By  Professor A. Griffin 

Friday the 13th Pt. VIII : Jason Takes Manhattan - The year was 1989, only one year after Jason Voorhees faced telekinetic heroine Tina Shepard in Friday The 13th Pt. VII: The New Blood. Jason was revived with much less care in what was to be one of most embarrassing films (and indeed the last film in the franchise) to ever come out of the Friday the 13th chute at Paramount pictures.

To be fair, most of the action of Jason Takes Manhattan takes place on a the claustrophobic confines of a luxury cruise ship carrying the graduating class of Crystal Lake High and bound for The Big Apple. Still the idea of it wears very thin by the time our boy Jason steps foot on the shores of New York (Actually mostly utilizing Vancouver locations to substitute for NYC).

Kane Hodder once more plays Jason himself. It's a grand moment in horror history, as it's the first time Jason is played by the same actor in two consecutive movies. Other 1980's horror icons that have been played by the same actor include, Fred Krueger (Robert Englund) Pinhead (Doug Bradley) and The Tall Man (Angus Scrimm). Jason joins the ranks of the elite. So to speak.

His rib cage is no longer exposed to us, there aren't as many exposed bones throughout and his clothes have become remarkably less tattered. His skin is a sickly pale blue this time around, as though he'd be slimy to the touch, and water logged to the point of being squishy. He has no mask on his face at the beginning of the film, (it was destroyed during the battle with Tina in part VII) but he appears in complete uniform again due to a most ridiculous set of coincidences.

A Crystal Lake High School couple Jim and Suzy are having some fun in the moonlight on Jim's boat. They toy with each other, make jokes and talk about the big graduation cruise to New York City for the seniors the next night. 

(Important plot point) 

Yes, it's business as usual at Crystal Lake. As they make the sign of the triple horned, bucktoothed, aardvark (Thank you Joe Bob Briggs), their anchor drags an underwater electric cable towards an ominous corpse floating in the murky depths attached by a chain. 

Hmmmm. 

We all see where this is going. The cable is hooked and faster than you can say Ready Kilowatt, Jason is shocked back to life for the second time in his undead career. Now, I don't think Jason was dead per say,…just floating down at the bottom of Crystal Lake waiting (and apparently regenerating). The shock treatment causes an electrical underwater explosion and a bubbling blue light effect from down below that sort of looked like Godzilla himself was coming up.

Jim's hockey mask is a remarkable mock-up of Jason's original, even down to the axe wound on the left side. This Jim guy knows his legends. Well the legend himself (the real one) climbs aboard and Jim is impaled with a spear gun and Suzy is stabbed with a spear. Suzy's death is actually the most effective one in the film (for me) as she is hiding from the murderous undead Jason inside a storage bin on the boat. Jason finds her and slowly raises the spear as she lies trapped in the storage cubicle begging, pleading for her life. Jason mechanically does her in. There is a cold bloodedness to Jason that sends shivers up my spine. I think he actually enjoyed hearing Suzy's pitiful cries for mercy and relished the horror that she experienced as he SLOWLY raised the spear for her to see and then plunged it down, pinning her to the inside of the storage bin like a butterfly in a collection. 

The students of Crystal Lake High are gathered at the docks and boarding the magnificent cruise ship that will take them to New York. Graduation is a big moment for these teens. Heck, growing up in Crystal Lake and actually making it to your graduation alive must be a high point for any student in this town. Unfortunately, there is a stow-away on the boat, appropriately named The Lazarus. Why does Jason climb aboard the big boat headed for New York? Well, to move the story along sure, but I think he instinctively goes to where the party is. 

Our main characters are introduced, Rennie Wickham, the strange introverted teenager who has a horrible memory of almost drowning and therefore a fear of water, Charles McCulloch, her guardian who insists she take this cruise, as it will be good for her, and Miss Colleen Van Duesen, the chaperone for this ill-fated cruise. Rennie's love interest, Todd Shaffer is also introduced. Well, the cruise gets under way and Jason makes himself at home in the bowels of the ship. 

