Getting Alice Cooper to appear in the the sixth and final installment of the original A Nightmare On Elm Street film series.
Cooper was far from the only big name to crop up in Freddy's Dead for a cameo. The musician-turned-actor appeared alongside Roseanne Barr and Tom Arnold (both big fans of the franchise) and original A Nightmare on Elm Street cast member Johnny Depp, who played himself in a parody of anti-drug commercials. However, despite this cavalcade of big names, Freddy's Dead was largely written off by critics as an un-scary dud.
Freddy's Dead's failure to find the right tone for the slasher sequel was central to its problems, as the movie frequently wobbles between self-aware comedy and attempts at violent horror. The second installment of the franchise, A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge, already proved dark humor was not the franchise’s strong suit when divorced from serious shocks. But unfortunately, the Alice Cooper cameo featured in Freddy’s Dead repeated this misstep. The shock rocker played Mr. Underwood, Freddy Krueger’s abusive alcoholic stepdad, in what could have been a creepy cameo. However, the role was way too broad and played into Cooper’s star power, meaning the scene winds up being oddly silly when it should be tragic.
The sight of Cooper stumbling downstairs with a bottle of booze in one hand and a belt in the other is as cliche an image of an abusive parent as possible, and the revelation of his identity is almost over-the-top enough to warrant a sitcom-style audience reaction. Actual sitcom star Roseanne Barr would likely have imbued the role of Freddy’s sadistic step-parent with more threat. Cooper’s larger-than-life stage persona doesn't gel well with a character whose cruelty is meant to be subtle. Also, the idea that Freddy had a violently abusive step-parent at all is somewhat superfluous for Freddy’s Dead, since the sequel clearly didn’t want fans to root for Freddy or feel sorry for him, judging by how creepy and vicious his younger self is.
As such, the reasoning behind illustrating this sad moment in his backstory is unclear. Unlike Friday the 13th’s Jason origins, this wasn’t a misguided attempt to make Freddy more human — he’s gleefully cutting slices across his midsection when Mr. Underwood confronts him, so viewers were unlikely to find him relatable. However, it is also unlikely that the scene was intended to establish how big a threat Freddy is, as his opponent is a pathetic drunk who barely even attempts to defend himself. All in all, Alice Cooper’s Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare cameo is an inexplicable misstep in a franchise full of them, and further proof that Freddy never needed more backstory after the original movie’s bare bones origins.
