Prom Queen is set in the year 1988, somewhere between the events that took place in the first and second part of the Fear Street trilogy. The narrative follows pretty much the same theme, and we find that a killer, for reasons unknown, is taking the lives of young and innocent people from Shadyside High. The story follows the life of a young girl named Lori, who was tortured by her classmates for no fault of her own. Lori, at times, felt extremely lonely, but deep down she also knew that she didn’t have any option besides facing her fears and her bullies. So let’s find out what happened in the film and how it impacted Lori’s life.
Spoiler Alert
Why was Lori bullied by his classmates?
Prom Queen does not take much time to establish that Lori Granger was bullied, harassed, and made to feel like an outcast by her classmates because of what had happened with her mother, Rose, in the past. It was said that Rose Granger had murdered her boyfriend, who hailed from Sunnyvale. Back in the day, Rose was very excited for her prom night, as she had hopes of winning the title of prom queen. But then her boyfriend was murdered, and the prom night celebrations were called off. Rose’s classmates always blamed her for ruining the most exciting and important day of their high school life. Rose was never found guilty by the court due to the lack of evidence, but that didn’t stop people like Nancy Falconer, her nemesis and classmate, from making up all sorts of stories about her. Such was the impact of that incident that Rose could never really bring her life back on track. Even having a daughter did not bring about a change in her life. Rose loved Lori, but still she felt a hollowness inside her that she couldn’t explain to anybody. Also, she was really struggling to make ends meet and to provide for her daughter, which took a toll on her mentally. Lori was a good kid; she did whatever she could to help her mother, but obviously she couldn’t do anything about what had happened in the past. The fact that Rose was blamed for murdering somebody she loved with all her heart made her feel very angry and also helpless at times. She must have wanted to shout at the top of her lungs and tell the world that she was innocent, but she knew that people didn’t care about the truth as long as they got to spread rumors at somebody else’s expense.
What happened during prom night?
Lori had made the brave decision to contest for the title of the prom queen even when she knew that Tiffany and her Wolfpack would make her life a living hell because of it. Tiffany was Nancy’s daughter, and just like her mother, she loved torturing poor souls like Lori. Nancy was a very loving mother, on the exterior, but she made it very clear to Tiffany that she couldn’t lose to a Granger at any cost. Tiffany bullied Lori whenever she found an opportunity to do so. There were times when Tiffany’s Wolfpack, consisting of Linda, Melissa, and Debbie, wanted to tell her that what she was doing was not right, but they were probably too intimidated by her. Lori didn’t talk to a lot of people, but it was a relief for her to have somebody like Megan by her side. Megan was a horror nerd, and her favorite pastime was smoking up and getting stoned. Megan had no interest in prom night or school politics whatsoever, and she just loved spooking and scaring people by performing tricks. There was another girl named Christy Renault, who was a rebel in the truest sense, and was considered to be the favorite, alongside Tiffany, to win the prom queen title. Tiffany obviously couldn’t bully Christy because she knew that the latter wasn’t as timid as Lori and wouldn’t hesitate to retaliate in full force.
Lori bought a beautiful dress for herself with her hard-earned money in the runup to prom, but she had no clue that her prom night was going to turn into a nightmare for the entirety of Shadyside High. The first victim of the anonymous killer was Christy Renault. The girl was just heading home after dealing pot to some rich brats from Sunnyvale. The masked man not only killed her, but he also made sure that he didn’t leave any trail behind. On prom night, we came to know that the killer was hiding inside the school, and one by one he killed every girl who was contesting for the title of prom queen.
Linda and her boyfriend were slaughtered in the most horrifying manner, and then similarly, Debbie and Judd, her love interest, were killed too. The killer didn’t even spare Tyler, who throughout the prom night made it very clear that he was attracted to Lori. Tyler, just like the other friends of Tiffany, was intimidated by her, which was why he could never express his opinions and speak his mind in front of her. Tyler had wanted to leave Tiffany for a long time, and him getting intimate with Lori on prom night just gave him a nudge to do what he intended to. Tyler broke up with Tiffany, but minutes later he was slaughtered by the masked killer.
Who Was The Prom Queen Killer?
The killer came after Megan and Lori, but Principal Wayland got in the way and somehow stopped him. At the end, Lori took off her tiara and stabbed the killer in the eye with it. It came to be known that the killer was none other than Tiffany’s father, Dan. He said that he killed the girls because he knew how badly Tiffany wanted to be the prom queen. Nancy herself told the police officers to take the man into custody and put him behind bars. But just moments before Dan was caught, we saw that there’d been two masked killers butchering the girls. This meant there was a second killer who was on the loose, and Dan was somewhat trying to protect their identity. Lori realized that though Tiffany was the worst human being she knew, she didn’t deserve what had happened to her. Her father had turned out to be a psycho killer, and Lori couldn’t imagine how traumatized the poor girl must have felt. But it didn’t take long for Lori to realize that she was totally wrong in her assumptions. Lori offered to accompany Tiffany back to her place as she felt sympathetic for the girl. Lori slept at Tiffany’s place, and after giving a statement to the local police, Nancy asked them to let her go, stating she needed to be with her daughter.
During Prom Queen’s ending, it turned out that Tiffany and Nancy both knew about what Dan was up to, and in fact, they were more than willing to finish what he had started. Tiffany and Nancy attacked Lori together, and the latter took a few moments to come to terms with what was happening with her. Lori defied the odds, and she was able to defend herself valiantly. Tiffany met her fateful end, whereas Nancy was gravely injured. Lori escaped from that godforsaken place and left Nancy behind, still breathing and cursing the former, proving the kind of hatred she had for the Granger family.
What Did The Mid-Credit Scene Suggest?
In the mid-credit scene, we saw that Nancy fell on the ground after being assaulted (in self-defense) by Lori. Blood oozed from her head, and it made a symbol on the ground that resembled a witch’s mark. What I felt was that the entire Falconer family was under the influence of a satanic curse, something similar to what Sarah Fier had gone through, because of Solomon Goode, back in 1666.
We know that the Mall Massacre happened in 1994 while the Camp Nightwing incident took place in 1978, which means that the events of Prom Queen took place in between, that is, in 1988. At that time, the grimoire, the book of spells, was still in the possession of the Goode family, specifically Nick Goode. Nick had the book with him till 1994, and so it could be a possibility that he or any other member of the Goode family used it to put a curse on the Falconers. It is to be noticed here that the sheriff who took Nancy’s statement also belonged to the Goode family, a fact that was not explicitly stated in the narrative. Ideally, the events of Prom Queen should have found a mention in the first installment of the franchise that was based in 1994, but no such mention was made. The question arises: why would Nick Goode or any member of his family have placed a curse on the Falconers? Maybe the sheriff harbored intentions like those of his ancestors, and he wanted to govern the lives of the people around him, or maybe he just wanted to take revenge for something that had happened in the past. I believe as of now the makers have also not decided as to how they are going to link the events of this film with the rest of the franchise, and it would be interesting to see what they come up with in the subsequent films.
