If you were caught up in the Fear Street craze of 2021, you likely remember where and when you watched those movies. They’re all over the place quality-wise, but I remember the exact place I watched them: With my lovely wife, on a vacation to Brown County, Indiana, and we stayed in our favorite cabin there, close to little Nashville. It was idyllic. Anyway.

The Fear Street trilogy — now four, I guess — came out with mixed reviews. We binged them all in a weekend. They were light, campy movies playing on horror tropes, but they did it in a fun, Stranger Things-esque way. The first and second movies were both way up and way down, depending on the ten-minute chunk you watched. The last one was uniquely unnerving until about halfway through. Overall, I’d recommend watching them!

Instead of… you know. Watching this.

Let’s get right into it.

Good

First, the movie does a great job with aesthetics and nostalgia-bait — after all, that’s what you want in a 1988 slasher titled Prom Queen. The first half-hour is full of this. Everything surrounding the high-school drama, the Prom setup, the social feuds, and of course the costumes, it’s all done very well. The characters are a little trope-y, even more than the first Fear Street, which did character-building the best. But overall, it’s good for a high school called Shadyside High.

(You’ll have to get over the corny names thing with these movies. That’s like… the first hurdle.)

Second, the movie wastes no time getting started. Early on, there’s a very bloody kill, probably too much for me. That’s another thing with these movies, but some people like it, of course. And The Conference did it flawlessly. (Check out my review of that much-better movie here.)

The ending is satisfying, I’d say, but I also wanted the movie to be over. I don’t mean to be condescending to this film, but it wasn’t good. And after the initial trilogy, I’d hoped for better.

Bad

I only have two points to make negatively, but they encompass pretty much the whole movie. Besides, why waste time? I’ve got 5 more movie reviews to write tonight! (Apparently, this week is my “catch up on 2022 horror movies I missed” era.)

First, this movie’s writing is pretty bad overall, both the dialogue and the story (though especially the dialogue.) There is lots and lots of recapping. This is a problem, anyway, but especially for such a short movie where not much happens. Probably because they’re busy recapping what did happen.

To this movie’s credit, it doesn’t get caught up in the original Fear Street plot. In fact, it makes pretty much no reference to it. Which I’m fine with, but opinions may differ.

Secondly and more importantly for some people, the movie just isn’t surprising. There is one very bloody kill (mentioned before) which caught me off-guard. Apart from this one instance, everything was straightforward. Not in an enjoyable way, either.

Overall

Overall, I’m giving this a 4.4/10. For those keeping track at home — don’t worry! I did it for you! — it sits right above Slenderman, which at least had a couple creepy scenes and showed promise.

The Fear Street movies were packed with emotions: at times really fun, sometimes even impressive, and other times very disappointing. During this movie, however, I didn’t feel much of anything. It goes on the list as another forgettable sequel.