The Reel Review
The final installment in the Netflix Fear Street trilogy goes back to 1666, to determine the source of the 300 year old curse on the town of Shadyside. The cast of the first two films – Fear Street: Part One 1994 and Fear Street: Part Two 1978 – returns to play various roles in the period witch-hunting horror.
Co-writer/director Leigh Janiak saves the best for last, with a clever, well crafted story that does its gorier, loose adaptation of R.L. Stine’s book series justice, with a fitting nod to the literary horror classic The Crucible and an ample dose of gore for aficionados. The LGBTQ+ love story adds an additional modern element to the adaptation.
The only downside is a somewhat clumsy and goofy finalé that transports the story back to the first film’s 1994 shopping mall setting to resolve the mystery. Its sillier, Super Soaker-infused mood doesn’t quite match the film’s stronger, more dramatic first half, but it is still a fun homage to the modern history of horror films.
REEL FACTS
• Author R.L. Stine, who wrote the Fear Street young adult novels that were the source material for the trilogy, visited the set during filming.
• Scream composer Marco Beltrami provides the score for all three films in the trilogy.
• Filmed in Georgia over a 106 day period in 2019, the Fear Street trilogy initially was planned for a theatrical release in 2020 until the COVID-19 pandemic struck, landing them on Netflix.
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