"I can't believe that there's a nightmare

on my street!"

The remake, or rather, reimagining of A Nightmare on Elm Street was pretty great. Reviewers will tell you otherwise, though, but that isn't something rare to the genre. It's pretty much expected.

It was by no means perfect, and in my mind didn't quite live up to the original, but the 1984 version of the film is kind of wedged into my heart pretty deep. Haley did not fall short as Freddy, and as a matter of fact, I'd say he did a fucking fantastic job. My issues with the film as a whole are somewhat 'minor', but they're enough to make a stark difference in my mind. For example, I had been led to believe that one of the biggest reasons for doing this reboot was to get Freddy away from being a wise-cracking killer. They do a good job of that, until the end of the film where Kruger gets a little dialogue heavy and starts to have that air of Englund about him.. the only difference being that it feels a lot more out of place with this Freddy than it ever did with Englund.

The first half of the movie literally had my heart racing, which almost never happens, and if it does, it's not for the length of time that it was. The suspense building that others will criticize as being 'expected and tired' is something that I applaud as feeling fresh. Part of that might be my knowing and expecting characters to die at a certain point, but that feeling should have been there with everyone, having seen the original or not. It's kind of just a goddamn genre thing. It got to me, and that doesn't fucking happen anymore, so I really just loved feeling uncomfortable again, like when I was a kid. Maybe it was just me though?

Of my two big problems with film, one was the use of CG at two particular parts that.. were really unnecessary. They should have just used spandex like they did in '84, and it would have looked great and been real. The other issue, and this might be a spoiler, is that the homage-death for our Tina character was very lackluster when compared to the original. I love watching a girl float around a room and get throw into the walls to the sounds of her back breaking just as much as the next guy, but.. I feel like I would have loved watching her get drug around the room in a far darker, bloodier, grisly mess (GRANTED this trick was done in the original movie and then AGAIN in Wes Craven's New Nightmare, but still.. the part felt like it wanted to be that scene, but didn't hit the mark).

So other than being a nit-picky fan-boy? Pretty great. I'd love to hear what other fans of the series, and genre, thought of it.

Convincing Myself

I keep lying and telling myself that the largest piece of motivation behind this project isn't just an excuse to talk to you again. I mean, the project itself means more to me than that, it really means everything to me right now. It's everything that's been plaguing and curing me for what has almost been a year, and maybe then some. It is about the important things in my life and what I've actually learned through all of this. But I can't pretend that an extremely important part of all of this was my relationship to you. And to my knowledge, you've only one out standing promise to me, and I hope you keep it.

I can already hear the horrible things that will be said about me once this is actually made public. I'm trying not to care, I really am, because this is more to me than anyone will know. Except, maybe you. And part of me is hoping that way.

I'm not going to lie to myself, and after I've tried every last thing I possibly can, I can look back and say "I was nothing but honest", and mean it. And then I will sit here, in love with you and alone, and read my book.

"He doesn't want us to cut through our chains

He wants us to cut through our feet." (And you know fucking good and well that we're doing it.)

It doesn't get easier, it's not a secret. You can't change how you feel in an instant, and sometimes you never can. Nothing can make it any less real, and it's those moments of reality that make the rest of it worth it. Sometimes we're just forced to live with pain, regardless of how much sense it makes. And all I can do is take that pain and try to make something worthwhile out of it. And I'm working on something I would call very worthwhile to me. It will probably upset a lot of people once it's out there and they see it, but I can't help but not really give a fuck. If it's what I have to do to feel something real again, then it's what I'm going to do.

In the mean time, I'm falling in love with pretty people and drawing them, poorly. This first boy's eyes were so beautiful that I would never be able to do them justice.

The second boy here has this thin, perfect neck that if I talk about for too long you might think me crazy.

(larger version upon click)

So far I'm not doing a good job masking the feeling of wanting to slit my throat*. It doesn't get easier, but I hear that if you wait long enough it does end.



*metaphor, you idiot