Jason Voorhees

Jason Voorhees from Freddy vs. Jason.

Jason Voorhees (born June 13, 1946) is a fictional character from the Friday the 13th series of slasher films. A vicious mass murderer, he has a presence in all the films, even when he is not the killer. With his trademark goalie mask and machete, he is arguably among the most recognizable villains from any slasher film. Throughout the series, Jason has never spoken aside from occasional mumbles and groans. Jason is credited as having been created by Victor Miller, the screenwriter of the first Friday the 13th film, in spite of the fact that he barely appeared in that film. For his part, Miller has gone on record as saying he has avoided watching the sequel films and that he has great reservations about how Jason has been handled.

Childhood years

Template:Spoiler Jason was born on June 13, 1946 to Pamela and Elias Voorhees. Sometime later, Elias left Pamela to raise Jason on her own.

At birth, Jason was deformed, possibly inflicted with a condition known as hydrocephalus. Originally Jason was created as a normal child by Victor Miller, but was later made to be deformed as the crew behind the film decided he was not "special" enough. It was eventually decided that Jason be deformed (much to the dismay of Victor Miller) and Tom Savini designed the makeup for Jason's visage (view Jason's makeup here ). When interviewed, Victor Miller, the writer of the original Friday the 13th, was asked about the new "deformed" Jason and said, "He wasn't a deformed creature from the Black Lagoon, but that's how movies are made. I don't think the ending would have been as good if he were a cute blonde kid who looked like Betsy Palmer at 8 years old, do you?". [1] By this statement, Victor Miller means that although he preferred the "normal" Jason, the jump ending would not have had the same effect if it included a normal looking child. Despite firm evidence in the original Friday the 13th some fans still firmly believe Jason was not deformed at birth, and instead, that his deformity was caused after the time of his supposed drowning (see below). This fan speculation is untrue as Jason's deformed face can clearly be seen in the flashback to his drowning; pictured here .

Some fans believe that Jason was also autistic, though in-film details indicate otherwise -- an autistic child would not be allowed into a summer camp in the 1950s, for example. Interestingly, the novelizations of the films describe the young Jason as quiet and distant but otherwise normal, and make no mention of either deformity or autism.

In any case, his mother loved him deeply. In the summer of 1957, Jason attended Camp Crystal Lake, where his mother worked as a chef. The other children chased him into the lake while the camp counselors were having sex in a nearby cabin, thus leaving the children unattended. Because he could not swim, he began drowning. The camp counselors didn't hear his cries for help, so Jason slipped under the water and was washed away to the other side of the lake. It is unclear whether he survived, or died and came back to life, but his growth into adulthood by the time of Friday the 13th Part 2 suggests that he survived.

Pamela Voorhees' revenge

Mrs. Voorhees went insane with grief after her son's disappearance. She swore revenge on the people responsible for her son's death. She waited one year to act out her vengeance. On June 13, 1958 she murdered the two teenagers she believed to have been responsible for Jason's drowning. After the incident, the camp was closed. A few years later, Mrs. Voorhees sabotaged an attempt to reopen the camp by setting fire to it. Later still, Mrs. Voorhees poisoned the camp's water to prevent the camp from reopening. Because of these incidents, the locals around Crystal Lake began to believe that the camp was cursed and dubbed it "Camp Blood".

The camp was deserted for years, until a man named Steve Christy, whose parents originally owned the camp, spent $25,000 to try to reopen it. Mrs. Voorhees snuck into the camp and murdered Christy and the six teenage counselors he had hired. The only remaining person, Alice, decapitated Mrs. Voorhees with a machete during a struggle. Alice goes out into the lake on a canoe and falls asleep. The morning after the police arrive and call out to her in the middle of the lake and when she wakes up the hideous corpse of young Jason pulls her into the lake. Since after this scene we see Alice in the hospital and the police officers tell her they didn't see Jason, this was apparently a dream.

