Some people never learn.

A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge often gets rated as the series' worst offering, and that partly stems from the way it ignores the "rules" of the Nightmare universe. It also does a terrible job with continuity, and it generally appears to exist in a different realm than the others.

The same holds true for 1991's Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare. An uncompelling mix of freak-show strangeness and cartoony horror, it provides one of the series' worst releases.

Dead does little right and seems generally poor. It appears pretty clear this one existed just to collect one more Freddy-related payday.

A decade after the events of the last film, nocturnal killer Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) appears to satisfy his desire for vengeance, as he kills all the kids from his hometown. However, this doesn’t satisfy Freddy’s lust for violence so he seeks new territory.

Actually, Freddy left one potential victim alive: teen “John Doe” (Shon Greenblatt). When “John” winds up in a home for troubled kids, Freddy stalks new blood.

As with the second movie in the series, Dead eliminates any character consistency outside of Freddy himself. Nightmare 3 carried along some participants from the first film, and both Nightmare 4 and Nightmare 5 continued this trend.

Although the ideas got looser as the series progressed, all the sequels other than Revenge made some sense in regard to Krueger's motive. Originally he stalked teens to get back at the Elm Street parents who killed him.

That rule went out the window in Revenge, during which Freddy cared about geography but not the people involved. The original theme came back in Nightmare 3 and made a partial return in Nightmare 4, but at least when his slaughter branched out to others, it made some sense. His subsequent choices seemed more logical than in Revenge.

Unfortunately, Freddy's Dead returns to the geographical destiny found in Revenge. Although all of the nasty events depicted there took place in one town, they didn't have to be this restricted, as Freddy's power showed no connection to location.

Dead seems to feel that it did, however, as it presents Springwood as a shell-shocked burg that can't escape the shadow of the monster. The idea actually boasts some potential since so few horror movies examine the after-effects of trauma.

Springwood sure went through an awful lot of dead teens, yet we saw no resonance from this during the first four sequels. You'd think this would seriously mess with folks' minds, and Dead attempts to portray that reality.

However, it does so in a silly manner that takes away from any potentially scary consequences. In fact, this shows one of the main failing of some of the Nightmare films: the way they went away from terror and made Freddy more of a cartoon character.

Krueger soon lost most of the fearsome and chilling qualities he displayed in the first couple of movies. Instead, he became a hip, catch-phrase uttering jokester.

Dead exemplifies this pattern, as so much of it plays for cheap laughs. The film really does show promise, and not just from the examination of the impact the murders had on the town.

It also introduces a Krueger child, an element that could add psychological resonance. Unfortunately, it doesn't, as the matter gets treated like a simple plot twist and not explored very well.

I could excuse the fact that we never heard of Krueger's family prior to this sixth movie, though one would think the concept would have materialized before this time. It didn't, and I'd guess it shows up here just because the filmmakers ran out of other ideas.

Sign they became desperate: Dead actually features a 3D segment. Was there any good reason for this portion of the film to be 3D?

Nope, other than as a gimmick to drag people into theaters. It didn't work, either as a fun treat or as an inducement to potential movie-goers.

Freddy's Dead doesn't become a complete disaster, but it nonetheless seems pretty weak. The film turns into a morass of lame thrills and flat characters, and it enjoys no reason to exist other than as a reason to make money. Add to that some of the most annoying cameos in memory and you find a fairly bad movie.

Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare appears in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 on this 4K UHD Disc. As with its predecessors, this turned into a fine presentation.

Sharpness remained positive. A few interiors appeared a little on the soft side, but the majority of the movie came across with good accuracy and delineation.

I noticed no issues with jaggies or shimmering, and the image lacked edge haloes. With decent natural grain, I didn’t sense any intrusive digital noise reduction, and print flaws stayed absent.

Dead went with a low-key, amber and blue influenced palette, and the hues appeared strong within those choices. They got a nice boost from HDR as well.

Blacks looked dark and tight, and shadows showed appropriate clarity. HDR brought extra punch to whites and contrast. The image satisfied.

Downconverted to Dolby TrueHD 7.1, I also thought that the Dolby Atmos soundtrack of Dead worked nicely, as the soundfield maintained an active and engaging affair. During the film’s quieter scenes, the mix offered good stereo imaging for the score and also delivered realistic ambience.

Not surprisingly, this movie kicked to more involving auditory life during its occasional horror scenes. Those offered positive use of all the channels.

The elements seemed appropriately located and they blended together nicely. The surrounds added a fair amount of unique information and meshed together in a pleasing way.

Audio quality appeared solid. Dialogue came across as natural and warm, while music seemed bright and vibrant, as the score presented clear highs and tight low-end.

Effects packed a good punch, so those elements appeared distinct and vivid. They lacked problems related to distortion, and they demonstrated deep bass response. Overall, the soundtrack of Dead worked well.

How did the 4K UHD compare to the prior Blu-ray? The Atmos mix became a bit more involving than the already satisfying 5.1 track from the BD.

Visuals appeared more accurate and also delivered superior colors and b blacks. This wound up as another Nightmare series upgrade.

Note that the 4K offers both 2D and 3D versions. Both offer identical cuts of the movie but the latter goes 3D from 1:10:54 to 1:24:05.

This used red/blue anaglyph glasses instead of the polarized lenses for true 3D Blu-ray. That meant the visuals for the 3D segments came with ugly colors and prompted headaches despite the brevity of this section of the film.

These scenes did offer some decent 3D effects but I found the cardboard glasses to feel ill-fitting and uncomfortable. While the 2D edition looked silly for the 3D sections, picture quality fared better so I’d opt for that presentation.

In terms of extras, we find four featurettes. Rachel’s Dream fills two minutes, 55 seconds with notes from director Rachel Talalay and actor Robert Englund.

“Dream” looks at how Talalay rose through the New Line ranks and got her shot as first-time director of Dead. This becomes a short but informative snippet.

With 3D Demise, we get a two-minute, 24-second clip that features Talalay and special effects designer John Carl Buechler. “Demise” examines the movie’s climactic sequence and its challenges. We find another brief but effective clip.

86’d runs one minute, 46 seconds and features New Line CEO Robert Shaye. He tells us how the Nightmare series ran out of ideas in a fairly honest chat.

Finally, Hellraiser spans 45 seconds and brings notes from filmmaker Clive Barker. He also discusses the difficulties involved when a series gets long in the tooth. It’s a passable snippet but nothing memorable.

Note that the BD included the film’s trailer but the 4K UHD dropped it.

As long as A Nightmare on Elm Street 2 exists, Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare won't be the worst movie in the series, but it comes close. Because I like the franchise, I don't find this film intolerable, but it seems fairly crummy across the board. The 4K UHD brings solid picture and audio but it skimps on supplements. Leave this one to Nightmare diehards.

Note that as of December 2025, this version of Freddy’s Dead appears only as part of a Nightmare on Elm Street “7-Film Collection’. As implied, it also includes the original 1984 movie as well as the franchise’s five other sequels.