Friday Conversation: Should Paramount Have Created A New Beginning?
After the success of Part 3, I was surprised that Paramount decided to make their next movie in the franchise the last. I was young when the The Final Chapter was released in theaters, I believe I was 10. However, even then I was stunned that they would stop making them. Of course, The Final Chapter also raked in big money and I knew the sequel was coming. After A New Beginning’s release in theaters, I waited patiently for home video to see Jason once again.
I have to admit that I was disappointed upon initial viewing as I felt cheated by the killer not being Jason. Just as some felt cheated by the original when Mrs. Voorhees was revealed as the killer and not any of the characters that were introduced throughout the movie. However, as years passed I grew to really enjoy A New Beginning. I think it boasts the greatest collection of characters in the franchise and has solid direction. It is one of the movies from my overall movie collection that I can just throw in the DVD player on a whim at home and watch many times.
Do you think that Paramount should have left the franchise dead after The Final Chapter? Should they have continued with Part 5 having Jason as the killer or do you like what they did with A New Beginning?
100% ABSOLUTELY!
I mean I understand that they had “killed” their cash cow, so to say, and I understand that the realized they could make more money by releasing another film. I’m sure at the time they had to go with the gimmick probably not thinking a “zombie” Jason would work.. (boy were they wrong).
I actually had someone tell me that it wasn’t Jason before I had ever seen the movie (yeah I was a little pissed but I was still excited to see it). Truth is I also remember everyone talking about how cool they kills were. It was like they would be bitching about the fact that it wasn’t Jason but “mostly” they would be saying “yeah but you HAVE to see this kill”.
Anyone who has seen my previous post know I LOVE part 5 because I have said it before but if it looks like Jason and it kills like Jason.. well it’s Jason. Every Jason had been a different stunt man behind the mask and that’s all Roy was (well not technically Roy since he never actually played Jason), another stunt man in a hockey mask. Plus without part 5 you wouldn’t have the tree strap kill… amongst MANY other GREAT kills from that movie.
“My Mama’s Gonna Chop You Up Into Itty Bitty Pieces My Friend!”
-mWd-
Some people might not like the movies after 4 some maybe even after 3 or 2. Me I think they’ve all been great. They all have aspects that are better or worse than the rest (i.e. story characters, sfx, etc)
A New Begining was good in part because of Final Chapter for me. I liked the Tommy Jarvis character and the fact that he’s all fucked up in the head because of Jason makes for a good movie. Then comes Roy to screw the kids head up even more. I like it I have to say I like it alot. Hard to compare or wrap my own head around it but I like it more than Jason goes to Hell as a Jason movie and Jason was actually in that movie. It was about Tommy and he directly relates to Jason. I hope that character comes back in a future Friday the 13th.
If it had been the last in the series ok I would of been pissed but thankfuly Mr. Voorhees continues to crank out sequels and now spanning across three decades.
I do think they should have chosen another title for TFC if they thought there was a possibility for another sequel. I don’t like that at all. However, they were smart enough to go with a sequel called a new beginning and keep Jason dead. I like it.
I don’t think it was the best, but def planned and set up to work.
At First I Hated this movie for the same reason that Jason wasn’t the killer, but now lot of years later I really liked it, its one of the most fun movies in the franchise in my opinion, I wish that Jason were the killer in this one for this reason, but all the story they made was really well done.
to me, this was the last good friday flick. the kill scene formula of not seeing the killer (except for hands and feet) was alot more suspenseful and put you more in the victim’s shoes since neither of you can really see it coming until it’s too late. and, of course, there’s the regular finale chase scene where they finally kill the killer which brings that final resolve.
when they released part 6, they showed jason too much. it wasn’t nearly as suspenseful. it even got too gimmick-ey for me. the first 5 created a paranoia of a sam fisher-like assassin lookin to kill whatever it sees without mercy.
something we’ll likely never see in the horror genre again, and it’s unfortunate with how good the special effects have gotten.
At one point i fed into the hype that Part 5 sucked; but then i began to wonder if it was really as bad as people make it out to be. it’s actually not THAT bad. i would even venture to argue that it’s more creative and entertaining with better kills than Parts 2, 3 and 4.
now that being said, it’s not as sentimental to most of us as Parts 2, 3 and 4; but it should definitely be included when we all have marathon Jason nights!
i know some people may skip 1, then go to 2, 3, 4, skip 5, then do 6, 7, 8, skip 9, 10 and 11.
part 5 yes,they could have skipped parts 6,7,8 those were when it just got really corny.i tell ppl who never seen these films to watch part 1-5 and the rest is just garbage to skip ‘em.
