15 - The Best Deaths from Each Friday the 13th Movie

Time for another Friday the 13^th Friday. Yesterday’s rundown of great slasher movie deaths didn’t include anything from the Friday series because I was saving them for today. So, for you, here’s a rundown of my favourite death scenes from the Friday the 13^th series.

Before we start, here’s a couple of videos for you to watch. Fancy seeing the brutal murder of over 100 people?

The original series (including FvJ)

The remake:

FRIDAY THE 13TH (1980)

Starting at the beginning with the death of an actor who would later go on to become a household name. Well, technically, bacon already was a household name but still. Six degrees of murder here from Mrs Voorhees, with the old arrow through the neck trick.

FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 2 (1981)

Oh Mark, yours may well be the greatest tragedy on this page. Not because of your disability – a guy in a wheelchair has just as much right to be hacked to pieces by a masked lunatic as anyone else – but because you were just about to get laid, thanks to the girl with the least subtle chat-up technique around. At least Kevin Bacon got to have sex before he died. Still, hacked in the face and then falling down a massive outdoor staircase in a wheelchair is a damn impressive way to go.

FRIDAY THE 13TH PART III (1982)

Debbie getting knifed in the back in the hammock. Another bed-death from behind – well, hammock death. Arguably more tragic than Mark’s death as Debbie was pregnant at the time, but that’s a whole massive can of worms I’m not getting into. Let’s move on.

FRIDAY THE 13TH: THE FINAL CHAPTER (1984)

Another reasonably high profile actor in an early role – in this case, Crispin Glover. All poor Jimmy wanted was a corkscrew. Then he found it – rammed into the back of his hand by Jason, who then hit him in the face with a cleaver. There’s a lesson here for all of us – stay off the wine or carry a corkscrew around with you.

FRIDAY THE 13TH: A NEW BEGINNING (1985)

The amount of post-coital sex in the world of Friday the 13^th movies just makes me think back to Mark. Poor Mark. Never mind, did you see those brown knickers she was putting on? I think you had a lucky escape there. Anyway, Eddie has sex with the gorgeous Tina and then gets his head crushed against a tree by a leather strap. If nothing else, at least it’s different.

FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VI: JASON LIVES (1986)

Another Friday the 13^th, another post-coital death scene. All Nikki wanted was for Cort to keep going for another ten minutes until the song finished. Jason (and Cort) had other ideas, and so Jason cut the power. Fleeing (and possibly peeing) in terror, Nikki gets caught short when Jason slams her head into the wall.

FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VII: THE NEW BLOOD (1988)

This one was a difficult choice, so there’s an honourable mention too. The best death scene, purely for the strangeness factor, is when Jason slams a party horn in Kate’s eye. That’s a creative death scene. The honourable mention goes to Judy, bashed against a tree in her sleeping bag. The scene originally contained multiple hits, but you really only need the one.

FRIDAY THE 13TH PART VIII: JASON TAKES MANHATTAN (1989)

As the series goes on, the deaths get weirder – I guess they felt they needed to compete with the Elm Street series. Another multiple choice entry here – I’ve picked the boxer being killed by a hot sauna rock to the gut, but I could also have gone for Jason punching Julius’ head off. Bonus points also for Jason killing the radio playing the lame hip hop track.

JASON GOES TO HELL: THE FINAL FRIDAY (1993)

Crap film, awesome death scene. I could easily have picked Jason’s death in the opening, as that’s pretty damn cool and, if nothing else, makes you wonder what the hell’s going to happen next. Trouble is, what happens next is “the film starts to suck”. I’m going to pick the obvious choice here and go for Deborah, the unfortunate girl hacked in half with a rail spike in the middle of having sex in a tent. As forms of contraception go, “have sex near Crystal Lake” is a bit extreme but it seems to work.

FREDDY VS JASON (2003)

Another multiple choice entry here – the post-coital death of Trey, stabbed repeatedly and then folded in half in the bed is pretty damn gross/awesome, but my choice has to go to the cornfield rave massacre. A double impalement, a head twist, multiple flaming machete slashings and then they just seem to queue up to be slaughtered. Wonderful.

JASON X (2001) - out of sequence to reflect position in the YouTube video

Oh, Jason X. So unfairly maligned, and yet so fairly maligned too. If nothing else, it gave us one of the greatest death scenes not just in the Friday the 13^th series but in all of slasherdom – Adrienne’s liquid nitrogen freezing/face smashing death. As brutal as it is disgusting as it is funny. Massive praise also has to go to the retro eighties holodeck scene with the callback to Part VII’s sleeping bag kill – though this time, the multiple hits added to the fun.

FRIDAY THE 13TH (2009)

The last entry on our killer countdown is poor Lawrence from the 2009 remake/reimagining/whatever. The axe in the back is pretty standard Jason, nothing special about that – until he’s slammed down so the axe comes through out of his chest. That’s more like it.