Before reading this review, we suggest checking out Fistula's F13 Intro first!
Word up peepz and playaz! Dis be da first part of F-Dawg’s Back 2 Da Hood reviews. Mad propz go out to Friday the 13 Pizart 2 yo, da birth of my homeboy JPeg Jason Voorhees.
But seriously, (please don’t stop reading because of that first paragraph) Friday the 13th Part 2 is, of course, the first movie to feature Jason Voorhees as a surprisingly stoppable killing machine. It’s also a strong horror movie of early 80s vintage that holds up surprisingly well 25 years later.
The movie begins with a classic stalking scene featuring Alice (Adrienne King), the lone survivor of the first movie. Luckily, Alice suffers from horrible flashbacks of the first movie, providing built-in, pre-shot padding. After a typical overlong stalking scene (featuring perhaps the most blatant spring-loaded cat in serious movie history), she is dispatched with an icepick (?) to the temple. That’s the beginning, now let’s move on to the plot. Camp Crystal Lake is a ghost camp five years following Mrs. Voorhees’ massacre in the first movie. But on the same lake, there is a training camp for camp counselors. There’s also a hooded killer, and boy oh boy, when those two meet up it’s a recipe for wackiness! That’s the beginning, middle and end of the plot.
The most notable difference between F13-2 and later installments of the series is Jason himself. Those used to the emotionless, hulking juggernaut with a hockey mask will be very surprised at the man’s roots. Jason (credited as Warrington Gillette but played mostly by a stunt person) is smaller, faster and rather spindly compared to the versions that Brooker, White and eventually Hodder made famous. Of course, as a mortal, this Jason is downright limp compared to what he would later become. He botches an ambush with a shovel, gets kicked in the nuts and rolls around on the ground and is generally outsmarted and outmuscled by protagonists Ginny and Paul. It’s not Jason at his best but it’s fun to watch and makes for a more suspenseful dynamic than the later “if he gets his hands on you, you’re dead meat” formula.
Speaking of Ginny and Paul, those two hold up decently as a leading duo. Ginny, played by Amy Steel, is as much as you can ask for in a movie like this, particularly in a bar scene in which she pontificates on just what Jason would be if he were still alive. Of course, she finds out later just what he is, one badass copy of the Phantom Killer from The Town That Dreaded Sundown. The rest of the counselors are painfully flat, and no I don’t mean flat chested. It probably doesn’t matter because the movie never really pays any attention to them. Oh, that might bother you if you actually want to care about your slabs of walking machete fodder… I mean characters.
The ending, in which Ginny tricks “frightened retard” Jason into believing she’s his mom, is pretty solid. You can also look forward to the first of many Jason unmaskings, though this one is unlike any you’ll ever see again. Rather than looking like a bald, lumpy-faced mongoloid, Jason looks like oatmeal on his right side and Hippie Cross Country Running Forrest Gump ™ – with action Jim Morrison beard! – on his left.
Just as it got started, F13-2 is really the end of several eras for the series. It’s the end of the underexploited potato sack with overall and plaid shirt Jason look. For the most part, it’s the end of Jason’s relationship with his dead mom – she does come back in dream form in Freddy vs. Jason, though Betsy Palmer was tragically absent. And, disappointingly, it was the last Friday to take itself seriously. Starting with the next movie, the series turned into the now-hackneyed teenage party slasher movies. Do I think that’s a terrible thing? No, many of those movies were much better than Part 2. However, by going down that road, the series became one prolonged joke and lost its way back. Double bag it next time, Jason.