If Jason Lives was part 5 I think the series wouldve done better but a new beginning kinda ruined it dont get me wrong I Love all Fridays (even 9)
I thin the story idea for “new beginning” was a good one. Also, I don’t think the idea of a parent, mad because his son was murdered by some “crazy-teens,” was a bad idea either. I think a part five, based on this idea… is kinda cool.
However…
I think the person in charge of part 5 totally blew it. The script was not good, the directing was horrible… there were a few good parts, Reggie, Tommy, etc… I just wish it was in the hands of somebody else because the basic idea, I believe, WAS A GOOD ONE!
I love A New Beginning.
I have to be honest and say I refused to buy it when it originally came out on VHS. Then sometime later when it hit DVD I found a cheap copy and bought it…I remembered that I did love it and realized my disappointment of Jason not being the killer was somethig to get over.
The characters and a lot of the kills were great in this installment and I did love the victim POV kills, instead of seeing Jason in every single kill shot.
It looked good and was moody enough to frighten me. And the “last chase” was great too.
For me, Friday was pretty decent (the first 4 are classics) until Jason went on a boat/Manhattan…the music was bland along with the kills and everything just seemed so, whatever.
Part 7 I liked a lot because it just looked really cool and Part 6 was okay (it did have great moments, but I generally disliked the actor playing Tommy – they should have brought back the guy from New Beginning).
Part 9 I hardly remember but remember enough that I pretty much dismissed it after watching. Since when did Jason’s evil live in a worm/heart/whatever that went from person to person – ridiculous.
Freddy vs Jason is not and never will be a F13 installment for me.
And the first hour or so of Jason X was pretty great I thought.
The re-boot; well stuff is done for an MTV/ADD generation now.
…”who the fu*k are you, and what the fu*k do you want”…
While the franchise was never the same after Part 1-4 the fanchise wouldn´t be what it is today if they never made ANB. We wouldn´t be discussing it here or probably anywhere else. Yes, most of the fans (including myself) believe that the true classic F13th where the first 4 movies and that the ones after Part 4 could not reach them. But those movies helped to maintain the interest in the franchise. Heck, if here wasn´t a Jason lives I would nt have even known about Friday the 13th! And I think a lotof the newer fans would´t know about the franchise if it wasn´t for Freddy vs Jason.
Storywise PArt 5 did what it had to do: What do you do after your protagonist died?
Should they have made ANB the way it turned out? The copyca-story had potential and is great, but the way it was executed in ANB was bad. The movie itself is just disapointing. First off, they needed a better director. If you compare Part 5 with part 1,2 and 4 you think you might compare “Plan 9 from outer space” with “Gone with the wind”. Watching Pam and Reggie running through the woods in the finale is funny but not scary at all. Too many unintentional/ annoying moment like the blue truck passing the same rock for 5 times in a row.I hate to say it: They should have gotten someone else for the score or put some pressure on Manfredini. Part 5´s score is horrible.
There was way too much cheese in part 5. They sould have tried to keep it more serous. Less of Ethel, Junior, Vinnie etc. And of course: They shoud have improved “whodunnit”-gimmick. Roy had just 2 scenes unmasked and you could smell from miles away that he´s the killer.
Part 5 is good up until you find out youve been tricked the whole time. After watching it a second time I noticed I should of known right away after Roy gives his evil stare before putting his dead son in the ambulance. Over all its good just not the same since its an imposter. I agree with the rest of the blogs a lot of creative kills in this one… still a good F13 over all
Na sorry but they should off sticked with f13th!!!
Love Ethel.
“Would you shut your trap. You ain’t so pretty yourself, you know.”
Ahh, Germaniac. Ethel and Junior were what made the movie so great or me. And my thought on these movies are that the characters and kills are the crux of the franchise. I can’t imagine Part 5 without these characters. Thne perhaps the movie would be unwatchable.
I do agree that certain scenes are comical as you mentioned. The running scenes are funny with the bad editing job.
Yes definately. I dont know why so many people dislike part 5, I mean ok its not Jason..but there are some over the top kills. Like the road flare in vinnies mouth, the hedgeclippers in tinas eyes, and my favorite the belt over eddies eyes. It had a very high body count…and it has one of the nicest tit shots in the franchise (Tina). Plus it has a little mystery like part 1. I know its kinda obvious who it is. That shot when Roy looks at the camera…then all of a sudden the screen goes black and jumps to the first Jason style murders of the film. But when i first saw it I didnt catch on so I really didnt know who it was. I was thinking it was dr. leonord or Ethel. But anyway 4 films arent enough. Even though the final chapter is my favorite in the franchise…Im glad Paramount went on, otherwise we would have no part 7 the new blood.
