Over the course of the past few months, thing have gone back and forth regarding the potential merging of two of the biggest studios in Hollywood: Warner Bros. and Paramount. Recently, however, the merger officially went through, and the iconic studios were essentially melted down to forge an inexplicable new monopoly-esque studio now called Skydance. In the lead-up to this merger and in the short span of time since it officially happened, much has shifted in unexpected ways with regards to plans for the future of various franchises (just ask James Gunn). One of the strangest cases of all of this though has to be A Nightmare on Elm Street, the long dormant iconic horror franchise, which has had a case of merger-related woes all its own.
As the undying demon-infested Freddy Krueger himself might say, “Mergers are a bitch.”
Prior to the merger, the rights for the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise were split between multiple parties. Most of the rights rested with New Line Cinema, which had released the film, but New Line became a subsidiary of Warner Bros. in the late ‘90s (mergers on top of mergers). That meant that up until a few weeks ago, Warner Bros. held the lion’s share of the rights to the series.
However, in an unexpected and semi-confounding move, Paramount (the company that was actively pursuing a merger with the aforementioned Warner Bros., who again, already held most of the rights) sought out the estate of the original writer and director of the first Nightmare film from 1984, Wes Craven, and made a deal for the rights to his original script for the first film.
This led to a situation in which, as the merger was very much moving forward and after over fifteen years of zero movement on any new Nightmare on Elm Street projects, there were suddenly two different Nightmare on Elm Street reboots being developed by completely different teams at two different studios that were aiming to become one conglomerated studio. Confusing, to say the least. The Warner Bros.-originating version of the reboot was being spearheaded by Lee Cronin (the writer-director behind Evil Dead Rise and the latest version of The Mummy) and the Paramount version had no creatives attached at all, instead just having the rights to Craven’s pre-existing script.
But now, it has been confirmed that in the aftermath of the merger, Skydance is pushing forward with the Paramount-originating reboot. So Lee Cronin’s take has been canceled, and at this time, no creatives are attached at all. Much of the reporting around this development has continued to focus on the prominence of the rights to Craven’s original script, but because of the merger, Skydance also owns all the rights that Warner Bros. did previously, meaning they could theoretically do anything they want with the franchise.
So what does any of this actually mean? Will Nightmare on Elm Street fans finally be getting a new installment in the series in the near future? It certainly seems that way, but there also seems to be a semi-decent chance that, even though they no longer have to do this by any means, Skydance is more interested in attempting to remake Craven’s original film again rather than exploring new ground with the franchise. I certainly hope that is not the case, as the last thing anyone needs is another retread of such well-worn ground, but Skydance’s commander-in-chief (David Ellison, a failed actor in his own right whose father essentially gift-wrapped a monopoly for him to run) has already proven himself to not exactly be a great judge of character or taste.
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