Jason's body count up until this point is 71 (including the deaths of Jim and Suzy at the beginning of this film) and before The Lazarus reaches the Big Apple, Jason has done away with 10 more. The deaths, however, are all practically bloodless. Director Rob Hedden knew what he was up against (The MPAA's illogical scissors) and had to come up with unique ways of showing the slaughter. The most brutal is the death of Boxer. Jason shoves a hot sauna rock into his chest while he relaxes in the dry sauna with a towel over his face. He never sees it coming. 

Ouch!

With his 81st kill, (Wayne, tossed on a control panel and electrocuted) Jason actually sinks The Lazarus, while all the main characters escape on a lifeboat.

Throw the little girl in the water and force her to swim, or drown. Not very nice. While splashing and trying not to drown, little Rennie is pulled under by…yes…Jason Voorhees AS A CHILD!

WHOA! Are we still on this whole, Jason drowned as a boy kick? That he's been undead since he was 15? No I refuse to believe it. Perhaps she saw Jason in that stage in a hallucination/premonition. Perhaps Jason (after being chained to a big rock and dropped in Crystal Lake in part 6) grabbed her and her weird psychic mind saw him as a child,…maybe Jason (the 15 year old) swam over to her and wanted to play? Who knows? It makes little sense.

ANYWAY….our heroes arrive in New York, and so does Jason. Staking up out of the water on the docks of New York harbor, and hilariously staring at a huge billboard advertising the Rangers (New York's Hockey team) with a close up of a goalie mask.

Apparently, the director also wanted Jason to kick a dog to death when he gets to New York. Wisely, Kane Hodder refused. "Why would Jason kick a dog?.." he is reported to have said. "…that's not his character at all!" Admirable and impressive. Hodder is fiercely proud and protective of his claim to fame, and rightly so.

Next, Jason is approached by some tough street gang members who apparently have it in their minds to rob him, the Sultan of Slaughter is hot on the trail of the main characters and doesn't have the time to butcher the punks, so Jason does the simplest thing…he raises his mask up and shows the face of death. The criminals (being a cowardly, superstitious lot) run in terror.

Jason continues to follow our heroes through he alleys of New York and in a moment of unusual role-blurring saves Rennie from being gang raped by a couple of New York junkies after they forcefully attack her and shoot her up with crack. (Jason saves her for him to kill that is.) The only reason Jason appeared to stop the rape and kill the two gang-bangers was that they were in his way. It's a nice moment though. Jason as a force of nature, like the Alice Cooper song said, "..if you see him coming get away if you can."

PICK UP SOMETHING WITH A SHARP EDGE PLEASE!!!

The climatic moments of the film are in the sanitation tunnels under New York. It's actually hard for me to type this but apparently, according to this film, each night, toxic waste is flushed through the New York sewer system. Hmmm, interesting. Trapped by Todd and Rennie down below, Jason is washed up in the toxic waster and bubbles away before our eyes, while CALLING FOR HIS MOMMY!!!! Yes, Jason speaks. He pulls his mask off and vomits water and screams for his mommy! His voice was eerily high pitched like a child as he watches the toxic waste rush towards him, "Mommieeeee!" As Rennie climbs up and out of the sewer, she has one last look down at Jason who appears as a young boy again, in his swimming trunks, lying dead in the toxic waste.

WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT ABOUT?

The biggest disappointment was mostly because of the build up I created for this film. My nutty friends and I threw a Jason party, with a Friday the 13th Jason Hockey Mask cake (red velvet inside), viewings of the previous Fridays on tape, making a large sign to bring with us into the theatre that would be used when Jason made his 80th kill. (It was a large 80 in blood red glitter) and we even played a Friday the 13th version of Hide and Seek in the dark of my backyard that night with one person donning the old Jason Costume and hiding until we as councilors found him or the various tools that would help us defeat him.