I have always felt that part 5 is exactly what part 3 of “Halloween” is considered…. Ignored and not part of the franchise.
When you look back at it, the fact that Paramount even wanted to make another Friday The 13th is shocking. The franchise had always been a fairly good money maker for Paramount, but it was widely known that the studio wanted to wash its hands of the series.
From a purists stand point, it wouldn’t have bothered me for the Friday franchise to end after Part IV. I think once Part V debuted, it signaled to the fact that the series still had legs, and that Paramount would reap the rewards. That being said, I thought that those behind Part V did a respectable job. It certainly wasn’t a ridiculous premise to have someone using a copy cat method to kill those responsible for their son’s death.
The counter argument to making a Part V is that it led to the silly Part VI, VII, VIII & the horrendously bad Part IX & X. Everyone has heard the anti drunk driving message, “Know when to say when”, well the Friday franchise probably could’ve taken a lesson in that area post Part V. I don’t think that means there couldn’t eventually have been another movie. I think it would’ve been a wise move to do what the Halloween franchise did after the “Season of the Witch” (which was awful), and that was to sit back and to take some time off before ideas poured in regarding the next film.
In my opinion those first 3 flicks post Part V were rushed, and ended up showing little reverence for what made the franchise successful in the first place. I know for many horror fans, their concern is centered around Jason & Jason only (who I thought became a caricature of his former self). In fact the franchise seemed to be more concerned with new and fun ways for Jason to kill his intended victims (and the # of kills), but because of that, the plot, storyline, and character development took a severe hit(especially in regards to the heroine/protagonist).
A crucial element of any good horror film is centered around a sympathetic protagonist/s and its secondary characters. As an audience we want to care about the heroine and the intended victim/s (Female & male). Unfortunately Jason’s victims post Part V became more one dimensional, and they were dumbied down to the point that their fate/s became less substantive. The Friday kids seemed to operate within a pluralistic society/niche in the beginning. Their backgrounds though different, didn’t seem to be disjointed, like the characters today. These days, it seems like the powers that be create characters that would resemble those seen in M.T.V.’s the “Real World”. In other words, it’s all about image/looks, and less about personality. By today’s standards, we would never see an Amy Steel running around the woods for her life; she would be replaced by some buxom blonde with a S.A.T. score around 650.
For me, this movie is like Halloween 3: Season of the Witch. When I first watched that movie, I was mad that it didn’t have Michael Myers in it. The same thing happened after I watched F13 Part 5 for the first time. It didn’t have Jason in it. So obviously, I was upset. However, just like Halloween 3, I have recently watched part 5 again, and even though neither of the films had the main killers people loved (Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees), that didn’t mean that they were bad movies. Part 5 is now one of my favorites. My only problem with it now is that all of the kills in the film are barely shown onscreen (the first four movies showed the kills in their full glory – Arrow in the throat from part 1, machete to the face from part 2, harpoon to the eye from part 3, face crushed in the shower from part 4), I wish they could find all of the gore footage they had to cut and release an unrated version of the movie like they did with My Bloody Valentine earlier this year.
Part 5 was good.
No problems with it.
That about sums it up Germaniac. Hindsight is 20/20. Because the franchise (but at that point maybe not yet a franchise) was only 5 years old, after TFC they could have filmed Frank jr eating lunch and it would have made just as much opening weekend. As one part of a 11 film saga, it made the writers of the following movies try harder to stay true to the implied “Rules” of a Jason movie. Lots of boobs and lots of kills thou.
I wanted to chime in once again to also state that not only do you get some of the most memorable kills from this installment don’t forget you also get great characters. I loved the shoot location and the music and sounds truly felt Friday the 13th to me.
And come on how great was the up close machete slow walk shot with “his eyes” playing…. everyone knows that scene.
Last words… if they had never made this movie we would have never gotten the best tits of the series.. Period
I absoulutley love A NEW BEGINNING!!!! I think it held up with the others in the series, and I think the end chase is one of the creepiest in horror. Especially with the barn scene. And I loved the kill when the girl is dancing upstairs in her room!!! I AM PROUD TO SHOW SOME LOVE FOR ROY!!!!
