Based on the Fear Street books by the duke of spook, R.L. Stine, Netflix’s Fear Street trilogy – which was released in 2021 – won over a lot of its audience, as it introduced everyone to the cursed town of Shadyside and paid tribute to horror films of yesteryear.
Now, there’s a brand-new instalment titled Fear Street: Prom Queen, which takes everyone back to another celebrated era: the electric ’80s. Sounds like a match made in horror heaven, right? If only. Mild spoilers for Fear Street: Prom Queen to follow.
It’s 1988, and all that Shadyside High can talk about is prom night. For the high school girls, there’s intense competition over who will be crowned queen. The entitled and pompous queen bee of the school, Tiffany Falconer (Fina Strazza), eyes the title, but her group of Plastics clones called the Wolfpack also have their sights set on the big moment. Elsewhere, the shy outsider Lori Granger (India Fowler) demonstrates that she, too, could be a contender to the crown, much to the ire of Tiffany and her pals. There’s a problem, though: on prom night, a masked killer appears and starts to knock off the potential queens, leaving everyone wondering who’s behind it all.
Netflix
There’s a comforting familiarity to the first act of Fear Street: Prom Queen. It doesn’t try to run away from its various influences, whether it be Carrie, Mean Girls, or Prom Night. Matt Palmer and Donald McLeary’s script works hard to nail down the typical high school experience from those films, and it largely gets it right. Everyone knows what I’m talking about: the bullies target the quiet one and rule the school with an iron fist, while others secretly hope these heinous teenagers get their comeuppance. While it’s nothing revolutionary or unseen before in the genre, the story ticks along at a decent pace and keeps the viewer invested in the characters.
The biggest issue, though, is the actual meat of the movie: prom night. Here, it’s where everything falls apart, because of an inability to commit to one direction and far too much homage to everything. It goes from slasher to horror comedy to straight-up comedy to parody, then all the way back to the start. There’s no identity to this film, nothing that makes it different from its predecessors. You can’t fault the actors because they perform admirably and what’s asked of them, but the direction is completely off here. Instead, this comes across like a first-year film where a director throws all their influences into a giant melting pot and mixes it all together, yet forgets the most important ingredient of all: their own unique storytelling voice.
One scene, in particular, sums up the bizarre nature of this film. After a tense encounter between Lori and Tiffany, they face off… in a dance battle. I’m not kidding. What is this? Guardians of the Galaxy? This only emphasizes Fear Street: Prom Queen‘s tonal problem. Is it Prom Night, Stranger Things, or Mean Girls? Quite frankly, the filmmakers don’t appear to know either. As a viewer, it’s jarring to see the film zigzag across genres and tones so many times in under 90 minutes, appealing to both everybody and nobody in the process.
Oh, and the killer reveal? Woof! Scooby-Doo villains had better motivations than this masked figure’s bogus agenda. It’s impossible to not laugh at the fact that you sat through the entire movie for this weak sauce moment. It doesn’t get any better from there, as there’s yet another twist that absolutely everyone could see coming a mile away. Well, at least there wasn’t another dance-off to settle matters, so small mercies.
Considering how refreshing and well received the previous Fear Streets films were, Fear Street: Prom Queen is nothing but a bitter disappointment. A worst film of the year contender? Maybe. Not only does it poorly remix other teen movies, but it also fails to decide what it wants to be. It’s like dipping a lollipop in cheese sauce and sprinkling it with mushrooms. It’s Taylor Swift playing with Dimmu Borgir via Tiësto. I don’t know what this is, or who it’s supposed to be for, and neither do the people who made it, apparently. If no one cares, neither should you.
Now, there’s a brand-new instalment titled Fear Street: Prom Queen, which takes everyone back to another celebrated era: the electric ’80s. Sounds like a match made in horror heaven, right? If only. Mild spoilers for Fear Street: Prom Queen to follow.
The remixed battle for the crown
It’s 1988, and all that Shadyside High can talk about is prom night. For the high school girls, there’s intense competition over who will be crowned queen. The entitled and pompous queen bee of the school, Tiffany Falconer (Fina Strazza), eyes the title, but her group of Plastics clones called the Wolfpack also have their sights set on the big moment. Elsewhere, the shy outsider Lori Granger (India Fowler) demonstrates that she, too, could be a contender to the crown, much to the ire of Tiffany and her pals. There’s a problem, though: on prom night, a masked killer appears and starts to knock off the potential queens, leaving everyone wondering who’s behind it all.
Netflix
There’s a comforting familiarity to the first act of Fear Street: Prom Queen. It doesn’t try to run away from its various influences, whether it be Carrie, Mean Girls, or Prom Night. Matt Palmer and Donald McLeary’s script works hard to nail down the typical high school experience from those films, and it largely gets it right. Everyone knows what I’m talking about: the bullies target the quiet one and rule the school with an iron fist, while others secretly hope these heinous teenagers get their comeuppance. While it’s nothing revolutionary or unseen before in the genre, the story ticks along at a decent pace and keeps the viewer invested in the characters.
The biggest issue, though, is the actual meat of the movie: prom night. Here, it’s where everything falls apart, because of an inability to commit to one direction and far too much homage to everything. It goes from slasher to horror comedy to straight-up comedy to parody, then all the way back to the start. There’s no identity to this film, nothing that makes it different from its predecessors. You can’t fault the actors because they perform admirably and what’s asked of them, but the direction is completely off here. Instead, this comes across like a first-year film where a director throws all their influences into a giant melting pot and mixes it all together, yet forgets the most important ingredient of all: their own unique storytelling voice.
What a strange little movie you are
One scene, in particular, sums up the bizarre nature of this film. After a tense encounter between Lori and Tiffany, they face off… in a dance battle. I’m not kidding. What is this? Guardians of the Galaxy? This only emphasizes Fear Street: Prom Queen‘s tonal problem. Is it Prom Night, Stranger Things, or Mean Girls? Quite frankly, the filmmakers don’t appear to know either. As a viewer, it’s jarring to see the film zigzag across genres and tones so many times in under 90 minutes, appealing to both everybody and nobody in the process.
Oh, and the killer reveal? Woof! Scooby-Doo villains had better motivations than this masked figure’s bogus agenda. It’s impossible to not laugh at the fact that you sat through the entire movie for this weak sauce moment. It doesn’t get any better from there, as there’s yet another twist that absolutely everyone could see coming a mile away. Well, at least there wasn’t another dance-off to settle matters, so small mercies.
Don’t waste your time on ‘Fear Street: Prom Queen’
Considering how refreshing and well received the previous Fear Streets films were, Fear Street: Prom Queen is nothing but a bitter disappointment. A worst film of the year contender? Maybe. Not only does it poorly remix other teen movies, but it also fails to decide what it wants to be. It’s like dipping a lollipop in cheese sauce and sprinkling it with mushrooms. It’s Taylor Swift playing with Dimmu Borgir via Tiësto. I don’t know what this is, or who it’s supposed to be for, and neither do the people who made it, apparently. If no one cares, neither should you.