Is SLEEPAWAY CAMP 3 That Bad?

Added: 2026-05-10

[00:00:00]So yeah, a lot of people think that Sleepaway Camp 3 is a terrible movie and it's 22% on Rotten Tomatoes doesn't exactly help, but is it actually that bad? Well, let's talk about Sleepaway Camp 3: Teenage Wasteland.

[00:00:20][music] What is up everyone? Welcome to Mad Blood. Now, first of all, let me know down in the comments down below what you think about Sleepaway Camp 3. Would love to hear what you guys think. And also, welcome to movie number three in my Sleep Away Camp review series. This has definitely been a crazy journey, so thanks for joining me on this ride.

[00:00:46]Let's just keep this going. So, and like I've said before, this franchise is a wild up and down journey. I mean, if you're binging this one with no prior knowledge about what you're getting yourself into, you will definitely feel a bit of a whiplash without a doubt because the first one is terrifying and campy and weird and unapologetically unsettling in its own kind of a way.

[00:01:11]Then you toss on movies two and three and you're just like, wait, what? What the hell? They are just dripping in pure8s cheese. And again, yes, the original movie has so much cheese in it as well, but a part of the reason why this franchise changed quite a bit after that first movie is for one, not only was just the genre changing a lot and evolving more towards a silly tone in a lot of the movies that were coming out.

[00:01:40]Hell, even just look at the Elm Street franchise with The Dream Child and Freddy's Dead coming out around this time. But when coming up for ideas for the second movie and beyond, the director of the first movie, Robert Hilts, wanted to go in a very dark direction. But because he was just starting law school and he started to have, you know, his first kid, he ended up selling the rights to the second and the third movie to one of his producers on that first movie. And this guy wanted to um definitely go in a more comedic direction. Not only that, but the plan was to film both the second and the third movie backtoback and keep both movies combined under a million dollar budget. What's kind of crazy, too, is between the second and the third movie, they only took one weekend off before just immediately throwing themselves into the madness that is Teenage Wasteland. Now, for me personally, I do love me some horror comedies, and there are some damn good ones that are out there. And especially when you throw in some over-the-top gore just to add into all the craziness going on in some of those movies, that can definitely make it a chef's kiss for me. Unfortunately though, kind of like another movie during this era, Friday the 13th Part 7, The New Blood, this movie was definitely one of those, man, what could have been as far as the kills go because this movie was absolutely butchered by the MPA. Trust me though, go and watch some of the uncut versions of the kills in this movie. They're pretty fun. All right. By the way, because I took a lot of flak in my last video for not singing the happy camper song to repay you guys. All right, here you go. [clears throat and cough] Oh, I'm a happy No, screw you guys. That ain't happening. All right, but enough of all that. Let's really dig into Sleepaway Camp 3: Teenage Wasteland from 1989. And I want to start off by giving you guys a brief plot synopsis of this movie. So, one year after the events in the second movie, Angela still hasn't been captured, and she's back at the same camp, but with a new identity. And this time around, she's a camper. And this time, the camp is now rebranded as an experimental summer camp, bringing together privileged and lowerass teens.

[00:04:11]But as soon as Angela gets off that bus, she's immediately itching to get back to doing what she does best. So, and if you remember, at the end of Sleepaway Camp 2, Molly is just stumbling up to this truck, hoping that somebody will be in there to drive her to go and get some help. But then she notices that Angela is actually driving the truck. And Angela just gives us that line of, "Howdy, partner." And then we zoom in on Molly's face, which ends the madness and all the killing in Sleepaway Camp 2. So where the hell are we going to go from here? And I mean, at the end of Sleepaway Camp 2, basically the entire camp was massacred by Angela. So you would have to think Angela at this point is either dead, she's still on the run, or she's locked up somewhere, right? And so basically the story goes in this one is that nobody knows where Angela is because for some reason the most recent picture that they have of her is from 7 years ago when she was much younger and also when she was 18 her juvenile records were destroyed. So, the only thing the cops or anybody else has to go off of to maybe recognize who she is and who did all the killing in that second movie is just kind of basic descriptions of her. Now, the opening of this third movie might confuse the hell out of you just for a second. So, we start out with this scene that I believe is the only scene out of the second and the third movie that was not filmed at the YMCA camp in Waco, Georgia. But this time we're in downtown Atlanta. And at first, we're just at this random girl's house that has milkshake to added across her boobs. And then after that, she's just walking in this city and then this trash truck tries to run her over. And clearly, it's not on accident because no matter where she goes, this thing is still trying to run her over. And I will say pretty much anytime a movie in the 80s uses a dummy human almost in any way, but especially when it's ran over, you're gonna get some bonus points with me because I just love that [ __ ] But this dumbass goes down an alley and then is like, "Oh [ __ ] well, I guess I can't go around or over this pile of trash, so well, I'll just get [ __ ] splattered here on the pavement." Which is exactly what happens. And I'm kind of like, who is doing this? I mean, I have guesses of who it might be. And yes, it is Pamela Springsteen back once again as Angela doing what she does best. Then she just tosses this body into the back of the garbage truck, crushes this thing, and then gets into a van headed to the now rebranded camp after 19 people were murdered there last year that we know it as Camp Rolling Hills, but it's now been rebranded to Camp New Horizons. And well, [ __ ] you know what that means?