Its okay.the hillbilles and the druggie medic weat thin on repeated viewings.There is alot less stalking and even less jump scares Its okay but I think 1-4 and hell night kick ass….
i agree with john robert’s post on all points.
my only problem with part V is not one the common, obvious complaints. i think alot of the kills have no setup and are poorly executed. …somebody’s doing something in a scene about nothing relevant, out of nowhere cut to a shot of hands holding a weapon and swinging, quick zoom-in on the person making a stupid face, end scene. …i’m not saying there aren’t some good kills, but alot of them are kind of WTF? that’s it?
While not my favorite of the series i do love new beginning. especally the sheers in the eyes of the naked girl who’s name escapes me at this moment
it would have been interesting to see where the series would have gone if they had continued in the direction the story line was going with tommy wearing the mask and sporting a knife at the end 
ah well i guess we’ll never know. BTW, this is prolly the best friday converstation ive seen on here in quite a while! keep up the good work guys. gives me something to do while im waiting for the next friday blurays 
I was going on 10 years old when I saw this movie. I loved it then & I love it now. No, it’s not the best of the series, but I agree with a lot of people who also love this movie that it is the last great Friday the 13th movie. Especially after all these recent editions that have come out on DVD over the past year, from part 6 on, it goes down hill. From the very first moment Jason comes back to life by lightning, it’s ridiculous. At least part 5 had a believable plot- someone wants revenge & uses Jason’s identity to get it. Really nothing more than that. And it had Ethel. One of the funniest frigging characters of the saga.
“You big dildo. Eat your fuckin slop.”
Ya know, I was just talking to a Canadian friend online about this.
Basically, like scabboy and others, I feel this was truely the last Exploitation-style Slasher entry of the series, and as a result, very operatically sleazy and old school slasher-iffic in places. But I ultimately feel it does have way too many characters that are ultimately just introduced for the sake of trying to have a suitably icky death of course before the MPAA steps in to enforce edits on the film makers. In short: It’s fun, but VERY flawed.
But I’ve always had a soft spot for this perverbial Black Sheep of the series. I never really minded the Pseudo-Jason/Roy Burns imposter. And some of the characters are quirky and most of the girls (in fact, I personally find ALL of them) are hot in an attainable way for us North American’s. Especially totally tubular mid ’80s New-Wave hottie Violet (Tiffany Theisen from Reform School Girls). But ultimately, I will admit the film is NOT high art in the least, even if it was never meant to be, and there is some inane and even silly & dumb dialogue and equelly silly & dumb set pieces. By this point, the series was well-versed into it’s own retro-Slasher formula, and as a result, I feel the cocaine fuiled intensions of the film makers and others really needed a tighter script that focused on Tommy and a slightly better well written group of the trouble teens at the Pinehurst halfway house.
But, alas, even with the MPAA-imposed cuts (which is another thing that ultimately makes me grop this half a grade from a C+ to just a C) it has, I’ve just always had a soft spot for this mostly anti-social and much more eccentric & quirky and even very oddly mean-spirited as all fuck entry in the series. They truely don’t make’em as inane and anti-social as this anymore.
Yup, it’s not high art in the least, but it’s the last installment that I truely enjoyed, many flaws and all, and is a solid Exploitation picture that is well worth having, even if the script and the directing (I’m sorry but Savage Streets Danny Steinmann is a fine enough guy, sleazy ‘n fun to an extreme, but someone a bit more subtle should have been hired by Paramount, and they know it) are very off-kilter in places, and it lacks some style and flare. Especially after three vastly superior films before it.
So I DO really like it in parts, but not on the level as many like the good ole’ boys of http://www.deadpit.com radio, or such. I like it just enough, and yes, it SHOULD have been made, and it should have been pretty much the same, although the Pseudo-Jason imposter ultimately needed a better story, and Tommy after his next ordeal should have shown signs of spiritually healing and leaving the institute and ultimately Essex Crystal Lake County.
And some of the characters (yes even in a fifth Friday installment) should have been more well written. I like it for what it is, and it’s a fine guilty pleasure, but I can’t help but think now every time I watch it now that it is getting it’s ass kissed now a bit TOO much on places like IMDB for being quirky & eccentric like a lot of films, and most of the acting is flat to a bit too over-to-top and ultimately like I said, I feel they needed another director and tighter script in order to seal-off the Tommy Jarvis character for this movie.
So I like it, plenty, but not a lot and I don’t just love it. So it’s not the first four superior films of the franchise, but for what it is, this flawed piece of mid ’80s New-Wave sleaze will do.
Part five seemed like filler, while parts 6 and 7 were like the true sequels to part 4.
I think part V should have been made. It wasn’t perfect. As several others mentioned, it would have been fun if they’d spent more time developing the suspects, giving a larger number of them motives to hate the behavioral center so it’s harder to pinpoint the murderer (and of course, get Roy in the picture more).