Jason resurfaces

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In Part 2 Jason wears a pillow case, an homage to The Elephant Man, as a mask

Living as a hermit in the camp's forest, Jason was drawn to the bank of Crystal Lake by the cries of two women fighting. He arrived just in time to witness his long-lost mother's bloody demise and was horribly devastated. Alice, his mother's killer (in self defence), was trying to get over the massacre when Jason attacked her in her home, stabbing her in the head with an ice pick. Jason then returned to the forest. Five years later, a man named Paul Holt opened up a camp counselor training ground near the Camp Crystal Lake site. Jason, wearing a pillow case (commonly misidentified as a burlap sack) on his head to hide his disfigured face, went into the area to drive them out of his home. After dispatching six counselors, he struggled with a girl named Ginny, who drove a machete into Jason's shoulder. Ginny returned to the training ground with Holt and they locked themselves in one of the cabins. A few minutes later, Jason appeared to burst through the window and attacked the two remaining counselors. However, it is disputed whether this was only a hallucination by Ginny, who awoke to find herself being loaded into an ambulance and Holt nowhere to be seen (Making Friday The 13th: The Legend Of Camp Blood by David Grove, states that Holt was killed off camera), or that it really happened.

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In Part 3 Jason gets his trademark hockey mask

The next day Jason killed a couple living in a home near Crystal Lake and got new clothes. Then he made his way to a vacationing spot called Higgins Haven and killed 10 vacationing teenagers there. It was there where he replaced the burlap sack with the trademark hockey mask that he took from one of his victims. The one person who survived Jason's rampage, a girl named Chris Higgins, whose parents owned Higgins Haven and was attacked several years before by Jason, took an axe and gashed it into the left side of his head, knocking him out.

Believing Jason to be dead, the paramedics took his body to the Wessex County Morgue, where he soon afterward regained consciousness and promptly killed the coroner, and escaped. When he returned to the camp, he killed the teenagers resting there. As he was about to kill a girl named Trisha Jarvis, her brother, Tommy, distracted the mute murderer by shaving his head and dressing as Jason when he was a boy. Tommy then hacked Jason in the left side of his face until Jason fell onto the machete and split his head open, instantly killing him. Tommy would spend the next four years in a mental institution. Finally dead, Jason was buried at Eternal Peace Cemetery near his mother.

Jason comes back from the grave

Years later, Tommy Jarvis, now in his early 20s, was released from the mental institution, but was still plagued by nightmares about Jason and a man named Roy Burns, whom he had killed a year earlier because he was masquerading as Jason and killing people in the mental institution. Sneaking out of the institution, Tommy and a friend went to Eternal Peace Cemetery to dig up Jason's grave and cremate him. After they dug him up, Tommy stabbed a metal rod from a cemetery fence into Jason's rotting corpse and threw his hockey mask into the grave. As they were about to cremate him, however, a lightning bolt struck the rod in Jason's chest, reanimating him.

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Jason Voorhees from Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood

The reanimated Jason killed Tommy's friend as Tommy escaped. Jason was now considerably stronger and even more resilient than ever before. With a bloodlust in his eye, Jason put on the hockey mask that Tommy threw into the grave before proceeding to Camp Crystal Lake, which was now called Camp Forest Green. When Tommy told the sheriff his ordeal, the sheriff just thought he was crazy and put him in a jail cell for the night. After escaping from the jail cell Tommy made his way to Camp Forest Green, where Jason had already killed several counselors. Tommy wrapped a metal chain with a rock attached to it around Jason. Then he pushed Jason into the lake, where he (seemingly) drowned. Jason's body lay at the bottom of the lake and decomposed for some time.

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Jason Voorhees, sans mask from The Final Chapter

Five years later, a girl at Camp Forest Green named Tina Shepard accidentally released Jason from his underwater tomb. Jason then proceeded to do what he did best: slaughter the people at the camp site. Tina then confronted Jason, using her telekinetic abilities to knock Jason's mask off, to see that Jason's face was now even more deformed from decomposing underwater for several years. Tina then forced Jason back into the lake with her powers.

