FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VIII: JASON TAKES MANHATTAN

The Friday the 13th franchise is really bad. For such an enduring brand, it is remarkably incompetent. Some of the Friday the 13th films are horrendous. Every other horror franchise has at least one good film in the mix, with a collection of fun additions. Friday the 13th has an iconic hockey mask and the best you can say about the films is that every even numbered Friday is watchable.
 
I would listen to an argument that suggests that Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives is the only good entry in the series because it has some understanding of how stupid fun this should be. That’s not this movie though, this is Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan which might be my favourite Friday because it’s title is a play on The Muppets Take Manhattan, and that’s a pretty funny movie to name your gory horror movie after.
 
The best part of Jason Takes Manhattan is that most of the movie does not take place in Manhattan. It should be called Jason Takes To The Seas because most of the film is set on a boat that is on its way to New York. How did we get to the point where the hockey mask wearing Jason is terrorizing a bunch of teens on a boat?

Well, as we all know thanks to Drew Barrymore having to answer questions at the start of Scream, the killer in the first Friday is Jason’s mum, Jason is found in the woods doing murders of his own in Friday II but the hockey mask is nowhere to be seen and he has a sack over his head (this series is so thin that the most notable thing about the character’s development is what he wears over his face), the hockey mask shows up in Friday III and Jason is killed. In Friday IV Jason goes to the morgue but is revived and then is properly killed this time.
 
Jason is not in Friday V, a guy named Roy does all the killing pretending to be Jason. In Friday VI Jason rises from the dead after his body is dug up and then struck by lighting, he’s then tied to a large rock at the bottom of the lake. InFriday VII Jason is once again resurrected thanks to a girl who has magical mind powers. He later ends up back at the bottom of the lake. Which is where he begins Friday VIII, when he climbs onto the boat and heads to Manhattan. He ends VIII by dissolving in toxic ooze.
 
And that’s where we are. This isn’t even the dumbest entry in the franchise. That would be Jason X where Jason goes to space. This series is so dumb that at some point the franchise even loses the right to call itself Friday the 13th. How do you lose the rights to your night? The 9th one was called Jason Goes To Hell: The Final Friday because New Line acquired the rights to the character but didn’t get the rights to the title. Like idiots would.

Where would I fit into Jason Takes Manhattan? I really could see myself being stuck with some kind of corporate gig having to perform comedy on board the SS Lazarus. That’s right, they named the boat after a person who rose from the dead, do you get it? Anyway, let’s see how it goes for me doing a gig on a boat to the graduating class of Lakeview High School.

IF I WERE IN 'FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VIII: JASON TAKES MANHATTAN' I WOULD:  DIE BUT AT LEAST NOT HAVE TO DO THAT GIG