On the other hand, some of the touches are just sheer brilliance. The blink-and-you’ll miss it moment of the camera lingering over Violet’s “Stop the Slaughter!” poster just before *she* gets slaughtered was the perfect piece of dark humor, and it consistently makes me chuckle. I will also admit to liking Roy and his story. For something that takes up such a small part of the running time, it did pack a punch, at least for me. The characters stand out (though whether they do this in a good or bad way is up to the viewer).
However, even though I like part 5 and think it should have been made, I also think they did the right thing bringing Jason back in part 6.
I hate the two redneck mother & son…They are too caricatures.
I haven’t still understood the film ending LoL
(sorry for my english)
A fan from Italy
They should have gone straight to part six from The Final Chapter. The New beginning was not really needed in the story line. They made Tommy look like the next Jason, meanwhile in Jason Lives he was the hero again. I would much rather have seen jason Lives as a direct version of the novel, even in they had to make a longer movie and film it as two parts! That would have made a great parts 5 and 6.
Perhaps we needed part 5 to give us the sense of time of Jason’s absence and it’s affect on the Crystal Lake community. Not a bad concept but it could have been done better. Unfortunately, by this time Paramount was already trying to bury the franchise and wouldn’t put any money into it. Too bad. It could have been cool: gory flashbacks, illusions of slaughter, a lot of shit could have gone down. Oh well, blood under the bridge now.
I like the film, but it, like some of the others, had it’s faults. I would love to have seen where they would have gone with Tommy as the killer. I don’t think it was the best move to jump so far into the future when the actual span between films was only a year. This iritated me, as did the gap between 6 & 7. Tommy as a child could have worked in part 5. Too bad Feldman was doing Goonies at the time.
I avoided Part V when it first came out. I had read about it in Fango and decided that it wasn’t something I wanted to see. A few years after its release, I ended up picking it up for $1 on Beta when my video store was liquidating all of their Beta inventory after Sony lost the videotape wars. I really feel like I overpaid, even at $1. The plot, itself, could have worked, if done right. Unfortunately, the direction, the FX, and the horrendous stereotypes (yes, they were over-the-top even for a Friday film) make this film utterly unwatchable to me. I have only seen this movie in its entirety twice. The second time was to make sure it really was as bad as I remembered it being. I gave it a second chance, and I still thought it was abysmal. It did have some genuinely creepy t.v. spots, though. I’ll give it that.
To me, “Friday the 13th” (the best ones, the classics) are the first four films and I consider “The Final Chapter” as the real final chapter.
BUT “A new beginning” still has “the touch”, “the magic”, the suspense of the classic ones. In many ways, Part 5 is the best among the worst ones. And it’s certainly a good film that gains with years…
With Part 6 the saga begins its real declive, although Part VI is fun and very enjoyable BUT it has not “the classic touch”… let’s say something is missing in this movie and its followers. From 6 to this days Jason turns into some kind of “rock star with a machete”, he is almost a “GIJOE toy action figure that moves like an action character”, he is someone we see almost every minute of each new film… the darknees is gone, the fear is gone… magic is gone.
Even Harry Manfredini’s scores changed in many ways from Part 5 and followers… his scores turned into a “synth era” that makes them, if you know what I mean, almost TV-ish music scores. So, even in his music the magic is gone.
My hopes for 2024’s reboot was they’d bring back the classic feeling, the magic, the suspense, the “invisible Jason”, the Tommy Jarvis storyline…. but what wrong I was… they still show Jason as a “rock star GIJOE-ish action figure” that is scary no more.
To sum up, “Friday the 13th” (as I understand this franchise) are just four films… and it ends with Joseph Zito’s masterpiece.
I really enjoyed A New Beginning. It had a summer feeling to me, and Ethel and Junior Hubbard were one of my favorite characters. I also liked Tommy as a silent and pretty much traumatised guy, with a very good looking pair of jeans;)
Although the film lacks a bit of gore, I still consider part V as one of my favorite Friday movies.
About the up coming sequels: I really would have liked to see Elias Voorhees, stepping up, and maybe this will finally happen in one of the new Friday-remakes….If Pamela isn’t coming back from the dead, then maybe Jason’s daddy will…..sure would make a whole new level of storytelling and maybe battle between Jason and his father….
But hey….that’s only my point of view. The whole series of Friday the 13th, with and without my favorite slasher in it..still have a place in my heart..and I’m glad I can watch these films and that they’re here for many other fans.