Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter is a film of contradictions. As the title brazenly declares, this movie was intended to be the end of the franchise. Spoiler: it wasn’t. Far from it. This outing’s success ensured that Jason would return a further eight more times (and counting).
Jason is now a horror icon. The slasher killer in a hockey mask is immediately recognizable — even to people who have never seen a single one of his films.
But why is that? I’ll admit here and now that this is as far as I’ve watched through the Friday the 13th films so far (more on that shortly), but to this point there is nothing special about Jason that would warrant such a pedestal.
Yes, Jason is a brutal, vicious, robust killing machine. But shouldn’t an iconic villain be more than that? Freddy had a perverse sense of humor. Michael has a chilling psychopathic vibe. Art takes pleasure in inflicting pain. Jason just kills. He has no personality. And, despite the franchise’s best efforts to impose some sort of narrative reasoning for his manic bloodlust, Jason never becomes anything more than a generic bad guy — an unstoppable killing machine that murders horny teens simply because that’s what happens in slasher flicks. (Also, lest we forget, his presence barely registers in the initial film.)
As it happens, Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter doesn’t need Jason to be anything more than what he is. You could take this exact same set up and characters, swap in an entirely different villain — or even just a nameless, bog standard, faceless spree murderer, which Jason essentially is — and it would work just as well. All of which is to say that, despite my general lack of affinity for this franchise, Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter is actually pretty damn good.
As is widely accepted, it is certainly the best Friday the 13th movie (at least of the initial tetralogy, which is as much as I can attest) but what’s good about it owes precious little to Jason. It’s everything around Jason that makes this so good. For the first time in the franchise, we have a bunch of likable characters that we don’t want to see getting killed. MVPs, of course, are Corey Feldman and Crispin Glover, whose lovable geeks elevate this beyond the simple formula of boobs and blood that slashers depend on to make bank.
But fear not, there are tits and ass aplenty in The Final Chapter — so much so, in fact, that a running gag involves Feldman’s 12-year-old Tommy repeatedly getting excited at chancing upon nubile nudes, only to have the sight forcibly hidden from him.
Indeed, for much of its runtime, The Final Chapter plays like a fun hangout movie. The characters aren’t just cannon fodder, they are actual characters. Tommy is an affable tween with a penchant for monster masks and a keen mechanical instinct. Jimmy (Glover) is an awkward yet confident guy struggling to make sense of a recent breakup and who desperately wants love and sex. There’s virgin Sarah, big sister Trish, vengeful Rob, divorcee Mrs. Jarvis, doofus Ted — hell, even the nurse at the morgue has a personality and invites empathy. The point is, after three films in which the cast is almost to an individual as dull as ditchwater, The Final Chapter has an embarrassment of riches.
There’s also decent splatter gore too, courtesy of the great Tom Savini, making his return to the franchise for the first time since the initial movie. There’s a lot of cutting edge slicing and dicing and the saw to the throat death is particularly gnarly.
Astute readers of my blog will have noticed that I don’t review horror films or books; I only provide recommendations. After slogging my way through the first three Friday the 13th movies, I’m glad to have finally struck gold and find myself in agreement with the consensus opinion: that if you absolutely, positively have to watch a Friday the 13th film, this is the one you should choose.
Will I watch any of Jason’s subsequent outings? Probably, but I’m in no rush to do so. I am curious how the character has endured for so long and why people seem so enamored of him based on the fact that, from what I’ve seen, there is zero reason. Presumably, he evolves to become worthy of his status in popular culture. Time will tell.
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Well you got a new subbie 😁
For certain, the G.O.A.T. of Friday films and my personal favorite time at the movies EVER when I saw it in the theater in 1984 with a bunch of teenage horror lunatics. It was a crazy ass party in that theater.