(plastic machete, Mr. Voorhees' sweater) Once in the theatre, our anticipation grew. With each kill, we would stand up in our seats and chant , "Jason, Jason he's our man, if he can't kill him no one can!!" Ok, we were a little rowdy and probably a little drunk, but we had a blast. Until we realized we weren't watching a proper Friday the 13th movie. The sadness drained our energy as we left the cinema. We realized that this might be the end of it.  That Jason would end his career with whimper, not a bang.

Jason remained dead and MIA in New York until 1993. That's the longest that Paramount has ever let the franchise rest in peace, in fact they dropped the series all together. I guess that says something about the shame that followed Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan. I can't even go on. I must take a break and quickly pop in Friday the 13th Part 3, just to calm my nerves.….

The home of Fred Krueger, New Line Cinema had just done away with the dream killer in a so-so way in Freddy's Dead: the Final Nightmare. When I read that new Line was going to continue the Friday the 13th series, I was overjoyed! Actually they couldn't use the title Friday the 13th, for Paramount still owned the rights to the name, but no matter, New Line knows horror, so it should be great! Surely they'll treat the Sultan of Slaughter with some respect.

When Jason goes to Hell: The Final Friday opened in 1993, I was dutifully there. Hoping against hope that New Line could make something magic happen in the woods again. Hoping that JV's adventure in New York didn't ruin him forever. One thing that did get me excited was the return of Sean Cunningham to the directors chair of a Friday the 13th film. Yes, the director of the original returns to bring you the last- or so the poster promised. The film opens in a way that thrilled me, gratuitous nudity (a beautiful girl in a shower) in a cabin in the woods and a familiar ki-ki-ki ma-ma-ma.  Jason was home.

How he GOT home is never addressed. Last time we saw him he was dissolved in a wash of toxic waste, (or somehow transformed back into a child) but here he was again in Crystal Lake in the person of Kane Hodder.

Jason looked a little weirder this time around. His head was bulbous and lumpy, (presumably a side effect of the toxic bath on his undead flesh) with strands of hair in various places. His new mask (that he got from part 8) looked fused onto his face, with the skin around it settling over the edges. He still had only one eye, and a bad temper. (Heck I would be too if I had to walk back from New York!) It seemed that New Line decided to ignore the last Paramount Friday the 13th film, which is ok by me, we'd all like to do the same.

The opening continues in a classic fashion with our nubile honey running from Jason out of her cabin and into the woods, the Crystal Lake killer in hot pursuit, heck she even falls down during the chase for old times sake…then…..suddenly….THE FBI SHOWS UP!!! 

Searchlights, helicopters and hordes of government soldiers with machine guns and bazookas come out of nowhere. They descend on the very confused Jason (I knew just how he felt) and

 BLOW HIM TO PIECES!!!!

Uh…..

"Ok, let's see where they go with this one", I thought to myself, squirming in my seat. Apparently the entire opening was an elaborate sting operation (with live bait) to trap, attack and destroy the infamous serial killer, Jason Voorhees. Jason was in pieces, and undead or not, nothing's gonna make him walk again. The body parts are taken away and as the scientist conducting the autopsy examines Jason's heart, it starts beating!! Something very strange takes over him, a force beyond his control, and he PICKS UP JASON'S BLACK HEART AND EATS IT!

There is a sudden change in his stance and his look and he promptly butchers his lab assistants in brutal bloody ways before escaping out into the night. On the table, the body of Jason Voorhees, only son of Pamela Voorhees, that's been through so much, lies still and quiet, and in pieces. There is no more Jason.

In this installment, the writers obviously tried in infuse some new blood (sorry) into the tired old franchise by; 1) trying to explain Jason's invulnerability, 2) using the body-jumping theme from an earlier New Line film, The Hidden, and 3) Giving Jason the new goal of finding his sister. 

