Franchise Battle: Halloween vs. Friday the 13th vs. Nightmare on Elm Street

[Nivek]

Where are the F13 fans, dammit?

 

[TheDreamMaster]

Despite my name, Nightmar eon Elm Street is my second of the three. Halloween coems first because no matter how bad soem entries were, they all kept a certain atmosphere that made them have their scary moments.
Nightmare is second because Freddy is awesome. No matter how comical certain entries became, I don't hate any of the films. 5 certainly sucks in my book though.
Lastly, Friday the 13th certainly isn't terrible, but some of the movie I can't stand. I like the first four films, 5 is ok, 6 and 7 are decent, 8 is terrible, Jason goes to hell is...strang,e jason X sucks all kinds of things, and Freddy vs Jason is a good way to waste an hour and a half but it was a fun "horror" movie.

 

[Spider-ManHero12]

Where are the F13 fans, dammit?

Agreed. The Hallwoeen Franchise my be my favorite, but Jason kicks so much ass.

 

[webhead731]

I like the Nightmare on Elm Street ones the best. The first was the best, but I enjoy the others.

I don't care for Friday the 13th at all.
Halloween is good.

 

[Steel Thunder]

the Saw franchise is garbage.
end of story.

Correct

 

[CelticPredator]

Where are the F13 fans, dammit?

Oh we're here....but aside from 1-4, the series is ass. Pure ass. Fun...but ass.

 

[CelticPredator]

I like the Nightmare on Elm Street ones the best. The first was the best, but I enjoy the others.

I don't care for Friday the 13th at all.
Halloween is good.

Where did you get that AVATAR!

 

[TLH]

Oh we're here....but aside from 1-4, the series is ass. Pure ass. Fun...but ass.

6 was pretty good for a F13 movie.

 

[CelticPredator]

Yes it was. It's my favorite....aside from 1-4 and 6....

 

[DACrowe]

If we're talking franchises then screw all three of 'em. All of them have too many piss poor entries for me to consider any of them good. However, I feel that the first Friday the 13th is pretty good. The first Nightmare on Elm Street and Wes Craven's New Nightmare are both awesome. And you just can't beat the original Halloween. So I guess my list would be...

Halloween
A Nightmare on Elm Street
Friday the 13th

well said

I concur that both had great installments and FT13 just doesn't compare in terms of entertainment or craftsmanship of the best installments of the franchise.

I actually wrote a paper once about the pop culture relevance of the slasher genre and its reflections of social anxieties it depicts (and eventually how it can be viewed as purporting sexist stereotypes and begins supporting hegemonies through stereotypes as opposed to questioning it, with the killer becoming an anti-hero instead of a monster). I kind of state it began with Psycho, if I recall, but I give most of the credit to Halloween. While TCM existed prior to Halloween, John Carpenter was the first to successfully bring that fear of Other on the outskirts of society such as in Psycho and TCM and put him in your backyard, thus making it inescapable. And he gave him the mask.

Halloween was the first to turn this into a genre so, I have to give it credit.

 

[hitmanyr2k]

Halloween wins this by a walk off. freddy and jason were parodies of the genre. michael was scary becuase he just sat there in the shadows and was grounded in reality by his very possible killer habits. Halloween was more believable then the other two and michael always escaped and never died, jason and freddy died every movie so it saturated any hopes of them being scary and a imposing threat.

What are you talking about? Jason didn't die in Friday the 13th Part 2. He pretty much got a machete through his shoulder and passed out from the pain. You never see him die. Paul and Ginny leave him in the shack. He didn't die in Part 3 either. Dude got an axe to the head and was rendered unconscious once again. In Part 4 that MF died though

 

[hitmanyr2k]

And I value each franchise on how many movies I enjoy from each one.

Halloween - H1, H2 and H4. The rest are garbage
Friday the 13th - F2, F3, F4, F6, and remake
Nightmare - N1 and N3

So Friday the 13th wins for me.

 

[Venom75]

My all time favorites in the Elm Street series are 1,3 and 4.
I gotta say that for me,both the original Elm Street and Dream Warriors are the best in the series. Part 1 is the greatest horror film of the 80's and part 3 is one of the greatest horror sequels ever. Dream warriors still kept Freddy pretty creepy,yet added awesome specials effect,deaths,dialogue and characters. Krueger started giving some one liners,but he still kept that scariness to him and didn't laugh after every little line he uttered. Part 3 has some of the best deaths of the horror genre(Phillip's puppet death,Jennifer's "big break,"etc).
Part 4 is when Freddy officially went from horror icon to stand up comic anti-hero. The film is not scary at all. But...it is clearly the most fun and entertaining of the series,with the best special effects of the Nightmare saga(of course,I grew up with the MTV generation,so what do ya expect?).

As far as Halloween goes,the original is a classic. It went the route of using suspense/terror instead of being all about blood and gore. I LOVED it. Halloween 2 is decent,but very flawed. You can clearly see it being influenced by Friday the 13th and the other slasher films of the time. The only other film I liked in the series is part 4(Danielle Harris was great!). Other than that,the whole Halloween series is crap,including Zombie's remakes.

