Fear Street: 1978
Run Time: 1 Hour 48 Minutes
Rating: R
Genre: Drama, Horror, Mystery
Summary:
In 1978 there is a summer camp called Camp Nightwing where Shadysiders and Sunnyvalers go camping together. After her boyfriend, Tommy is nearly killed by the nurse, Cindy, Tommy, Arnie, and Alice attempt to discover why the nurse would try to murder a teenage boy but along the way, Tommy gets possessed and starts to kill the kids of the summer camp so Cindy and Alice try to solve what’s going on. We also see the perspective of Cindy’s sister Ziggy as she and the campers try to survive the attack.
Characters:
Fear Street Part 2: 1978 features two sisters as our lead protagonists. Cindy is the older sister who is the perfect girl. Although from Shadyside, Cindy tries her best to leave Shadyside for a better life. Ziggy, on the other hand, is a fiery child. She is passionate and loud. When bullied, she takes her stand as much as she can. Deena and Josh are also featured; however, they only have a role at the beginning of the movie.
Nathanyal: 9.0/10
Review:
As a standalone movie, Fear Street Part 2: 1978 was a good movie. Again, it wasn’t a horror movie, and it instead focuses more as a slasher and thriller. Compared to the first movie, Fear Street Part 1: 1994, I have to say that I liked the first one more. This movie has less lore than the first and focuses more on violence, so it didn’t interest me as much.
The main thing I didn’t enjoy about this movie was the amount of lore we got about the witch and the curse. Coming from the first movie, I expected Fear Street Part 2: 1978 to have a bigger focus on fleshing out the witch and the curse. Instead, we focused more on the events of Nightwing Camp. Another minor gripe with this movie is that this isn’t a horror movie. Sure, there are a few tense situations with some minor jump scares, but overall, it didn’t feel like a horror. It felt like a slasher with all the blood and gore involved.
On the good side, I really enjoyed the characters. Of everyone in this movie, Ziggy was my favourite. She seemed so unapologetic with her actions, and her “do not care” attitude made me love her character. The other characters were also given time to develop and change, so I liked all of them as well. As a whole, this cast of characters was pretty strong. Now, as a slasher movie, this movie was pretty satisfactory in that sense. There was a lot of death and gore, and I have to say that the movie went a bit overboard on some of these kills. To some, this might be much, but it’s nice watching a movie with gore for once. From a story perspective, I enjoyed learning of the background of “axe guy” from the first movie.
Overall, Fear Street Part 2: 1978 was a solid sequel to Fear Street Part 1: 1994. Although I enjoyed the first more, this one was still a fun watch. With some fun backstories and good characters, you will enjoy this movie if you liked the first.
Favourite Moment (Spoilers):
My favourite moment in Fear Street Part 2: 1978 was the reveal that C. Berman was Ziggy. Throughout Fear Street: 1978, I was sad that Ziggy would die, since I assumed C. Berman was Cindy. However, when it was revealed that Ziggy was C. Berman, everything made sense, including the part where you had to die in order to stop the witch’s curse. I also liked that the sacrifice of Cindy for Ziggy fulfills Cindy’s dying wish of saving Ziggy’s life.
Austin: 8.6/10
Review:
Fear Street: 1978 is the second movie in Netflix’s first trilogy, and it’s pretty good. It struggles to connect itself into the larger story at play, but the movie itself is quite entertaining. This is another slasher movie, as opposed to the original horror classification, so not overly scary. The gore is pretty intense at times, but if blood doesn’t bother you, this is a good one.
The idea of a camp killer is a little bit saturated, but I thought this was well written. The way we spend a bit of time developing characters before we get to the massacre part was really well done, and it makes the killing feel less futile. It matters more because it’s not just random characters being killed left, right, and centre. The lore behind the entire series starts to show its face, but we don’t get a ton of connections to the first movie. The lacklustre connection to the previous movie wasn’t awesome, and it missed out on a great opportunity to be that bridge between 1994 and 1666. I don’t think it affects the movie too much, but it definitely hurts the series as a whole.
Our characters are really well done, and although they aren’t all likable, that is by design. We get a great swing of age groups, personalities, and life experiences that create a ton of unique events. As I said, they make the killing mean something, and the emotional connections are there. When the plot gets a little bit slow or thin, the characters helped hold it together and made this a much more entertaining movie. The relationships within the movie were awesome, and it kept me engaged before the killing began.
Fear Street: 1978 is a pretty good movie, depending on why you are watching. As a connecting movie, it’s just okay but nothing spectacular. As a stand-alone, camp killer movie, it’s pretty darn good. It’s intense, gory, and full of emotional moments. I think this is the worst of the three, but the other two make this worthy of a watch.
Favourite Moment (Spoilers):
My favourite moment has to be when the killing begins. When Tommy goes mad, it’s intense, a little bit scary, and very gory. The triple tap kill is one of the more memorable moments of the movie, and it jump-starts the second half of the movie.
Sebastian: 9.0/10
Review:
This film is probably my least favourite in the series in terms of the story itself but that does not mean it is still an enjoyable slasher flick. I would say that excluding the beginning and end of this film is probably the most watchable without watching the other two. It has the least connective tissue though I would argue that the film does still have enough connectivity that no matter what it would be confusing to just watch any of these without the full context. The characters in this were great especially the character of Ziggy who’s loud mouth no crap attitude made her entertaining to watch at all times throughout the film. The plot in this film is quite straightforward as we see a summer camp where a murderer begins to kill the kids. Not without the context of the other films this just sounds like a standard slasher movie but with the added lore of Fear Street, we really begin to understand some of the true horrors of what has been happening in Shadyside for centuries. The gore and kills in this film are more gruesome and seem to be generally more violent which adds to the fear as it’s a summer camp full of kids so the murders are even more brutal. In terms of the trilogy as a whole, this one probably divulges the least amount of information other than a few key locations and again further establishing the history of Sarah Fier and Shadyside. I like seeing the roots and connection to the first film and I thought the film did a good job with its slasher elements as well.
Favourite Moment (Spoilers):
My favourite moment was the twist reveal that Ziggy was C. Berman as they obviously make you think it’s Cindy and I respect as a film that can make a twist work so well.
