(CNN) -- Springwood teenagers Dean, Kris, Jesse, Nancy and Quentin are having trouble not sleeping: They're knocking back coffee, popping pills, anything to delay another date with their dream stalker (which may explain why these high school students look like college grads). When one of them does drop off, the bedsheets turn red. 

Wes Craven's 1984 slumber party massacre started from scratch -- it was a low-budget item from what was then a genuine independent studio, New Line -- and became the iconic horror franchise of the decade. 

With his battered fedora, a striped sweater, a razor-glove and a face like Sal's Famous, Freddy Krueger was the most personable boogie man Hollywood had come up with in a long time, so what if he was also a child abuser? A recurring nightmare who stalked teenagers as they slept, Freddy preyed on the defenseless and played fast and loose with physics: If Salvador Dali had created a slasher movie villain, he might have come up with someone like Freddy. 

After eight movies, a TV series and a comic book, you might think Mr. Krueger had been done to death. It's been seven years since Freddy put Jason Vorhees in his place (in "Freddy vs Jason"). But you can't keep a good bad guy down, and at the rate Hollywood is cannibalizing its horror back catalogue, we'll be seeing remakes of the remakes any day now. 

Directed by pop video director Samuel Bayer and written by Wesley Strick and Eric Heisserer, the new "A Nightmare on Elm Street" is actually a lot like the old one. So much so, for a while you wonder why they didn't just re-release it. (You'll wish they had.) 
what was it?
a TV series