Robert Englund finally reveals why he disappeared in New Nightmare

Freddy Krueger actor Robert Englund solves the 30-year-old mystery of why he inexplicably vanished halfway into Wes Craven’s New Nightmare.

One of New Line Cinema’s biggest rolls of the dice, and in the history of the horror genre for that matter, was the Nightmare On Elm Street sequel New Nightmare in 1994. New Line was the “House That Freddy Built” – as in Krueger, the killer who haunts your dreams – but the character grew stale after ten years as a surprisingly marketable pop culture icon.

To liven the thrills up again, they decided to go in a completely different direction that deconstructed the character and so returned the original movie’s director Wes Craven plus its stars Heather Langenkamp and John Saxon. The man who embodied Krueger with terror and panache, Robert Englund, was along for the ride as well, but the plot did not revolve around the same old hijinx.

A new vision of terror

Given the chance to finish what he started for once, Craven brought Freddy into the real world, terrorizing the people responsible for his creation, particularly Langenkamp, better known to the world as Fred’s “Final Girl” Nancy. The film would delve deeper into Freddy’s lore and make him scary again, which is good news for fans as well as the material.

However, New Nightmare wasn’t without its blemishes if you look deep enough. One oversight is the gaping plot hole involving Englund’s double duty as both himself and Krueger. While there is no complaint about his performance – certainly not as the latter – the actor turns up without prosthetics for a few scenes but the fate of the movie’s Robert is left up in the air.

Englund’s last scene without makeup and claws is a phone conversation with Langenkamp. Talking while painting a picture, he is grilled about having nightmares related to you-know-who. As he hangs up, the camera pans to show his disturbing art verifying Englund was being stalked by Freddy. Or that’s at least a sound interpretation; the film is rather ambiguous on the matter.

Caught in a web

Unsurprisingly, this lack of exposition was not Craven’s intention. Things were just left that way, dangling, as the script was being edited. In one draft, a scene was written to fill in the gaps but rewrites caused it to never make the jump from page to screen. In short, the scene in question will never be seen by anyone, ever.

Undeterred, horror fan and citizen sleuth Lektro Quinn, bugged by this mystery for seven years, caught up with the frightful Fredster at German Comic-Con where he told all — on tape, no less. Englund revealed the existence of the unfilmed scene and described it as a nightmare of being trapped in a giant spider’s web complete with an enormous arachnid.

In an homage to The Fly, a gigantic spider with the red and green stripes of Freddy’s shirt climbs down to prey on the prone actor. He takes this as an omen of what Krueger was doing to his career and everyone else, so movie Englund stopped answering the phone, cutting off contact with Langenkamp and Craven.

Hence, he doesn’t die — or become Freddy either in another popular and compelling theory. No reason was given for why the scene was scrapped but it likely came down to the good-old encumbrances of cost and time.

Translation

Now all Nightmare fans the world over can rest easy as they finally have an answer to a nagging conundrum. They might even watch New Nightmare with a renewed perspective next time which is a great hope for a film that, although it’s garnering newfound appreciation today, in its time didn’t quite take off.

Its meta, fourth-wall-breaking plot, on the other hand, was a forerunner to things Wes Craven would explore in Scream, which called back to and broke every rule there is. We’re up to part 6 in that series as of this year but, sadly, the wait continues for the next stroll down Elm Street.

Are you a fan of Freddy and the Elm Street series? Do you think New Nightmare is an undiscovered gem and if so, how did you react to the above revelation? Sleep easy and give us your answer below or on our socials.