Last year, Netflix conducted an ambitious Halloween streaming experiment, releasing a trilogy across three weeks, starting on July 2. Taking inspiration from the book series written by R.L. Stine, the trilogy’s stylistic and atmospheric worldbuilding makes it rewatchable for any spooky Halloween season.
“Fear Street Part One: 1994”
A series of bloody murders have plagued the rundown American town of Shadyside for the past 300 years. Many residents, including those from its rival town, Sunnyvale, were led to believe that Shadyside had been cursed by Sarah Fier (Elizabeth Scopel), an accused witch who was hanged in 1666. While Deena (Kiana Madeira) seeks romantic vengeance against her ex, Sam (Olivia Scott Welch), they quickly join forces with Deena’s younger brother Josh (Benjamin Flores Jr.) and her best friends Kate (Julia Rehwald) and Simon (Fred Hechinger) to end the witch’s curse that has mystically resurrected the town’s most notorious killers.
As we are first introduced to our continuing cast of the trilogy, “Fear Street Part One: 1994” limits itself with its paper-thin dialogue and characterization of their main and side characters. Rather than acting practically in life-threatening situations, the angsty high schoolers often end up making the wrong decisions and overcomplicating their plans.
This is not necessarily something that is uncommon in the horror genre, yet the film forces some of their likable characters to act in ways that will only advance the plot. Rather than naturally eliciting excitement and suspense, its forced techniques fall flat and poorly substitute its entertainment for shock factor, resulting in a frustrated, unsatisfied audience.
While the film suffers from slow pacing and overwriting, the directing choices and editing compensate tenfold. The film’s vibrant colors and shadows are used as a storytelling vehicle; the darkened shadows blend nicely with the colorful, saturated fluorescents to imbue fear and suspense. Nonetheless, “Fear Street Part One: 1996” unfortunately begins on the wrong foot with a confusing marriage of ‘90s horror film aesthetic and Riverdale-like dialogue that doesn’t quite fit in, cheapening its dark aesthetic.
“Fear Street Part Two: 1978”
In a flashback to 1978, a joyful summer camp of kids from the towns of Shadyside and Sunnyvale quickly turns into a horrifying bloodbath. Unlike her popular sister, Cindy Berman (Emily Rudd), who works as a camp counselor, Ziggy Berman (Sadie Sink) struggles as an outsider. When an axe-wielding killer suddenly terrorizes their summer haven, Cindy desperately searches for her sister until she discovers the witch’s bones in an underground cave below the camp.
Though the film builds on a strained relationship between two sisters who never seem to understand each other, the film undoubtedly finds its footing with its aesthetic and homages. A loose killer on a campsite is something beloved horror fans have seen countless times before; the film’s plot plays out like “Friday the 13th” while borrowing influence from films like “Carrie” to shape Ziggy as an outsider.
The film knows who their audience is and what they want, proudly wearing its influences on its sleeve like a camp badge of honor. Unlike “Fear Street Part One: 1996,” the sequel profits from their characters playing caricatures of horror tropes and emerging through their respective arcs as well-rounded characters by the end.
After Ziggy and Cindy reunite, they finally learn to love each other and value their sisterhood before Cindy sacrifices herself. Her poignant death leaves Ziggy as the film’s final girl, the only sole survivor to tell her story to our main character, Deena.
Even though “Fear Street Part Two: 1978” begins with Deena visiting Ziggy, who now lives alone as an adult, the film pivots back to the ‘70s for the remainder of the film and tells a story that seemingly exists in its world of the past. It is only until the last few minutes of the movie where we return to the main plot, tying it all together. As a result, “Fear Street Part Two: 1978” succeeds commercially as the strongest of the three while effectively thrusting its viewers into the past and revisiting their favorite horror tropes.
“Fear Street Part Three: 1666”
In the first half of “Fear Street Part Three: 1666,” Deena desperately attempts to end the curse by reuniting the remaining bones of Sarah Fier with the rest of her corpse and relives a flashback to 1666 through the eyes of Fier herself. Through this psychological, mind-splitting experience, Deena learns the dark history of how the town of Union wrongfully accused Sarah Fier of witchcraft and divided into two: Shadyside and Sunnyvale.
“Fear Street Part Three: 1666” is the most experimental of them all; the flashback recycles the characters we have met before to play different characters from the past with uncanny backstories. This is most effective with the strained relationship Sarah Fier shares with her friend Hannah Miller (Olivia Scott Welch) as their romantic dynamic mirrors those of Deena and Sam in the present.
These parallels inspire an interesting and experimental concept for the horror genre, especially when the film’s predecessors have milked every commercial horror trope in the book.
However, the film has more tricks and treats up its sleeve with a heartbreaking plot twist and sudden pivot that occurs in the third act of the movie. When the town accuses Fier’s partner of witchcraft, Fier steps in and persuades the town that she is the real witch. Immediately, Fier is hanged after she swears vengeance on the townspeople who have wronged her for her romantic involvement with another woman and the evil doings of the Goode family, who have been the ones performing satanic rituals.
Fier’s emotional death scene consists of abruptly stitched shots of the trilogy, powerfully revealing the film’s subtexts of homophobia, misogyny and injustice. This scene alone permeates the third film with the purpose of storytelling, jumping back to where we left off with Deena’s main quest to break the curse of the town with her new knowledge.
When Deena returns to her reality again, the puzzle pieces come together; Fier was never a witch or the enemy that the town pegged her to be. With this profound discovery, the film pivots back to 1994 and brands the rest of the film as a sequel to the first movie, jumpscaring its audience with the title card for “Fear Street 1994: Part Two.”
While the tragedy of Fier’s past is essentially the skeleton of the trilogy, each film exists in dramatically different realms of aesthetics and visual styles while gradually contributing to the same overarching plot. Each part of the trilogy carries strong commercial value yet each one is stylistically distinguishable from one another, allowing the cohesive trilogy to achieve its rewatchable quality.
There is also much to be appreciated in the trilogy’s appealing color grading for their films and color palette for their retro movie posters — each movie has a designated color palette that is reminiscent of the film’s setting. While “Fear Street Part One: 1994” is distinctive with its cool hues of bright purple and blue, similar to the colors of the Shadyside mall neon signs, “Fear Street Part Two: 1978” has warmer color grading and hues adjacent to the warmth of a campfire.
If it’s one thing that Netflix’s “Fear Street” trilogy knows how to do, it’s style. Despite the trilogy’s slow start, the directing of the three-part trilogy does not completely play like a regurgitation of old horror tropes. Instead, Netflix conducted a unique standout joining the pantheon of its horror movies, skillfully blending fright and fun with a cohesive, intriguing plot, nostalgic color grading and powerful messages.
Raymond Dinh is an Arts & Entertainment Intern for the fall 2022 quarter. He can be reached at raymontd@uci.edu.