As for Friday the 13th,those movies are just dumb fun. Not masterpieces by any means. You just take a guy in a mask and horny teens and BOOM...you got your movie. I liked part 3(love that cheesy disco music!)and part 4 was the best of the series. Part 7 would've been awesome had the idiot censors not cut that film to threads. I did like the remake though mainly because they made Jason scary again. He was quick and even set traps. Good stuff!

 

[The Dark Defender]

saw isnt a "horror movie". granted saw has achieved cult status for our time but it is not in the same league as scary as the other 3 franchises are. none of the saw movies have any shred of make you jump moments.

I'd say Adam's capture in the first SAW film and Kerry's as she realizes she's on a tape that she's watching and the killer is in her apartment are on par with most of the creepy/jump moments from the other three.

Saw franchise can go **** it's self. Worst series of all time. Hands ****ing down.

I'd rather watch those cruddy Puppet Master flicks then another Saw movie.

Very well thought out criticism there.

Granted, I can understand why SAW isn't on the poll, although I think it's a far better franchise than any of them, as mentioned, this is more about the nostalgic slasher franchises that have been around for decades.

 

[CelticPredator]

I dont even want to spend time other then saying this Series is ass tastic. I've spent enough time on why. Now, I just have to bash it. Bash it until it goes away.

 

[Sawyer]

Ehh... this is tough. All three franchises are pretty much a mixed bag of both **** and gold. But, for my own enjoyment, I'm going to have to go with the Halloween franchise.

 

[Dark Victory]

There is only 2 decent Halloween movies. Halloween, and Halloween 3. (blow me). Friday has 1-4, and 6.

Nightmare has 3 good ones.


I pick Alien.

Halloween 3 -- right next to Plan 9 from Outer Space -- is one of the most unintentionally funny horror films I've ever seen.

 

[The Dark Defender]

I dont even want to spend time other then saying this Series is ass tastic. I've spent enough time on why. Now, I just have to bash it. Bash it until it goes away.

Yes, you've indeed spent plenty of time fitting the description referenced in my avatar and custom title.

 

[Lunar_Wolf]

Halloween is an amazing flick. I really liked H20, but nothing else from the original franchise does it for me. I also enjoyed the remakes.

Friday The 13TH is meh to me.

A Nightmare On Elm Street is a film I love and most of the sequels are fun as well. I grew up on this franchise, so for me, it wins.

 

[Hobgoblin]

Looks like I'm in the minority but I always liked F13th the best by far. Mike Myers always bored me. I dont know what it is but he was just never that scary. Freddy bothered me a little because I would have to sleep sometime but at least I could come up with a plan before then. Now Jason Voorhees. Thats my nightmare (no pun intended.) A big, relentless, unkillable psychopath has you cornered out in the woods. Run as fast and as long as you want, he'll find you. And kill you in the bloodiest way possible. You dont have time to think or fight, the moment you stop moving, you're dead.

 

[Jennifer Walters]

Let's see:

Halloween: Halloween, Halloween 2, Halloween 4, H20, RZH
Friday the 13th: Ft13th 1, 2, 3, 4, remake.
Nightmare on Elm Street: 1, 3, 4, and 5.

Yeah...I'm going with Halloween.

 

[Punisher Rising]

Friday The 13th: 1-7, Reboot
Halloween: 1, 2, 4, 6 and H20
Nightmare On Elm Street: 1-3 and New Nightmare


I enjoy all three but F13 is my favorite by a good-sized margin.

 

[Fresh Prince]

I like H 1 and 2 from the original better then any FT13 or NMOES movies.....Just the suspense in them two Halloween movies and Micheal being such a mysterious character got to me more then Freddy and Jason.

 

[nocomics]

Okay, so, we all know that the three most storied, popular, and extensive slasher franchises are Halloween, Friday the 13th, and A Nightmare on Elm Street. Which franchise is in your opinion the best and why?

You can probably guess what I pick. I'll post later on why.

Well all three have been watered down with countless sequels and remakes,but I take it in a different way so bear with me..
If going by Original Movie: Halloween,Nightmare,Friday...
Sequel:Friday,Nightmare,Halloween
Trilogy: Nightmare,Friday,Halloween
Quadrilogy: Friday,Nightmare,Halloween

Remakes: Friday,Halloween,NOES??????

I think Friday had the more solid first 4 movies overall,and Nightmare had a better 3 than those. I know it seems weird,but that fourth movie in Friday was really good and that was deciding factor too me in that franchise.
Halloween just had that really good original movie its hard to beat.
I grew up on all three especially watching Friday/NOES movies and they were all good in the day,and was always fond of Halloween as well.

 

[Mace Dolex]

Halloween 1, 2, 4, H20 were good, parts 5, 6, 7 were so-so and the RZ remakes were just too malicious and made for the sake of gore.

Even Halloween 3: Season Of The Witch was better than the remakes.

Friday The 13th series just got stupider with each entry but Jason Goes To Hell got interesting because the focus wasn't so much on Jason and Jason X was only slightly amusing for taking it to space.

So I pick the NOES series as the best I guess since that's the franchise I have DVD's of and Freddy Krueger is always best when he's scary or a funny man kind of like with Batman where he went from dark and brooding to 60's camp and back to dark and brooding.