The deeper horror to these movies is about being stuck in an existence you can’t escape, in which everyone looks down at you, and which makes you hate yourself and others more—also known in “Fear Street” as being from Shadyside. “1978” foregrounds this self-loathing and focuses on characters with even more angst than those we saw in “1994,” as with Ziggy (Sadie Sink). She’s bullied by fellow campers and snotty young citizens of Sunnyvale, to the point that they call her a witch after hunting her down, beating her up, and burning her arm. It only fuels Ziggy’s anger at the world and herself, and Sink’s intense performance gets a great deal of volume out of this one note. Her harrowing intensity later brings in references to Stephen King’s “Carrie,” which are not inaccurate. But you wouldn’t want to follow Carrie around at summer camp, and this movie reminds you as to why.
Ziggy receives no help from her older sister and camp counselor Cindy (Emily Rudd) who is basically a traitor because she’s desperately trying to look like a Sunnyvaler. She doesn’t swear, is sexually tame with her boyfriend Tommy (McCabe Slye), and she wears a pricey white polo shirt as a symbol of this purity. Ziggy hates her for this fakeness, which makes their sisterhood estranged and even more tragic, and so does Cindy’s ex-friend Alice (Ryan Simpkins), another self-loathing Shadysider with the scars on her wrists to prove it. Alice has more fun than Cindy at camp, and popping pills and having sex with her boyfriend on campgrounds are an extension of her nihilism. The contention between Cindy and Alice only gets louder when they’re later stuck together underground, investigating a creepy witch maze, but the emotional beats are about them going for other’s heads. Even though the movie has an affection for these characters and their flaws, it uses them in a counter-productive way—have you ever been to a party where people yelling at each other stops the music and sours the whole vibe? “Fear Street Part Two: 1978” is like that, during the parts that otherwise try to stoke our intrigue.
Like “Fear Street Part One: 1994,” the script here tends to slog through more backstory related to Sarah Fier, the witch who soon enough possesses Cindy’s sweet boyfriend Tommy and turns him into a scowling, relentless, axe-wielding murderer. We know a good deal of this stuff from creepy cutaway moments in “1994,” and “1978” can’t reignite the sense of discovery in watching counselors learn about the cult-like scenario with their own eyes. “1978” feels held back by the information it needs to show about how to stop Sarah’s curse, to justify the bodies that piled up in the process.
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