It’s now been a complete FIFTEEN YEARS since we last saw the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise on screen, with Samuel Bayer’s maligned remake effectively killing off the Freddy Krueger saga back in 2010. But the poorly received remake isn’t the only thing to blame there, as the franchise rights have become increasingly complicated […]
It’s now been a complete FIFTEEN YEARS since we last saw the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise on screen, with Samuel Bayer’s maligned remake effectively killing off the Freddy Krueger saga back in 2010. But the poorly received remake isn’t the only thing to blame there, as the franchise rights have become increasingly complicated over the years.
As Bloody Disgusting reported way back in 2019, the U.S. rights to A Nightmare on Elm Street have reverted back to Wes Craven’s estate, while Warner Bros./New Line Cinema continues to own the international rights to the franchise and its iconic killer, Freddy Krueger.
But that still doesn’t quite answer the question of why nothing has been done with the franchise all these years. While Robert Englund may be retired from playing Freddy Krueger, at least in the world of live action, there’s still endless potential to revive Freddy for a new generation. What does Englund himself think about the 15 years of silence from the saga?
Englund tells Indiewire in a new chat, “There are so many people involved who have a piece of the action. When Wes passed away, he left an awful lot of rights to his estate. He has many many rights that he worked out between character titles and names and plot and things like that. New Line Cinema obviously has a big hand in it. And much of that was surrendered to Ted Turner, then went to Warner Bros. So Warner Bros. has a huge piece of it. I know Michael Bay had been involved with some interest and also Blumhouse.”
“I think the [2010] remake was premature,” Englund muses. “I love a lot of the actors in the movie, so I’m not going to say anything bad about it, I just think the timing was off.”
What would Englund choose to do with the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise for the next installment? “I know, eventually, they are going to reboot the franchise,” he tells Indiewire. “And I think they can do part 2 as a standalone and really get into the subtext of Freddy manipulating Jesse and playing with his subconscious.”
He adds, “My theory would be, you don’t go near again. You either do a prequel or start with , which is the biggest success in the franchise and a fan favorite. So I would do 3, 4, and 5. .”