WHOA! Sister? Jason was an only child! That's what Mrs. Voorhees said in part one, that was the basis of her rage and grief….what sister? Well, apparently sometime after Jason drowned , Pamela Voorhees had another child and apparently gave the baby up for adoption. THEN she went bonkers and vengefully butchered all the kids at the summer camp. (sigh) ok, we'll go with it. In addition, Jason also has a niece, Jessica Kimble (Kari Keegan) and she plays an important part in the highly mystical storyline.

A bounty hunter character, Creighton Duke, is introduced and claims Jason is still alive, jumping from body to body. Apparently, he's been hunting Jason for quite a while. (Remember what happened to the last Jason hunter in part 4?) He tells Jessica, "through a Voorhees he was born, through a Voorhees he will be reborn and only through a Voorhees can he be destroyed." All very confusing. The Voorhees house is searched and a startling find is unearthed, The Necronomicon.  Yes, the book of the dead written by the Mad Arab Abdul Alzar and made famous by Sam Raimi in The Evil Dead. Even the Evil Dead dagger makes a cameo appearance.

The biggest problem (and there are many) in this film is that is NOT a Friday the 13th movie (both in name and in theme). We see a recognizable Jason Voorhees only in the beginning (before he is blown up) and then throughout the film only in mirrors that show him in his traditional hockey mask wearing glory when the possessed victims are reflected in them. Jason's exposed spirit by the way, looks like a fanged snake or slug.

The spirit of Jason jumps from body to body, brutally killing whoever gets in his way until he can find his sister, Diana. Apparently, if the little slug-demon can posses a body of a true Voorhees, the last living Voorhees, then Jason will be reborn and immortal again. So, we've got a little of The Exorcist, Evil Dead , The Hidden and Halloween, but very little actual Friday the 13th.

The real shame is, the special effects in this entry were great! The gore was cranked back up for some really gruesome kills and Jason (or whomever he was possessing at the time) was really piling up the bodies. 20 kills total this time, including the bodies of the people he possessed (for after he uses them up, they fall lifeless). He even kills himself (in a way) as Kane Hodder, who actually had little to do in the film as Jason proper, so he also plays a FBI agent who is killed by one of the Jason-hosts.

Jason does eventually find Diana Kimble (Erin Grey) and possesses her body. Problem is, she is dead as the creature enters her (between her legs in a very tasteless moment) and the Jason that is re-born is the exact same toxic waste scarred, mask fused on, rotting Jason we saw at the beginning. 

The re-born Jason then crushes the life out of Creighton Duke, and turns his attention to his sister's daughter, his niece. However, using the mystic power of the Necronomicon, Jessica opens up a pit into hell itself, and Jason is grabbed by some very large (and slightly muppet-like) demon hands and dragged into the Abyss.

What happened? Where's my Jason who stalked unwary teenagers engaging in premarital sex? Where's the rage and brutality of the Killer of Crystal Lake?

I left Jason Goes to Hell with mixed emotions. Yes, it was better than Jason takes Manhattan, and it had lots of gore and some excellent gross-out scenes, but it just didn't feel right. It didn't thrill or excite me. If the movie was about an unknown serial killer/evil spirit who went jumping from body to body in search of re-birth, it would have been a fantastic fright flick, as a Friday the 13th, it just didn't work.

At the very end of Jason Goes to Hell, The Final Friday, we see Jason's mask lying on the ground where the pit closed up after him. The camera pans slowly towards it. The audience cheered when a familiar razor fingered glove burst out of the ground, grabbed the hockey mask and pulled it back down into the underworld. 

 I was certain that Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday was the end of my favorite slasher. Rest in peace, (again) Jason Voorhees.

1979's Alien told us, "In Space, No One Can Hear You Scream…" but if you listen very closely, you can hear,.….ki, ki, ki, ma, ma, ma.

Continued>>

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