The Bizarre Series that is Friday the 13th

[Winter]

The Friday the 13th series is a strange series when you get down to it as it took a while to find it's identity and started out as a rather different then what it became. The first Friday film was a, the admission of the film's creators, a collection of rip-offs that didn't even technically feature the series' main character Jason Voorhees except in flashbacks and a possible hallucination. Jason wasn't the killer until the second film and didn't get his trade mark hockey mask until the 3d film and didn't become a unstoppable zombie until the sixth film which wouldn't be given an explanation, of sorts, until the 9th film of the series.

And yet this series, that again started out as a rip-off of other great horror stories, is seen as one of The most iconic horror franchises in pop-culture with one of the most iconic horror icons of all time. I got into the Friday series around the time Freddy vs. Jason was coming out though I will admit that I've never been a huge fan of the series or horror as a whole BUT I've always respect the genre and found this series in particular fascinating due to how the series main character grew as the series went on.

To the point that I find the influence of the series is the impact it had on itself as it started to forge an identity for itself it became one of the most bizarre series in all of pop-culture which was a result of it's ever changing lore.

One thing I find interesting about the series is that it doesn't enter the realm of speculative fiction until the sixth film, where Jason becomes a Zombie, but until that moment it is, mostly, set in the real world. Sure, Jason does manage to survive seemingly mortal wounds like an axe to the head but for the most part Jason was just a regular guy with an ugly face. The fifth film in the series actually got a LOT of hate when it first game out when it seemingly brought back Jason only to turn around and go


youtu.be/Zk1qyQTuHtg

Yeah, that didn't turn out well for the film so film 6 decided to bring Jason back for real... by turning him into a teleporting zombie and when the series threw out reality and started getting weird, or rather, weirder.

Whereas before the series took a while to find itself after part 6 the series started to go into a "throw EVERYTHING at the board and see what sticks" phase and stayed there until the late 00's.

You had Jason vs. Carrie in everything but name, Jason on a boat that eventually gets him to New York, Jason apparently being part of the Evil Dead series and possessing people that ends with Freddy Krueger stealing Jason's mask, Jason IN SPAAAAACE. The Freddy Krueger film featuring Jason Voorhees only Jason does most of the actual killing and is at least more interesting then the people either serial killer is killing so it balances out.

Which leads us to our final film the Reboot film in the series which, honestly, is kinda my favorite film in the series. Yeah, it's basically just a rip-off of the parts 2 through 4 with a bit of part one thrown in there but it does a lot of new things with the franchise too that I actually like. For Starters, Jason isn't just some mindless Zombie who kills people just for being in killing range or for having sex, he kills cause he wants to be left alone and is intelligent. No really, Jason is actually pretty cunning in this film and while things like him making a tunnel system is a bit silly it's a lot more scary when you really think about it.

I also like how this Jason can run and sets traps which was inspired by the then recent Saw movies though nowhere near as elaborate as those films just simple things like a bear trap or putting someone in a sleeping bag over a campfire. Simple yet horrifying. This is a Jason that feels like he could be real and someone you wouldn't want to be alone in the woods with. This Jason also has my favorite design of the characters which takes the best parts of the character over the years and combines them in a way that works. They even made the bag head Jason look terrifying, which is no small feat.

Some argued that they tried to make Jason too sympathetic but I have to STRONGLY disagree as the series has Always tried to make you feel a little sorry for Jason since the first film and there are lines that Jason has yet to cross. For example Jason has yet to kill kids. Scare them yes but he's never harmed any of them, yet. He's origin has also always been a bit sympathetic. He was just a kid with a misformd face that was picked on and killed, by accented, by a bunch of kids which was because the camp counselors were to busy having sex and getting high to notice.

And the reboot, really doesn't lean into that to much. Honestly it has less focus then most other films in the series including part 2.

And one thing I like about this film over other horror reboots like Rob Zombie's Halloween or A Nightmare on Elm Street is that it's NOT a copy and paste of the original films and DOESN'T spend to much time on the origin of Jason like the other films did. You get the basics in the opening minutes of the film where we see Jason's mom, played by Nana Visitor who played Kira in Deep Space 9, and then the film gets to the horny teens and the kills. This film waste no time in getting to what fans want and is a nice back to basics for the series that really went to left field and kept going until it was in space and then KEPT GOING.

So, yeah, I really liked the reboot, more then the other films in the series and think it's the best. I may not love horror the Friday series itself is likely never going to be something I actively seek out but again I respect it and this series will always be a fascinating series. Starting out as a film that was a rip-off and ending on a pretty solid if not greatly underrated horror film that, in many respects, was ahead of it's time.

Thoughts?

[Rocketboy1313]

I did not care for the remake when it came out, but I have softened on it considerably since then as a distillation of the slasher genre presented unironically and shamelessly (very shamelessly, I think Michael Bay said the film was "excessive").

Strangely, the movie it was most trying to rip off initially was "Halloween" which was originally intended to be the start of an anthology series, where each movie is just a horror premise rotating around the holiday, but then was forced into being a Michael Myers franchise.

Meanwhile Friday the 13th is far more the anthology series. First is a sort of mystery killer, the second is a hillbilly slasher, and like you said it escalates up to cyborg zombie horror. By having a canon that makes no sense after the 1st movie Friday the 13th gave itself a creative freedom that borders on being an anthology series that just happens to call the antagonist Jason in each entry.

[CharlesPhipps]

I do love FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH and have even done a book review on the Crystal Lake Memories documentation of the series.

https://booknest.eu/reviews/charles/117 ... kememories

At heart, Jason is a campfire story and the fact it's not a very well-told campfire story with a bunch of contradictions and impossibilities doesn't change it in the slightest. I think the second video game actually manages to distill most of it into a fantastic archetype and it works wonders. Not everything needs a complicated mythology and I believe JASON VS. FREDDY is probably about as deep you can go into that particular well.

(Though it misses that Jason was never afraid of water--he used to often hide out in it)

Interestingly, I did a D&D adventure once with Jason as the zombie foe of the characters. The player characters determined that Jason Voorhees couldn't be "killed" by the Lake due to the fact Jason NEVER DROWNED. He wandered off into the woods and lived there for decades. Instead, in order to permanently kill him, you had to use his machete since that's what was used to kill him in Part IV. Also why Tommy Jarvis was briefly possessed.

Another player theorized that the Necronomicon's presence in JASON GOES TO HELL meant Mrs. Voorhees brought him back to life with black magic and the Counselors were human sacrifices to make it happen.

Which is the kind of batshit craziness that the series inspires because its mythology is so incoherent.

[McAvoy]

Ehhh. Friday the 13th is just like Nightmare on Elms Street and Halloween.

In that it's first movie was successful enough for studies to greenlit sequels. And they were cheap on the whole.

Offhand the only modern version of that, that is similar is the Saw series.

[CharlesPhipps]

My Bloody Valentine takes place on a Saturday the 14th.

Which I always felt was amusing.

https://youtu.be/IuY7GsM6tvE

[hypocratus]

Am I the only one that thought you were referencing the tv series?

[sayla0079]

Am I the only one that thought you were referencing the tv series?

I did as well.


youtu.be/APiMp_tZvcs


youtu.be/VuBww6GTd50