[00:07:13]Yep, here we go again. And I will say, hell yeah. That music that kicks in over the opening credits and the movie title.

[00:07:21]It's a banger, dude. And it just feels so late8s rock and roll kind of reminds me a little bit of Jason Takes Manhattan. I just dig it. And as random as it is, I actually like the opening to the third movie better than that campfire opening in the second movie.

[00:07:39]It's in a new location. We're in the city, which feels new and fresh. It's quick and it just gets to the point. And now after watching that opening, you might be thinking to yourself, now was that just kind of one of those Friday the 13th moments where they just throw in this random scene with a random girl that doesn't really have anything to do with the plot and then they kill her in some crazy way just to kind of add to the body count in the movie and just to give us some more gore to enjoy. Well, no, not exactly. So, the goal was here with Angela killing this girl was to kill her and then steal her identity.

[00:08:16]That way, she could get on the bus to camp. Now, everyone at this camp will now know Angela as this girl, Maria. And also just to add to everything that was going on while they were filming this movie, apparently the location where they were filming this camp in the third movie was actually haunted and had a bit of a dark backstory to it, but there were people on the set that did have some weird kind of paranormal experiences while filming this third movie. One person in particular told this story of they were standing next to the flagpole and they felt hands grab their ankles and then when they looked down to see who it was, nobody was actually there. And there were several people on the set as well that experienced things like feeling like somebody was brushing by them or walking by them and every time they would look behind them, nobody was there. And actually 2 years before they started filming Sleepaway Camp 2 and three, a boy actually died here. So, while filming, especially some of these night scenes in this movie, it just kind of added a little bit of eeriness on set for pretty much everybody involved. So, and like I said, this isn't just going to be a typical summer camp experience this time around. So, this camp in particular is doing this thing where they're experimenting with two distinct classes of campers this year. So the first group comes from more of an upper class upbringing, from more upper class areas. And the other group of campers is going to be from more like lowerass areas, lowerass families. And like they say in the movie here, their goal is to promote sharing, love, and harmony and a better understanding between the rich and the poor. But I've got a feeling that uh this is not going to work out.

[00:10:07]But I actually do like this angle that they take. I feel like it adds some variety to the cast because it just easily sets you up to have so many different situations where you can make how different these campers are clash in some kind of a way just to make things a little bit more interesting. And yeah, I get that the only thing they have of Angela is pretty much just a description. There's no pictures or any real information, but I love how it's only one year after all the madness that happened in that second movie. all the killing in all of that. And Angela, yeah, looks pretty much exactly the same other than her hair just being a little bit like frizzier and a little bit lighter and she's just standing there with sunglasses on and there's just a news camera right in her face. Now, it seems like after hearing interviews from the production for this movie that they were pretty happy filming the majority of this thing during the day. Now, for me, I don't hate it. It doesn't ruin the movie, but I do think a lot of the scenes in Sleep Away Camp 3 would have been a little bit better if they were at nighttime. And I get this movie is supposed to be a comedy. It's not exactly supposed to be like super scary and eerie or anything like that, but I do think some of the kills and the other things like that. not only would have the MPAA maybe would have been a little bit more lenient because some of this stuff would have been in the shadows a bit, but I also think the nighttime just kind of would have added to the whole woodsy camping type of a feel to this movie. But I guess you could say that the brightness of all of it does make this movie feel just a little bit different in the genre and also in the franchise. But just practically, one of the main reasons they filmed a lot of these scenes during the day was because they were freezing their asses off as the production for Teenage Wasteland was moving later and later into the fall as these scenes went along. And also because a lot of the scenes in this third movie are just them outside camping in tents and doing a lot of stuff like that, which is quite a bit different than say the first movie where a lot of the scenes are inside of cabins and stuff. They actually wrapped filming for the third movie on Halloween day. So yeah, a little cold. Uh maybe they should have tweaked the script a bit to, you know, account for the time of year or something. All right. So, how long do we have to wait until Angela starts killing again at this camp? Is she gonna ease into this? You know, kind of feel it out a little bit? Nope, not at all.

