PopHorror Let's Get Scared
The Friday the 13th franchise has spawned 11 original movies (counting the crossover), a remake, a non-canonical TV series, an upcoming TV series, three video games, and one of horror’s most iconic killers. But when faithful fans start to rank the movies, Friday the 13th Part 4: The Final Chapter is nearly always in the top two. As “The Final Chapter” turns forty this year, let’s see what makes it stand above so many other sequels.
Friday The 13th Part 4: The Final Chapter was directed by genre legend Joe Zito (The Prowler 1981) and featured the return of gore guru Tom Savini (Dawn Of The Dead 1978). This movie was marketed at the time as the final Friday the 13th movie (see our writers’ tribute to the original film here), but as we’ve learned in hindsight, nothing is ever truly final in horror. What Friday The 13th Part 4: The Final Chapter does so well is that it introduces Jason Voorhees to his only equal in the series, a young outcast named Tommy Jarvis (played by Cory Feldman: The Goonies 1985).
Tommy is a nerdy, eccentric, curious kid. He’s unfairly ostracized, much like Jason was before his untimely drowning. Having a character with so much intuition and common ground with our killer makes their showdown special, but also heightens the stakes as an innocent young boy fends for his life.
Feldman isn’t the only acting standout here, as Ted White’s (Starman 1984) Jason is among the most expertly played antagonists in the series. With a creepy lake house as the setting, and some of the most memorable kills (like the corkscrew or the raft) in the buildup, Tommy then shaves his head and becomes a mirror image of a younger Voorhees.
The only thing more (endearingly) creepy than Crispin Glover’s (Willard 2003) dancing is the ending, in which the franchise is seemingly passed on to a new vengeful killer. While the franchise never took advantage of that daring direction, Friday The 13th Part 4: The Final Chapter is seemingly the perfect example of a slasher sequel that does everything right.
