Of all the holidays celebrated worldwide, no single day is more loved by the UTG staff than Halloween. With the arrival of the year’s best month, the time has finally come to begin rolling out a plethora of features and special announcements we have prepared in celebration of our favorite day, including the one you’re about to read.

Now in its third year, 31 Days Of Halloweenis a recurring feature that will run throughout the month of October. The hope and goal of this column is to supply every UTG reader with a daily horror (or Halloween-themed) movie recommendation that is guaranteed to amplify your All Hallows’ Eve festivities. We’ll be watching every film the day it’s featured, and we hope you’ll follow along at home.

[Warning: the material within is likely NSFW]

Day 16: A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987)

There will always be a place in my heart for Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, and the numerous slasher film villains that were created to emulate those monsters that first helped bring the genre to the forefront of pop culture nearly half a century ago, but in my mind, the greatest killer of all will forever be Mr. Freddy Krueger. He’s slayed dozens of teenagers over the last thirty years, including a recent reboot that I’d rather pretend never existed, but even with the numerous highlights each film possesses there is one that stands out as the best of the entire Nightmare On Elm Street franchise: Dream Warriors.

Released in 1987, just like fellow 31 Days selection Street Trash, A Nightmare On Elm Street: Dream Warriors is the third film in Wes Craven’s iconic horror franchise. The film features a cast of future megastars, including a slim Laurence Fishburne (billed as ‘Larry Fishburne’) and the first-ever on screen appearance from Patricia Arquette (otherwise known as the silver screen love of my life), as well as the typical genre nobodies who will eventually succumb to the terror that is trying to make a career in Hollywood. Everyone plays their part well however, which is surprising in almost any genre film, but it’s not like anyone can outshine the nightmare inducing performance of Robert Englund.

The plot of Dream Warriors is fairly straightforward, at least for the first two acts: Franchise mainstay Nancy has grown up and become a psychiatrist specializing in dream therapy. She meets a group of teens at a local hospital facing Freddy Krueger, the same demon she once encountered in her sleep, and makes a personal vow to help them defeat the monster once and for all. She soon learns that one of the teens, Kristen, has the ability to pull other people into her dreams. Realizing this power may offer an opportunity to stop Freddy, Nancy helps the kids realize their special abilities within the nightmare world, and together the group enters Freddy’s domain in hopes of stopping him for good.

If I started to lose you around the time I mentioned someone having the ability to pull others into their dreams, you either need to loosen up or learn to appreciate films that are willing to think outside the box. One of the many things that sets the Nightmare On Elm Street franchise apart is its relentless pursuit of originality. Every film, every death, and every story is a completely different experience than the one that came before, which is something neither Halloween or Friday The 13th can claim. Taking such risks often comes with a few missteps, and those do occur from time to time, but overall the franchise stands as a testament to the horrific power of persistent creativity.

I’ll be the first to admit that Dream Warriors is the most over the top entry in the Nightmare franchise, and it’s certainly not done any favors by the fact it had to make a lot of movie magic happen in a time before CGI could solve every problem. That said, I don’t think the core adventure would be as fun or replay worthy if computers could have created everything you see on screen. You know someone, likely a group of people, spent days or weeks trying to figure out how to make it appear that Freddy was walking someone through a hospital corridor while using their veins like marionette strings. Likewise, someone was tasked with combining Freddy and a television. Those kind of efforts are not made in most films, especially today, but in Dream Warriors they’re only two examples of well over a dozen original ideas on display.

Writing this entry today I realized that many of my selections for this year’s 31 Days marathon have been focused as much on the fun you have watching them as the thrills and chills the individual films contain. Dream Warriors is another wonderful example of making the somewhat senseless killing of young people fun in a way that no other film – including those in the same franchise – has ever been able to duplicate. The fact that the story and performances are good is just icing on the cake.

You should watch every Nightmare On Elm Street annually, but if you only have time for one this Halloween season I must insist you make it Dream Warriors.

Editorial written by: James Shotwell
Last year’s Day 16 film: Cannibal Holocaust

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James Shotwell

James Shotwell is the founder of Under The Gun Review. He loves writing about music and movies almost as much as he loves his two fat cats. He's also the co-founder of Antique Records and the Marketing Coordinator for Haulix. You should probably follow him on Twitter.

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