[00:12:46]And once again, Pamela Springsteen's character is going to be her normal nonchalant self while she's killing in this movie. Yeah, her personality is going to be quite a bit different this goound. She's not going to really be like her normal outspoken like upfront in the spotlight self like in the second movie when she was, you know, one of the head counselors. She's going to be a little bit more uh lowkey in this movie in a lot of the scenes. Angela's first victim is going to be the newscaster that is there at camp reporting on this unusual type of idea behind this camp.

[00:13:22]But I will say, holy [ __ ] man. that Ferrari that this lady has, that is kind of insane. It's like, how much were they paying newscasters back in the 80s? And as everybody is kind of scattering as the broadcast is now over, she looks at Angela and she's like, "Oh, she looks like a lowerass kid who might have some drugs." So, she just immediately asks Angela for some coke. And that kind of triggers a light bulb in Angela's brain and she's just kind of thinking, "This actually a perfect opportunity for my first victim here at camp. So, let's go.

[00:13:54]And she's like, "Yeah, definitely. I could score you some." And then she just wanders off into the cleaning closet on camp and gathers up whatever kind of poisonous white powder cleaning supplies that she can find that will probably kill this lady and then gives it to her.

[00:14:11]And then she drives off in her nice ass Ferrari and then parks in the woods, gives herself a nice little bump and then just immediately dies. It's kind of a hilarious scene in a messed up way.

[00:14:22]like blood is shooting out of her nose and all of that and she yeah is just instantly dead. And once again, just speaking of the kills in this third movie, unfortunately, yes, like I mentioned earlier, what a missed opportunity. This movie was so cut down by the MPAA. They would cut stuff and send it back and then they would say no and then cut stuff and more stuff and more stuff and more stuff and the MPAA just kept giving them an X rating. Now, to me, when you're just talking about like sheer blood, guts, and gore that you can actually see on screen, not offscreen, not what's implied or anything like that, I would definitely consider this third one the least gory movie up until this point in the franchise. Now, the kills though, I would say definitely are more creative than the kills in the second movie, but again, unfortunately, so much of it is offscreen. And yes, of course, so much of this just has to do with like sheer timing and luck and the era that your movie comes out in really does affect how much gore is going to be in your movie. But you can only imagine if this third one, Teenage Wasteland, came out in say the early8s. I'm not even going to talk about like the modern era. That's a totally different level.

[00:15:36]But if this one just came out in the early8s or something, man, we could have seen so much more. But with that said, even though the kills are very toned down, thanks MPAA, you bastards, we still get some fun ones in this third entry in the franchise. You can tell they're a little bit more creative and they're still going to make you laugh.

[00:15:59]And yes, you can still see a little bit here and there along the way. One of the standout kills in this movie is without a doubt the firecracker kill. So, one of the campers in this movie is just like constantly pranking Angela over and over again with firecrackers, M80s, whatever you want to call them. And she's like, "All right, enough's enough. Karma is a bitch." And when this guy is sleeping, she puts a firecracker, an M80, whatever it is, in this guy's nose and it explodes and his face just pops. And yeah, we can't see a lot of it. We do see a little bit of the aftermath, though. I think it's a fun little life cast of the guy's head. That actual prosthetic ended up in Fangoria magazine, which was pretty cool. And it does look pretty gnarly. But then right after that, you know, the guy next to him who's sleeping with him looks over and sees the whole thing and he's screaming cuz he's just like us. He's like, "Holy [ __ ] that just happened."

[00:16:53]And then Angela gives us the great, you know, nonchalant line that she loves to do. Batter up and just bashes this guy's head with a piece of wood. and then seconds later douses another person's entire tent in gasoline and then just lights this dude on fire. It's kind of a crazy scene and it's pretty fun. You've also got the goofy cleancut guy who turns out he's got a big crush on Angela. So, she's like, "All right, I'm going to use that against them and, you know, pretends like they're going to do some kinky stuff." and she ties him up to this tree and then takes the rope and connects it to the back of a jeep and then just drives off. And it's implied in the movie that it completely rips his arms off. But make sure you go out there and check out that uncut version of this kill because it's pretty damn glorious.

