Horror Middle Child Fear Street: 1978 Is a Slower, Sloppier Slasher Excelling at Set-Up

The middle entry of a film trilogy, at least on paper, immediately seems like it would be the most difficult to plot out in a way that allows that entry to stand on its own, without the context of the films that precede and follow it. Hew too close in your second entry—which must be considered a “sequel,” even if the trilogy is all being released at once—and the novelty grinds to a halt, while potentially exposing the shortcomings of the original in the process. Diverge too dramatically, and you risk muddying the aesthetic of the trilogy as a whole. Ultimately, the easiest route is simply to play things relatively safe, handing off the torch to the third film and allowing that entry to cement viewers’ final impression of the series.

That’s pretty much Fear Street Part 2: 1978 in a nutshell. This second entry of director Leigh Janiak’s ambitious R.L. Stine adaptation trilogy for Netflix hits the ground running, with plenty of momentum provided by the surprisingly visceral Fear Street: 1994, and although it follows through on that film’s lively visuals and gruesome deaths, it finds itself hurting somewhat for compelling characters and variety in what it’s able to offer. Bound by its retro summer camp theming and the obvious horror allusions that theming implies, 1978 is a more lightweight diversion that occasionally finds itself spinning its wheels, although it does redeem itself with a startling transition into the jumping off point for final entry Fear Street: 1666. Nevertheless, it feels like middle child syndrome has likely come into play on this second chapter.

It doesn’t help that the entire film is essentially told in a single flashback, as the mysterious C. Berman (Gillian Jacobs) narrates to protagonist Deena (Kiana Madeira) and brother Josh (Benjamin Flores Jr.) about the events of 16 years earlier, when she and her teenage sister came face to face with the curse of witch Sarah Fier as residents of Camp Nightwing. The Friday the 13th and Sleepaway Camp references do abound, but the true themes of this entry are the struggles of these young folks against a sort of predeterminism—much is made of the impossibility of “getting out” of the unlucky town of Shadyside, or bucking an entire town’s expectation for your future. In a manner similar to Stephen King’s Stand By Me, in which Chris Chambers laments the fact that “everyone knows I’ll turn out bad,” these kids see no real chance to get beyond the shallow mold that life has set for them.

It’s not a bad basis for this slasher-inspired story, but Fear Street: 1978 isn’t able to do much with it—perhaps relevant is the fact that director Janiak doesn’t have a screenplay credit on this installment, as she does on 1994 and 1666. The time period in particular feels less relevant to the plot this time around, being communicated largely by a ceaseless parade of licensed music from the likes of Neil Diamond, Kansas, Joan Jett and Blue Öyster Cult, rather than how these characters comport themselves. The Romero-esque themes of racial and socioeconomic tensions reappear from 1994, but the critique this time is being delivered in a more direct and heavy handed way, literally pitting the residents of unlucky (and correspondingly more diverse) Shadyside against the sneering white aristocrats of Sunnyvale in the camp’s annual “color war” competition. No one is going to miss this subtext.