 that ends up helping them out, but they kinda skip over a needed scene where they should be explaining what's happening and they have to convince him it's real since he just ends up part of the gang with not a question to the validity of the craziness that's actually happening. It may end up a feeling like a slasher version of Stranger Things overall (especially since it looks like the mall they shot the 1994 sections in looks like the same mall from Stranger Things Season 3) and maybe less like the actual Fear Street book series from my knowledge, but that's what audiences want these days I guess and it works for what they've done with these movies Overall they aren't great, but was worth the full watch. Just not something I'm likely to ever revisit. I still don't quite know what their final intended market was as it's not really for the now-adults that grew up on the books, but for the tweens this is some good entry level horror with some surprisingly nasty gore throughout. But being made as movies these all need to be able to stand on their own, which they do not. As a mini-series it works, but not in the format they chose. Part 1 - 2/5 Part 2 - 2.5/5 Part 3 - 3/5 Overall - 2.5/5
Overall I enjoyed all three parts. I'm glad the final film wasn't set entirely in the past as I found that portion the least entertaining from any of the movies. There is certainly enough gore in the series to satisfy horror fans and Leigh Janiak did a good job with pacing as even with a five and a half hour run time between the three parts I was never bored.
I was a fan of all three. Love that Netflix wasn’t afraid to go for the R rating. Another thing that made these great for me is how approachable they were. What I mean is my wife hates horror and will not watch it. I have to wait for her to go to bed in order to watch what I love. Makes for long nights on the weekends. Anyway, since these were mainstream and based off of childhood books she watched all three and had a good time! Was nice to have my partner along for the ride for once!
The Fear Street Sagas book series was usually pretty fun and creative, so I was hoping that was what they were going for with 1666. Unfortunately, they went with a fairly generic girl-accused-of-witchcraft-and-burned-at-the-stake plot. I'm glad this wasn't the whole movie. Even though I did not care for 1994 either, I found myself surprisingly enjoying 1994 (Part 2) tucked away after 1666. It brought everything together well, but after a fairly messy 5 hours leading up to it, it was kind of too-little too-late. Of the series as a whole, there was about an hour of 1978 that I thoroughly enjoyed (the slasher part of it), but overall this whole thing was kinda meh. You could tell they were made by someone who never read a Fear Street book. I think they just browsed the covers and wrote something super hyper for the social media generation. The costume from 1994 wasn't even from Fear Street, it was from one of Stine's Point Horror books (Halloween Night 2). HBO Max has a Point Horror anthology TV series in development, which will hopefully be a bit more '90s teen-horror nostalgic than these movies.
I enjoyed the 3rd film too but was a little burnt out by the end when they go back to 1994. Whilst I enjoyed the films as whole I don't really think I would revisit them again.
Yeah, they were fine. I do think some of the moments and ideas in them were really good but it also felt a little generic and plain at times. The killers felt a little ho hum. They looked alright but didn't really have much of a presence outside of that. Even the kills were lacking, more so in number because the few we get were pretty gruesome. I'm assuming the books weren't linked into an overarching story and I kind of feel it would have been cooler to take the same approach for the movies.
Watched about 30-40 minutes of the first. Chose to switch it to TCM 2. Take that for whatever it’s worth.
I’d been looking forward to this since whenever it was announced since I read quite a few RL Stine books back when I was a kid and the series definitely did not disappoint. 1994 was pretty good and then 1978 was even better. 1666 was just OK though, easily the weakest of the 3 for me. The first hour where it was 1666 really seemed to drag but then things picked back up a bit when we were back in 1994. It's too bad a lot of Netflix stuff doesn't wind up on BD because I would definitely like to have this series on BD.
I watched the third one tonight, it was the one I was least looking forward to, I was not that enamored by the 1666 setting and as I expected it was ok, nothing special. I was suprised the 1666 part ended so quickly, I was expecting the film to move back to 1994 but not with nearly an hour left on the clock. My interest started to peak again with the set up in the mall, but then the first police officer turned up and it all fell apart, it was lazy and ignored it's own laws all the way to the ending which was another WTF moment, MY wife and I spent most of the last 50 minutes ripping it apart with this continuing way into the end credits. It's a real shame they got it so wrong as it was a dampener on an otherwise enjoyable series. I'm glad I've seen it but based on the last hour I wouldn't want to revisit.
Don't know why I waited six months, but I dug into these over the last few days and enjoyed all of them. 1994 had the characters I liked the most and the best slasher sequences (the mall opening and the supermarket finale), but the needle drops were more aggressive than any film I can remember. *** (out of 5) 1978 was my least favorite, even though I am more into the golden age of slashers than the '90s revival. Splitting the focus between groups of characters who weren't very well developed hurt this one. There's also the matter of the "twist" at the end that was so poorly handled I was confused when it was revealed because I thought the "big reveal" was obvious from frame one. *** (out of 5) 1666 was the one I was least looking forward to and I ended up enjoying it the most. I'm not a fan of horror prequels like Ginger Snaps Back, From Dusk Till Dawn 3, or Tremors 4, but this old timey flashback really worked for me. I enjoyed seeing the actors from the previous installments play the village teens and the way it recontextualized the curse of Sarah Fier. ***1/2 (out of 5)