[00:17:42]You see the arms just tear off. Blood is squirting out. Damn you MPAA for ruining all the fun here in the late 80s. But one of the kills that the MPAA was actually the most disturbed by and was heavily cut down was the older counselor, her name is Lily, when Angela buries her alive underneath the dirt except for her head and then decides, you know what would be fun is I'm going to go over and grab the lawn mower and I'm going to run this lawn mower over her face. Another one of those ones where we can see the uncut version.

[00:18:16]There's some clips out there of this one. And I don't know, maybe this kill inspired that lawnmower kill we see in Final Destination Bloodlines. I don't know. Let me know what you guys think down in the comments down below, which is also a very fun kill sequence. But yeah, this one, especially the uncut version, pretty gnarly and a good time.

[00:18:35]And then we also get the flag pole kill, which of course is completely ridiculous. She hooks this girl's like rope or belt up to this flag pole and then just casually pulls her up. I mean, her forearm strength must be off the hook, but she pulls her up to the top of the flag pole and then just unleashes it and she falls right onto her head. And in the original cut of it, they show a closeup of the head hitting the stones or the cement underneath the flag pole and her head just explodes. And they filled this fake head with like pig brains and stuff like that. And also, story has it with the flagpole kill that director Michael A. Simpson got a call from the MPAA and they said, "Sorry, man. Yes, this movie is going to have an X rating." And he's like, "All right, okay. Can you give me a little hint of maybe what we should cut out?" And they're like, "Well, we can't tell you what exactly you should cut out, but off the record, we will tell you that a woman who was watching this got physically ill while watching the flagpole scene." And now, let's talk about the cast in this third movie for a second. And speaking of the older counselor lady who got her head ran over with a lawnmower. I remember thinking this while I watch this one, she just adds kind of a little extra personality to a lot of the scenes that she's in.

[00:19:54]She Yeah, she gets a little bit more bland as the movie goes along, but especially early on. Um, you know, I feel like a lot of the counselors and some of the characters in the second movie were kind of bland. And a character like Lily immediately kind of stood out to me as adding a little something extra to this one. And by the way, how the hell does this old ass weirdo named Herman hook up with the hottest girl at this camp? But speaking of Herman, fun little fact about this guy is pretty much everybody involved in the production of this third movie has said that even in real life, yeah, he was pretty much just as quirky and crazy and as wild as he was in this movie. And secondly, Herman was played by an actor named Michael J. Pard, who I [ __ ] you not, was once upon a time actually nominated for an Academy Award and two Golden Globes for his work on the film Bonnie and Clyde from 1967.

[00:20:54]Hey, who would have thought, man? And I feel like a lot of what Herman does in this really works for me. I feel like just his ability to improv on the set and just be kind of offthe-walls crazy and unpredictable with, you know, what he's going to do on screen. I feel like that worked for his character and it works in this type of a movie. And I think it definitely helped to make this cast in the third entry a little bit more memorable than the cast in the second movie for me. And just speaking a little bit more about the cast, I also think adding this cop to this cast to help with the camp during this week. A guy that has history with this camp, his son was killed last year. I think that also adds a little something extra to what's going on. But anyways, as this story goes along, a part of the plan here at this camp is for a few days they're going to separate the groups into two different groups and then the last two days they're going to combine back together. And of course, Angela, as this goes along, is going to try to figure out some kind of a way that she can single out everyone and kill everyone as soon as she possibly can because I guess she just really likes killing people. And kind of like the second movie, as the body count is piling up and we're getting closer to the end of this one, Angela just decides whoever's left, she's going to nonchalantly just tell them that, yeah, it's me doing this. I did everything last year as well. And she decides to do that to one of the girls that's left and then also to the cop. Now, on one hand, you could say, wow, that's uh pretty ballsy there. Or you could also say it just kind of doesn't make sense. Now, of course, this movie is supposed to be a cheesy horror comedy, but still in this scene, I'm leaning a little bit more towards it doesn't make sense because really everything happening in this scene doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

[00:22:51]So, Pamela here at this point is having this standoff with the cops. She's now admitted that she is Angela. So, of course, that means that she killed his son. She's also clearly hiding something behind her back with both hands. This guy, he's I mean, he's a cop. He has a 2x4 as a weapon, but yet he's just standing there staring at her. I mean, if I was in this situation, I would be seeing Red. There would be no conversations unless it was just Angela trying to say something as she's just like gurgling on her own blood. And then the cop says, "Come on, an what's it going to be?" And then Angela in her normal nonchalant silly self just says, "A gun." And then she just blows this guy away. It's though kind of a quick weird way for a guy you would assume that would be a bigger part of the end of this movie to go out like that so quickly. I feel like they build up his character to make it seem like there's going to be this big showdown or some big fight sequence at the end of this one, but nope, just kidding. Um, he's now gone. And personally, I think because of the history there, and I actually thought the actor that was playing the cop is a pretty good actor, I feel like they should have done just a little bit more with that character. And after killing the cop, I believe there's only like four people left at the camp for Angela to take care of. And they don't actually know what's going on.

