Harefooted Halloween: Friday the 13th: A New Beginning

What I Liked: Not a whole lot…more EXPLODING credits!

It’s hilarious when Tommy full on body slams one of the other hospital patients into the breakfast bar out of nowhere WWE style.  What an audacious move to pull on someone!  I don’t think it was meant to be funny though.

What I Didn’t Like: Exploring how little Tommy Jarvis’ (Corey Feldman (License to Drive)) life has been affected by Jason’s murder spree as an adult (John Shepard (The Hunt for Red October)) has potential as probably more of a dramatic film.  As a part 5 in a slasher series it’s used as brief setup to connect to the previous installment but ultimately nothing is done with it.

Believe it or not there’s a microscopic plot that, well, not unfolds…happens?  This entry is sometimes referred to as the murder mystery one because you’re kept in the dark the majority of the time as to who’s bumping off all these people.  The attacks are very similar to Jason’s MO but we thought he was dead.  The conclusion is not satisfying and pretty friggin’ stupid.

They cut way back on the gore often only showing the victim’s brief reaction or cutting away before the weapon makes impact (the MPAA was notoriously harsh on the Friday sequels).  Additionally, four folks get killed off screen bringing the total body count (including the bullshit dream sequences) to a staggering twenty one.

An attempt was made to add more humor to this one (example: a guy almost shits his pants on the way to the john because he ate an enchilada) but oh my god, the backwoods ma and son characters that are filthy, surly and all around rotten irritating assholes are possibly the worst two things in any Friday the 13^th movie.  My guess is they’re supposed to be comic relief with a grown man acting like a bratty toddler and his pissed off mother yelling at him all the time but they certainly are not.

Overall Impressions: *Spoiler* The bad guy isn’t Jason which I don’t get.  If the guy was gonna act exactly like Jason the entire time then why the switcheroo?

The filmmakers wanted to change shit up but had no fuckin’ clue what to do.  Bringing Jason back undoubtedly felt too repetitive so they cook up this Tommy Jarvis character to tease as a successor but abandon that and throw a completely separate dude into the mix and abandon that as well.  As I mentioned in my Part 4 The Final Chapter review there isn’t any sort of through line that connects the Fridays besides Jason.  They never setup a universe to explore.

Usually I appreciate when a sequel goes for something different even if it fails because at least they attempted to delve into new territory.  But with Part 4 The Final Chapter, and this one especially, it comes off half-hearted at best.