HALLOWEEN 2K18: A Review of "Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan"

"I'm in Times Square and I can already see twelve McDonalds'."

Happy 1989, fellow Halloween freaks. We've reached the end of the 1980's and their two biggest slasher booms. 1989 was much like 1988, where both Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger made entries in the year, and Jason's was before Freddy's as usual. Jason's was a little strange this time around. The producers wanted Jason to take a bite out of the Big Apple, but production & budget cuts forced them to relocate the shoot to Vancouver. Only about a day or two's worth of shooting took place in New York City, since most of New York City is some of the most expensive real-estate in the world. Remember that, Native Americans who sold that island to us for twenty-four dollars. This is Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan, the freakin' eighth entry in this franchise about a hockey-mask wearing guy who kills people. This time, Jason's on the prowl in Manhattan. Let's dive right in and see if Part VIII falls flat on its ass or tries to save the franchise from losing its touch with its dwindling fan base.

"Can you gentlemen direct me to Shea Stadium?"

Two graduating high school students are aboard a houseboat on Crystal Lake. Jim (Todd Caldecott) tells his girlfriend Suzy (Tiffany Paulsen) the legend of Jason Voorhees (Kane Hodder), before playing a prank on her with a hockey mask and a prop knife. A few problems here right off the bat. First off, Jason Voorhees shouldn't even be a "legend" anymore. Seven damn murder sprees have taken place. He shouldn't even be a myth, a fantasy, or hearsay anymore. Secondly, that's just a really dumb prank. But these movies are full of that stuff. The boat's anchor damages some underwater cables, which shocks Jason's corpse, still hanging there from the end of Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood and revives him. He sneaks on board, takes the mask, and kills Jim with a harpoon gun before impaling Suzy, who tries to hide from him, with a barb.

The next morning, the SS Lazarus is ready to set sail for New York City with a graduating senior class (AKA "Killing Gallery") from Lakeview High School, chaperoned by biology teacher Dr. Charles McCulloch (Peter Mark Richman) and English teacher Colleen Van Deusen (Barbara Bingham). Van Deusen brings McCulloch's niece Rennie (Jensen Daggett) along for the trip despite her aquaphobia, much to his chagrin. Jason sneaks on board and kills rock star-wannabe J.J. (Saffron Henderson) with her guitar before hiding. That night, a young boxer who lost to champion Julius Gaw (V.C. Dupree) is killed when Jason slams a hot sauna rock into his abdomen while Rennie, searching for her pet Border Collie Toby, discovers prom queen Tamara (Sharlene Martin) and Eva (Kelly Hu) doing drugs. McCulloch nearly catches them moments later and Tamara pushes Rennie overboard, suspecting she told on them. She uses video student Wayne (Martin Cummins) to record McCulloch in a compromising situation with her but rejects Wayne's advances afterward. Jason kills Tamara with a shard of broken mirror as she showers. All this time into the movie and we're still not in New York City. I wonder when and how "Jason" will "Take Manhattan"? Is it even in this movie? Is it in the next movie? Am I wasting my time? Well, that's a given, but still.

Mike Tyson trains for his next fight (c. 1989)

Rennie sees visions of a young Jason throughout the ship, but the others ignore the deckhand's warnings. Which is a great way to get yourself killed in these movies. Jason kills Captain Robertson (Warren Munson) and his first mate. Rennie's boyfriend and Captain Robertson's son, Sean (Scott Reeves), discovers them and tells the others before calling for an emergency stop. Eva finds Tamara's body and flees; in that moment she meets Jason, who chases her. Eva enters the disco room and finds all doors locked, where Jason enters and violently strangles her to death before throwing her violently onto the dance floor. The students agree to search for Jason while McCulloch decides that the deckhand is responsible; however, the deckhand is found with a fire axe in his back. Ain't it always the way? Jason tosses student Miles (Gordon Currie) to his death, and Julius is knocked overboard. In the hold of the ship, Wayne comes upon J.J.'s body and is thrown into an electrical box by Jason; his corpse catches fire and causes the ship to sink. With the other students dead, McCulloch, Van Deusen, Rennie, and Sean escape aboard a life raft and discover Toby and Julius are alive and WHEN THE FUCK DOES ANYBODY GET TO NEW YORK FUCKING CITY?! Literally none of this has ANYTHING to do with New York City. The life raft is a good moment, because as a lost audience member feeling LIED TO by the title, it feels like you're getting close.

Candid photo of generic 1980s woman. Or...
I'm sorry, a screen-cap of the movie.

Well I finally get my wish as they somehow row all the way to New York City where Jason stalks them through the streets. Rennie is kidnapped by a pair of junkies, and the group splits up to find help. Julius fights Jason but becomes exhausted after Jason does not go down; he is then decapitated by a single punch from Jason. Seems like an oddball way to kill someone. Can someone who punches a head off even pretend to be dead for so long? Can he be harmed? That doesn't even remotely add up to me, but I'm also nitpicking the science of a Friday the 13th movie, so who's fooling who? Rennie escapes from Jason when he kills the punks that kidnapped her, which is honestly very nice of him. She runs into Sean, and they reunite with the teachers and the police before Jason kills the officer who is helping them. Alright, never mind, he's an asshole. Rennie crashes a police car after a vision of Jason distracts her, which is a stupid way to crash a car. Van Deusen is incinerated in the car when it explodes, and it is revealed that McCulloch is responsible for Rennie's fear of water, having pushed her into the lake as a child. What a... twist? They leave him behind, and Jason drowns him in a barrel of waste.

Is there such a thing as a "Bad Face" Day?

Jason chases Rennie and Sean into the New York Subway. Kind of a dumb place to chase them into. Jason doesn't even need to do anything, he just has to wait for the New York rats to kill them. Sean incapacitates Jason by knocking him onto the electrical third rail. When Jason revives, he chases them through Times Square, where they try to escape through a diner. They flee into the sewers and encounter a sewer worker. He warns them that the sewers will be flooded with toxic waste at midnight before Jason appears and kills him. Why the toxic waste is being flooded into the sewers is fucking beyond me, but whatever. Sean is injured, and Rennie draws Jason off, wounding him with a splash of acidic waste. Jason is forced to take off his mask, horrifying Rennie at his acidic, melting face. She and Sean climb the ladder as Jason staggers to get them. Just as he is about to kill them, the sewers flood and engulf him. Rennie sees a final vision of a child-form of Jason as the waste recedes. The two escape to the street, where they are reunited with Toby, who had run away earlier, and walk off into the city.

Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan is a very weak entry in the series, but nothing that was ever its fault really. It's still entertaining enough, I guess. It was the fault of a moneyless production with bad acting and constant script rewrites that resulted in a movie with lousy script ideas, which included sewers getting washed with toxic waste and a "twist" that didn't really mean anything. The movie prides itself being based solely around the idea of Jason Voorhees walking the streets of Manhattan and it only includes about 25ish minutes of New York City actually being in the movie. The rest is on a party boat. The kills were still pretty gory and interesting... except the whole "punching a guy's head off" thing. Plus, this was the eighth movie in ten years. Audiences just weren't buying into it anymore. Luckily, this would be the last movie for what can be considered an extended period of silence on Jason's part. Between this and Jason's next entry, two Nightmare on Elm Street sequels would come out in theaters.