Jesse Walsh


Jesse Walsh is a fictional character in the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise. He was created by David Chaskin and portrayed by Mark Patton. Making his debut in ' in 1985, Jesse became the first male protagonist of the series. In ', Freddy enacts a plan to possess Jesse, using his body to kill in the real world, slowly gaining the strength to manifest his form physically. Outside of the films, Jesse has a main role in the novels. Because of the LGBT representation in a mainstream film, Jesse has developed a large fan base in the gay community and has been called a gay icon. Jesse has been observed by some scholars as a variation of the "final girl" slasher film archetype, and has been referred to as a "final boy".

Appearances

In film

In , Jesse is a high school student who moves into Nancy Thompson's old house on 1428 Elm Street with his family and begins to have nightmares about Freddy Krueger. Jesse first encounters Freddy in nightmare sequence that takes place on a school bus. Jesse takes his friend Lisa to school and becomes friends with a boy named Ron Grady after they fight. Lisa helps Jesse unpack his things after school and they find a diary from Nancy Thompson explaining her nightmares. Jesse realizes that Freddy wants to possess him and use his body to kill in the real world. Freddy successfully controls him and kills Jesse's coach and attempts to kill Jesse's sister though Jesse is able to resist.
He seeks help from Ron and asks him to watch over him while he sleeps but when Ron falls asleep, Freddy regains control and murders Ron. Jesse retreats to Lisa's house during a party but Freddy again takes control, trying to kill her. Jesse fights back against his control and Freddy instead turns on the other teenagers present, murdering seven before disappearing. Freddy travels to the boiler room where he would take his child victims while still alive. Lisa confronts Freddy and Jesse is able to finally regain control, exorcising Freddy. After this incident while travelling on the school bus with Lisa, their friend Kerry is impaled through the chest by Freddy and the bus careens off the road, revealing Freddy is still alive and has again trapped Jesse. His fate is left ambiguous.
Jesse briefly appears in flashbacks during Freddy's introduction in Freddy vs. Jason.

In literature

Jesse is the lead protagonist of the 1992 novelization of A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge. In 2012, Mark Patton released Jesse's Lost Journal. There are 68 journal entries that span 1982–1985. The first 30 entries closely follow the events of , though unveil new details not seen on screen. There is a different conclusion in that Jesse supposedly kills Lisa Webber at the power plant, rather than the film's final bus sequence. The remaining 38 journal entries focus on Jesse's time at a psychiatric ward, his sentencing for murdering Ron Grady and the apparent disappearance of Lisa's corpse, his escape from the institution, and his efforts to build a new identity. Jesse still wrestles with Freddy Krueger in his mind, and enters into a panic when Hollywood begins making the Nightmare on Elm Street films based on Jesse's and Nancy Thompson's journal entries.

Development

Conception

In an interview, Mark Patton stated, "I don't think that Jesse was originally written as a gay character. I think it's something that happened along the line by serendipity."

Casting

beat out actors such as Brad Pitt, Christian Slater and Matt Damon for the role of Jesse and revealed that he based certain aspects of the character on Ally Sheedy's character in The Breakfast Club. In an interview with Attitude magazine, Robert Englund stated "... the second Nightmare on Elm Street is obviously intended as a bisexual themed film. It was early '80s, pre-AIDS paranoia. Jesse's wrestling with whether to come out or not and his own sexual desires was manifested by Freddy. His friend is the object of his affection. That's all there in that film. We did it subtly but the casting of Mark Patton was intentional too, because Mark was out and had done Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean." Yet, in the documentary Scream, Queen! My Nightmare on Elm Street, Patton describes being a closeted lead actor appearing in a horror film with a gay subtext. After , Patton shouldered the negative publicity as well as his HIV-positive diagnosis. His mental health declined as a result, and he relocated to Mexico from Hollywood to start a new life. The documentary addresses Patton's grudge against screenwriter David Chaskin for his denying that gay elements were purposely written into the script.

Reception

In his book Monsters in the Closet: Homosexuality and the Horror Film, Harry M. Benshoff references Jesse, stating the following:
In The Queer Encyclopedia of Film & Television, Claude J. Summers stated:
In Hearths of Darkness: The Family in the American Horror Film, Updated Edition, Tony Williams notes that Jesse is a victim of a "dysfunctional family situation." Jesse and Freddy's relationship is intended to have a homo-erotic subtext with Freddy representing Jesse's fear of 'coming out'. Commentators point to the lack of interest Jesse shows in Lisa and his retreat to Ron's bedroom after a failed attempt at kissing her, implying Ron is the object of Jesse's affection. At one point in the film, he also ends up in a gay S&M club where he is confronted by his homosexual gym teacher, Schneider. This plot is not made obvious in the film though Krueger-actor, Robert Englund and writer David Chaskin both admit to the concealed subtext, indicating that the casting of openly gay actor Mark Patton to play the role was intentional. In Legacy of Blood: A Comprehensive Guide to Slasher Movies, Jim Harper describes Jesse as "the main victim of the film."
In Remaking Horror: Hollywood's New Reliance on Scares of Old, James Francis Jr. dubbed the character as a "final boy" and noted the parallels between Jesse and Nancy Thompson, stating: