Here's the thing with LGBTQ themes in horror (and, indeed, all media): there are those works that go at it with deliberate and conscious intention, that incorporate those factors as integral parts of what they are. Then there are those that don't intend anything of the sort, but owing to some quirks in their production, end up becoming icons of unwitting -or, perhaps, sublimated- queerness. A Nightmare on Elm Street: Part 2 falls squarely into the latter category. Whilst incorporating no -ostensibly- LGBTQ characters at all, the film is a Pride Parade of unintentional campery, homoerotica and rainbow-hued horror. Foregoing the more concerted disturbia of the original film, this first of many sequels is the beginning of the series' inevitable slide into self-parody. Freddy Krueger, an entity of sincere threat and disturbing supernatural horror in the original film, here begins his transition into the familiar, wise-cracking anti-hero that the franchise will eventually revolve around. The horror set-pieces are generally played more for gallows humor than genuine tension or disturbance; even most of the murders, grotesque as they are, are framed in such a manner that they maintain a camp, black comedy beneath the gore and elaborate mutlation. Freddy himself undercuts whatever horror the audience might experience with wisecrack after wisecrack, which eventually serves to shunt the film more into the realms of horror-comedy than any sincere sequel to the original. That said, the film has maintained a certain fascination above and beyond most of the other sequels in the franchise, owing to the subtext of homosexuality that runs throughout. Whilst no character is particularly marked out as gay or even queer in and of themselves, there are factors that are more than a little suggestive at various intervals: Take, for example, protagonist Jesse: whilst ostensibly romantically interested in one of his (female) classmates, his role in the film is a proxy for the original film's Nancy, whose prophetic dreams concerning Freddy Krueger he shares. Likewise, his trajectory in the film is redolent of what has become -problematically- known as the “Final Girl” trope; the last survivor of a horror serial killer's rampage, who usually occurs in the closing sequences for one final scare. Beyond that, Jesse's framing is unusual for horror films of the era; much of it requires him to be in states of sleep or having just woken, meaning that he is often all but naked, sheened in sweat and curiously sexualised in a manner reminiscent of soft-core gay pornography. This may be simply a quirk of the directorial style of the film, but seems to be bizarrely deliberate, as though the film makers are trying to inject a commentary that they couldn't make directly owing to studio mandate or perhaps just good, old fashioned culturally-prevalent homophobia. Making the male protagonist a proxy of the female characters that came before -and that predominate horror of the era in general- makes for as fascinating commentary in and of itself, deliberately or otherwise subverting proscriptions of both masculinity and femininity, making Jesse a curious focal point for numerous LGBTQ concerns.  Jesse's relationships are also highly redolent of those LGBTQ youth faced in the 1980s when struggling with their identities: whilst he ostensibly has crushes on female classmates, his most abiding and intense relationship is with bully-turned-confidante Grady, with whom Jesse shares several scenes that verge on the homoerotic. Their relationship, beginning with violence, becomes physically intimate in a manner somewhat beyond friendship, suggesting that one or both may be struggling with their identities. This, of course, fits neatly into the central conceit of the film in which Jesse is effectively becoming Freddy Krueger during his nightmares, providing a medium or gateway through which the supernatural monster can stalk and murder his victims. Throughout the film, Jesse is forced to confront certain changes and unwelcome feelings occuring inside of him as a result of Freddy's influence; a factor not unlike a young, gay youth dealing with internalised homophobia. Whilst perhaps unintentional, this seems to be a consistent reading of the film in years since: Krueger represents -and, to a degree, embodies- the culturally pervasive demonisation of LGBTQ people which Jesse, being a child of that era, has internalised. It's only by mastering himself, gaining some control over his identity and emotions, that he manages to defeat Freddy and prevent the demon from emerging again. One could derive any number of metaphorical implications from this: making Freddy a manifestation of homophobic narrative makes a great deal of sense given his origin story and the pervasive fears and distorted myths regarding LGBTQ people throughout the 1980s. Jesse's fear of being gay -or perhaps bi- serve to feed and resurrect Freddy as a manifestation of all he secretly most dreads in himself. This element, however metaphorical, is compounded by certain decisions the film makes: during one of his blackouts, Jesse is discovered by his school coach at a gay fetish bar, which in itself might be a more-than-heavy-handed suggestion of what the film ultimately wants to say, but is prevented from in any direct fashion. Likewise, Jesse seems to be framed and presented in the same manner that over-sexualised female protagonists and characters of horror franchises of the era generally were: there are numerous scenes in which he is showering, semi-naked, engaged in some intimate activity more commonly associated with female characters. This may be a thematic by-product of the film attempting to put him in the place of Nancy from the original, but even that has the effect of shunting a male character out of their traditional framing and into a condition in which proscriptions of “masculinity,” sexual identity and gender become questionable. Perhaps most revealing of all is his relatinship with Grady: whilst the two begin as enemies, even that dynamic has a subtle, homosexual undercurrent: the initial physical violence is a precursor to physical intimacy, this film's way of introducing male on male physicality in a manner conducive to certain proscribed expectations of genre and gender. This quickly transitions, however, into intimacy of a very different kind: whilst the two never -overtly- engage in any romantic activity, the fact that Jesse trusts Grady above and beyond anyone else with what's happening to him is a barely-coded metaphor for LGBTQ youth “coming out” to a friend who they have a crush on. The fact that Jesse chooses Grady to confide in above and beyond his female friends is significant, as is the fact that Grady accepts him and believes him, even agreeing to watch over him while he sleeps in case Freddy should emerge (which, of course, he does). Grady's murder at the hands of Freddy during this encounter thereby becomes more than just the latest “kill;” it is a metaphorical representation of the relationships destroyed or never even begun thanks to internalised homophobia. Freddy, being the manifestation of 1980s demonisation of homosexuality, slaughters the subject of Jesse's sublimated homosexual desires, a murder that is psychologically ritualistic and has certain wider implications given that Freddy, it seems, can only murder with Jesse's subconscious permission (later in the film, Jesse prevents him from killing other characters by exerting influence over him from within). Freddy in this film is a subtly different monster from the original; in that film, he represents the sins of the Fathers, a cruel past taking its toll not on those who were directly responsible, but on their children (a dynamic that any child of the 1980s and 1990s will be immediately familiar with). Here, that dynamic definitely exists, but is rendered more specific thanks to the LGBTQ subtext that pulses beneath every scene: He is culturally proscribed, internalised homophobia: the fear of the self that LGBTQ youth of the era were afflicted with almost universally, and which crippled so many emotionally to the point of neurosis and even suicidal tendencies. All of this is bound up in Freddy's peculiar dynamic with Jesse, and the fact that Krueger is able to kill other youths through him as a result of his fear: the commentary is fairly plain, if one takes the time to analyse beyond the surface: traditional bigotry murders our children. It turns them against themselves and against one another, enjoining them to destroy what they might otherwise love. Further Reading TODAY ON THE GINGER NUTS OF HORROR WEBSITE TUXEDO JUNCTION BY THOM CARNELL [FICTION REVIEW] THE HEART AND SOUL OF HORROR FEATURES Comments are closed.
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