[00:24:25]They're off camping still. They're by the campfire. Angela shows up and makes up some of her, you know, her normal story that she makes up about something else going on. Lures them back to this place and tells them that there's one more game that they need to be a part of, but they have to be tied up for this game. And now they have to guess where like the last other, you know, she tells them what's going on eventually and she admits to everything while they're tied up and then tells them, "Okay, I've got a game for you guys. You need to guess which cabin this other girl is in." And then when they walk in there, two of them get like these axes that fly down and like go right into their chest. Kind of reminds me at the end of the original A Nightmare and Elm Street, NY's little traps going on there. Kind of fun, but that's a that's a silly scene, no doubt.

[00:25:10]And then Angela runs out of the cabin.

[00:25:12]She gets chased by one of the girls.

[00:25:14]They have a little scuffle and actually Angela ends up losing that fight. She gets stabbed multiple times and it looks like ends up taking her last breath and we assume is dead. I love how this dude who's supposed to be in a gang and he's only known this girl for a couple days is now like, "I love you, babe. I'm going to move to Ohio. We're going to get married." It's just kind of, you know, a little off-brand for this guy. I will say though, I actually like the end of this third movie more than the ending of the second one. So, what we see here at the very end is the ambulance is driving away with Angela in the back.

[00:25:54]And the EMT all of a sudden notices like, "Oh [ __ ] she's actually alive."

[00:25:58]And the cop looks over at him and is like, "What are you doing? Just kill her. Nobody will know. We can't let this psycho live." And I'm sitting in my chair like, "Yeah." I'm clapping like, "Hell yeah, finally somebody who's not going to let a serial killer continue on just doing a bunch of crazy shit." And then you can see Angela opening up one of her eyes and then she grabs a syringe next to her, stabs the EMT in the chest with it, and then stabs the cop right in the eye. And then the guy who's driving the ambulance is like, "Hey, what's going on back there?" And then Angela Pamela Springsteen in her normal nonchalant kind of a way just says just taking care of business. And then boom, the movie is over. And then this that classic8s rock and roll music that perfectly fits this type of a movie immediately kicks in. I mean, hell, maybe after this it'll be like Halloween 4. Maybe this ambulance will crash by a river somewhere. Angela will escape and the carnage will continue. Or she'll be taken in by some hobo, get a new tattoo, and then join some ancient cult. Who knows? The possibilities are endless.

[00:27:09]Now, what I do like about Sleepaway Camp 3, though, is there are some things in this one that feel different and new and fresh. And I also think a lot of the characters in this third entry are better than a lot of the characters in the second movie. And again, the kills in this one, man, what could have been if we would have gotten the original cut for some of these, at least a little bit more, that would have taken this movie to a totally different level for me. And kind of like the second movie, if I'm in the mood to watch something this silly and this campy, there's going to be a lot of scenes in this one that do work for me at times. I also like that similar to the second movie, but I think even a little bit more, this third one feels like very rock and roll to me.

[00:27:59]Like I mentioned just a second ago, kind of has a little bit of that Jason takes Manhattan type of a feel to it. But there's just something about late8s horror that just kind of hits a little bit different than some of the other eras. Now, do I think this is like this all-time great horror comedy that I will regularly revisit on a regular basis as the years go on? No. I I wouldn't say that. But like I mentioned earlier, it definitely has some fun moments here and there. Has some funny characters. And once again, just like the second movie, Pamela Springsteen is pretty solid in this. And like I've said a million times on my channel, I will always be a sucker for a horror movie that takes place at a summer camp. But anyways everybody, that is my review of Sleepaway Camp 3: Teenage Wasteland. Again, let me know down in the comments down below what you think about this movie, what you think about this franchise. Would love to hear what you guys think. If you also want to see my review of the original Sleepaway Camp and the second movie as well, I have an indepth review of both those movies on my channel. Pretty long videos. We really dig into both those movies. I think you will enjoy it. But if you don't want to miss future videos on the channel, the best way to do that is to make sure you subscribe, turn on those notifications as well. If you enjoyed this video, leave a like on it, share it with a friend, please. Really does help me out a lot. But anyways, everybody, thanks again for watching. It is always great to talk horror movies with you here on the channel. My name is Matt and I will talk to you in the next one.