Then after that, Jason was resurrected by an electrical cable and climbed aboard a cruise ship full of teenagers bound for New York. He was close to being unleashed in all of Manhattan, but he was (seemingly) killed again by toxic waste in the sewage system, where his body washed up back in Camp Crystal Lake.

A few years later, he came back yet again, only to be supposedly blown to bits by a team of FBI agents. Unfortunately, he was reincarnated in several bodies through his evil soul. His only surviving family member, his 22-year-old niece Jessica Kimble, stabbed Jason with a magic dagger, sending him to Hell.

Freddy versus Jason

Years later, Jason would be resurrected once again. This time, by Freddy Krueger, a serial killer with supernatural powers. Disguising himself as Mrs. Voorhees, Krueger manipulated Jason into murdering a number of children in the Elm Street neighborhood in the hopes that the residents would attribute the deaths to Krueger himself and fear him once again. With this fear, Krueger's powers would be regenerated and he could redeem his role as a killer through dreams. However, Jason then went on several public killing sprees leaving behind dozens of witnesses who testified that the killer was not Krueger, but a seven-foot tall maniac wearing a hockey mask and wielding a machete. Krueger, furious at having had his newly regained power quickly dissolve, challenged Jason. Because much of Krueger's powers exist in dreams, he manipulates a boy to tranquilize Jason. While asleep, Krueger challenges Jason and discovers Jason's fear of water. Krueger again challenges Jason in the real world. During the struggle, Jason ripped off Krueger's right arm and impaled him through the chest with his own glove of "five fingered knives", striking the decisive blow. Stunned and dying, Krueger fell to his knees and was then decapitated by Lori Campbell with Jason's machete, while Jason sunk to the bottom of the lake. Then the setting changes to "dream like" with fog and we then see Jason come up from the lake the next morning carrying the decapitated head of Freddy Krueger. Krueger's head winks to the audience.

Jason's current location is unknown.

What the future may hold

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The new and improved Uber-Jason.

While much of the details leading up to his capture are unknown, in the year 2010 Jason is held in the Crystal Lake Research Facility (built on the site of what was once Camp Crystal Lake). Being unable to have Jason executed due to his regenerative ability, the government operates on him instead, presumably trying to find the source of his invulnerability.

Eventually, the researchers decree that Jason be held in cryogenic suspension. Jason manages to escape and murders several guards, before being lured by the project manager Rowan into a freezing chamber. As he is being frozen, Jason stabs a hole through the door, both mortally wounding her as well as letting the coolant escape, freezing her with him. This is Jason's last known activity as the facility is left undisturbed. Eventually Earth itself becomes an uninhabitable planet, with humanity relocating to a new star system, living on a world called "Earth Two".

In the year 2455, a ship full of students find Rowan and Jason's still-frozen bodies and take them back to their ship. The crew thaws the two bodies, reviving Rowan while Jason remains unconscious, leading the others to believe him dead. When Jason later wakes up, he goes on a killing spree until an android belonging to one of the crew members upgrades itself and blows off Jason's arms and head, as well as a large portion of his upper torso.

Jason's remains are left on a bed used to help regenerate tissue, and the nanotechnology repairs Jason's injuries (including the hockey mask). The medical equipment discerns that there wasn't enough tissue left to reanimate Jason, but through a glitch, over-rode the abort procedure. The Nano-bots searched for a synthetic replacement for Jason's tissue, and used the metal around them as a substitute, giving Jason his armored appearance seen above. When the process completes itself Jason's build is larger than before, his strength is enhanced enough to rip through titanium, and his body is virtually indestructible; being able to withstand gunfires and the center of an explosion with no visible damage.

When a rescue ship arrives, the surviving crew members escape while one of the crew members remains and sacrifices himself by tackling Jason into Earth Two's atmosphere. It is unknown if Jason survived the entry into the atmosphere; if he has, his last known whereabouts are believed to be in the bottom of one of its lakes.

Other appearances

The character of Jason has appeared in many other media forms other than just the movies. He has appeared in comics books: Satan's Six, Jason Vs. Leatherface, and most recently a series of specials from Avatar Comics.

