The “Fear Street” trilogy is somewhat interesting in that all three parts of it were made before any of them were released, which shows that the people behind the films were confident it would be a hit. “1994” is the first part of the trilogy as it essentially is a setup for what feels almost like a horror movie multiverse. It’s very ambitious but as a film itself, it’s pretty unremarkable and borrows way too heavily from other horror films.

The town of Shadyside has a history of regular folk going crazy and killing people. The latest incident sees a guy in a skull mask massacre people in a shopping centre (the whole first sequence is so clearly inspired by “Scream”). Deena (Kiana Madeira “After We Fell”) and her friends become endangered and so they desperately try to solve the mystery of what has been plaguing the town for so very long.

The characters in this film are just not very likeable. They’re not terrible and they’re not total idiots but I just found them unnecessarily mean and of course, they are way too eager to bed each other… or themselves, if you know what I mean. Deena in particular just feels like a real jerk. The Skull Mask killer is clearly meant to be a homage to Ghostface from the “Scream” franchise. We also get to see another killer that is clearly a homage to Jason Voorhees from “Friday The 13th”.

“Fear Street: 1994” has a great mix of 90s music in it and I think the visual style of the movie is very appealing with a great use of colours. Unfortunately, the characters are rather uninspired and the whole thing just feels way too similar to other horror films. I get that this is all meant to be a tribute to some of the most popular horror franchises of the past but that almost seems like cover for making a lazy horror flick.