Ah, the return to my favorite long running horror series, FRIDAY THE 13TH! Why do I like F13 better than, say, the HALLOWEEN or HELLRAISER serieses (I know it's not a real word, I'm trying to make comical use of grammar, which is harder than you'd think!)? Well, because the character is under constant change. In the HALLOWEEN movies, Michael Myers is always the same: some unstopable psycho whose supporting characters have more interesting stories than he does. In the NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET flicks, Freddy doesn't change, he's always this smart ass dream demon who kills teens with their own fears and fantasies. Pinhead? Cenobite demon from Hell who makes people into freakish (and often stupid) twisted monsters and always gets beaten by a magic box. Leatherface? Despite the fact he takes coolness stature above Jason in my book, he's always the same flesh eating lunatic, running around with a chainsaw and drooling on himself. But, with the FRIDAY THE 13TH series, there's always something different. In the original, it was a woman, Mrs. Pamela Vorhees, avenging her dead son. Here, in Part 2, Jason is all grown up into a backwoods survivalist savage. Part 3? More of the same as Part 2, only now he's got a hockey mask, and that ONE shot of his face at the end purveys just how sick he really is inside. Part 4 sees the "death" of Jason. Part 5 sees Jason replaced by a copycat killer named Roy: a fat guy who drives an ambulance and avenges his fat son's murder. Sixth installment: Jason returns, now as a super zombie. Episode 7: super zombie Jason battles a girl with psychic powers, ala CARRIE. Part 8: like the subtitle says, Jason expands his stomping grounds to include NYC and a cruise ship. Jason Goes To Hell: Jason has become a body jumping ghoul looking to reincarnate himself through the use of his sister's body, eventually losing out when he's dragged to Hell by giant arms. The upcoming Jason X: Jason goes to space, becoming a mechanized slasher with a new, more streamlined look. The changes may not have all been popular ones, but at least the writers tried to keep Jason fresh, despite the sacrifice of hollow and even irritating victims. Then again, they're supposed to die, so who cares what they're like! They're just there to provide sex and gore damn it!

Okay, now that I've deffended my enjoyment of the FRIDAY THE 13TH movies, allow me to review Part 2. We open with Alice (heroine of the original) as she has a flashback of the events from our last movie, flashbacks she sounds like she's getting off to! For those who missed out, allow me a quick recap: a middle aged woman named Pamela Vorhees went on a wielding spree through the councilors of doomed Camp Crystal Lake in a psychotic effort to avenge the accidental death of her young son Jason, back in 1957, making way for a flurry of cheap knock offs to follow in the years after... So, back to Alice, she wakes up after her little nightmare, showers (though denying us the pleasure to play voyeur), and heads to the kitchen for a snack. Instead, she finds the head of poor old Mrs. Vorhees in her fridge! Then, someone grabs her and shoves an ice pick into the back of her skull! From here, we're mislead by the opening title, which gives the odd impression that this is gonna be an action movie. Why they do shit like this, I do not know...

Now, let us jump over to old Crystal Lake, site of our last slaughter. On the other side of the lake, away from "Camp Blood", is a coucilor training facility, where a group of horny teens goes to learn how to take care of bratty kids and how to have sex with their fellow councilors. As per the original, the scruffy old town drunk is back, telling all the nubile youngsters that they're gonna die, and just annoying the Hell out of everyone. Upon first viewing of the hot blonde ASSistant, Ginny (the chick who shows up late for the seminar), I'd say she's gonne be our heroine. Also, from the looks of her beat up Volkswagon, I'd say it's gonna give her trouble at a crucial life-or-death moment later on... trust me, after seeing flicks like this for eons, you begin to spot stuff like this a mile away. Now, at a little campfire circle scene, we learn about our new slasher, Pamela's son Jason, who's all grown up and ready to take up the family business! Seems that Jason didn't drown after all, but in fact, survived. The little retard then took to the surrounding woods, where he grew up the natural way: eating dead squirrels and living in a run down shack. Then, on the fateful night of Pamela's return to the camp, Jason witnessed the decapitation of his own mom. Now, revenge in his heart and machete in his hand, Jason exacts revenge on all the teenage bastards who tresspass on the lands of Crystal Lake. Why? Jason feels the place is like holy ground because his mom died there, and if anyone tresspasses on his holy land, the punishment is death! Think of it as the whole Jews vs. Islamics thing, only this Jew has a laundry sack over his head and wears over-alls!

After Jas takes out that annoying drunk dude (via strangulation), and the nosey sheriff (courtesy of the business end of a claw hammer), he sets his sights on those disrespectful teens, and when the majority head into town to do some binge drinking, this leaves a select few for our madman to sink his gardening tools into! Let the games begin! Jason proceeds to snare, slash throats, machete-to-the-face, stab, and DOUBLE spear the kids, meeting his only real resistence from our heroine, Ginny, as she returns, having had her fill of watching others get drunk. Jas makes a move for her and, sure enough, that damn Volkswagon gives Ginny trouble (see, what'd I tell ya?), though she does manage to escape his clutches. She then gives him the classic last ditch effort: shot to the nuts. It works rather well, givine Gin a chance to recooperate, before she gets a tad medievil on our villain's ass, going all WWF and smashing a chair over his head! But, her stumblings through the forest lead her to the lair of our bad guy, where she gets cornered and finds the head of Mrs. Vorhees in a shrine type of set up. As a last resort, Gin must put on Pamela's old grungy sweater (which Jason has been keeping a stark vigile over), hoping she can sucker the misguided murderer into thinking that she is his mom, back from the dead to reward him for his good work. This works, almost long enough for her to plant a machete in his skull, but goes to pieces when he sees his mom's true rotting cranium, still detatched and sitting on his little alter.

Lucky for Gin, her boyfriend Paul shows up to help her stop Jason, distracting the monster so she can shove the machete into his neck... if you think he's dead, then you better go back to preschool Junior! My point is proven, as Jason later jumps through a window, ruinning a perfectly sappy moment and revealing his horrendous visage (which he'd been hiding behind a dirty canvas bag the whole time), before we go all white washed and come back to find Ginny being hauled into an ambulance, delirious and asking where Paul is. The whole thing wraps up with Jason, supposedly still dead at his shack, then we get a close-up of Pamela's festering head (you keep expecting it to open it's eyes) before we hit the credits.

Yeah, this is basically just another "killer in the woods" kind of movie, but not only does it introduce us to the real star of the series, but it also gives real F13 fans like myself a legitimate origin for Jason and his whole motivation for killing people. However, for taking so long to attempt building up a story and fleshing out characters, the killing spree at the end is rushed, with most of our deaths happening in the last 20 minutes. Also, this'll probably confuse those people who think horror movies are limited to the mainstream, leaving them asking, "I thought Jason wore a hockey mask?", or ,"Why is the Elephant Man killing everyone?". So, serious followers should like it, while others, not easily entertained with simple sex and violent gore, should probably go pick up something like SILENCE OF THE LAMBS to challenge their brains with.

Sequels: FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 3; FRIDAY THE 13TH PART IV: THE FINAL CHAPTER; FRIDAY THE 13TH: A NEW BEGINNING; FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VI: JASON LIVES; FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VII: THE NEW BLOOD; FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VIII: JASON TAKES MANHATTAN; JASON GOES TO HELL: THE FINAL FRIDAY

If You Liked This Flick, Check Out: HALLOWEEN 2 or BLOODY MURDER