Also, in the anime, Pani Poni Dash!, Akane Serizawa can be frequently seen in a hockey mask, trying to impersonate Jason. Also her hand puppet resembles a smaller version of Jason, with Jason's blade and hockey mask as well as his blood stained shirt.

The men behind the mask

Much like his masked counterpart Michael Myers, the part of Jason Voorhees has been played by various actors; some uncredited, others taking great pride in their parts. Due to the physical demands the character requires and the lack of emotional depth depicted, it comes as no surprise that almost all of the actors are stuntmen with no pre-existing history solely in acting. The best known among them is Kane Hodder who has become a favourite among fans and is often cited as the best to take up the role; there are others, however, that argue against these claims, pointing to another one of the actors as a better or "best Jason." Although, it is worth noting that there are those who do not see any distinction between the portrayals and do not find it worth arguing over.

In the original Friday the 13th Ari Lehman portrayed a young Jason, seen only in a brief flashback and the surprise ending. Although he is not the only actor to portray a young Jason (a role that went to Timothy Burr Mirkovich in Jason Takes Manhattan and Spencer Stump in Freddy vs. Jason) he stands as the first actor to ever play Jason Voorhees.

For the role of the first adult Jason, some controversy arose over the role in Part 2. While Warrington Gillette is credited as Jason, the majority of the role was actually played by Steve Daskewisz, who was simply credited as the stunt double. Gillette only played the role in the unmasked scene, with Daskewisz playing the role in almost all of the character's other scenes. Although this credit was corrected of sorts in Part 3 (in which Daskewisz is credited as Jason for the reused footage from the climax of the film), this confusion existed for years.

Daskewisz was asked to reprise his role in the third film, but turned it down simply because of the money he would have had to put out during filming and refrained (though he later says he regrets this). Instead, the role went to Richard Brooker, a trapeze artist, cast simply because of his big frame. He took the role believing that dialogue was not a necessity to acting.

More controversy stirred for the part in The Final Chapter when the role was handed over to professional stuntman Ted White. He refused credit for the role, feeling bad about the treatment of the actors who would play the victims. He claims that he took the role solely for the money, not wanting his name on what he called a "piece of shit." Although, he has been cited as later saying that the film come out better than he had expected and is credited in reused footage for later films.

Much like with Part 2, there has been confusion over the role in A New Beginning, partly due to the crediting of the killer and not Jason himself. While Dick Wieand is credited as Roy Burns, the film's actual murderer, it was stuntman Tom Morga who performed in the few flashes of Jason, as well as portraying Roy in all but the unmasked scenes. Wieand, while not ashamed, has been outspoken about his lack of enthusiasm over his role in the film.

C.J. Graham auditioned for the role in the sixth film. He initially lost the role, but was called back five days later for the role when the hired stuntman, Dan Bradley, failed to give the desired performance (Bradley can still be seen in the paintball sequence in the film). A nightclub owner with a military history, Graham performed almost all of his own stunts in the role. Although he was passed over for reprising the role, he has often been cited as speaking highly of his time in the part.

The part was then taken up by Kane Hodder in The New Blood where he carried the role consecutively into Jason Takes Manhattan, Jason Goes To Hell, and Jason X. He remains the only actor to reprise the role, and is often cited as perfecting the role. His strong following caused obvious upset among fans when he was turned down the role for a fifth time.

For Freddy vs. Jason, the role went instead to Ken Kirzinger, a Canadian stuntman who worked on Jason Takes Manhattan. There has been conflicting reports over the reason behind the casting of Kirzinger, although many believe that it may have simply been due to his residence in Canada, where the film was shot, and thus done to save money. Additionally, according to director Ronny Yu, Kirzinger was hired because he was taller than Freddy actor Robert Englund. Ken stands 6'5" compared to the 6'3" of Kane Hodder and Ronny Yu wanted a much larger actor to tower over Englund who stands 5'10".]

See also

• Freddy vs. Jason
• Michael Myers
• Pinhead
• Leatherface
• Chucky
• Freddy Krueger

External links

• The Many Faces of Jason- a look at the various shots of Jason behind the mask