Jason X review.
Remember when this series was about a mother trying to keep a summer camp closed? You’ve come a long way, baby. Jason X is a stupid movie that knows it’s stupid. What that means is that you can find fun in watching it because it’s having fun with itself. But it also means that it’s stupid.
Classic movie reviews will contain spoilers.
Jason X
Directed by Jim Isaac
Written by Todd Farmer
Starring Kane Hodder, Lexa Doig, Lisa Ryder, Chuck Campbell, Melyssa Ade and Peter Mensah
Jason X Review
People who exist outside of the horror bubble perceive the Friday the 13th franchise as a series of movies where a hockey mask wearing killer murders camp counselors. This specific set-up has, of course, only happened one time. Jason Lives is the sole entry out of 12 installments where a hockey mask wearing killer murdered camp counselors. That’s it. That’s the only time. Even inside of the bubble you may be scratching your head or, more likely, shouting at your screen that it isn’t true. It is.
Jason isn’t the killer in the original movie or in Part V…so we can eliminate those. He spends Part VIII on a ship and in Manhattan (allegedly). Parts III, IV and VII sees him carving up party goers on the lake…not counselors. Jason Goes to Hell features Jason killing adults in the town near the lake. Freddy vs. Jason puts him in the suburbs for a while then fighting Freddy Krueger where the camp used to be. There are no counselors in the 2009 remake. Jason X puts him in space. That leaves Part 2. He does kill camp counselors (in training) but he doesn’t have his iconic mask yet. Jason Lives…one of a kind.
Semantics? Sure. But even if we remove the mask mandate…Jason only kills counselors twice. His mother does do it once too…but the cliché isn’t backed up. Hell…if you just count movies where the main plot sees Jason slaughtering innocent teens around the lake…he only does that in half the movies. And one of them is a remake.
What’s the point of this long preamble? Jason movies are all over the map. From body swapping to imposters…from Freddy to telekinetic Tina…from Crystal Lake to Manhattan. The series sees no shortage of reinvention and wild (mostly missed) swings. Jason X is the entry that left the map altogether.
That’s right…it’s time for Jason to go to outer space. In the future, no less. Apparently, the future looks an awful lot like a SyFy original movie. That’s the kind way of saying the effects in Jason X do not hold up. Which, itself, is pretending that they ever looked good in the first place. I’ve said it before and I will say it again…if you can’t afford it, don’t shoot it.
It’s not all bad in the future. Jason X gives us one of the absolute best kills in the entire franchise. If you’ve seen the movie…you know exactly what I’m talking about. The frozen face smash. I’ll accept the argument that it is the best kill in the 12 movies. It’s incredible. It also follows a cheekily clever sequence where a thawed-out Jason is awakened by his fornication senses tingling. This sequence of Jason X is the clear peak of the film. It may be all downhill on both sides of it…but it’s a hell of a peak.
The rest of the movie is full of annoying characters spouting bad dialog. Jason Lives made a case that a comedy laden take on Friday the 13th can work. It did so with snappy dialog performed by likable characters and making clever observations. Jason X does the opposite of all those things. Whereas Jason Lives thinks the formula is fun…Jason X thinks it’s stupid. Which could work if Jason X wasn’t even stupider.
You may have fond memories of Uber-Jason…the upgraded monster strengthened by nanites. I guess that makes Jason a cyborg-zombie now…which sounds way cooler than it is. The film’s tagline is “Evil gets an upgrade”. It looks good on a poster but doesn’t amount to much. For all his upgrades…Cyborg Jason is defeated in minutes. There’s a hologram sequence that is kind of cute though.
Jason X would mark Kane Hodder’s final time behind the mask. A fan-favorite for his hulking physique and love of the franchise…Hodder is, once again, given a dud of a movie. Playing the character four times in increasingly silly circumstances. He’s still a great Jason despite the string of lesser quality Friday movies.
You may have noticed that we haven’t mentioned any of the cast of Jason X. Well, there’s a reason for that. Outside of Lexa Doig’s Rowan…there isn’t a lot to talk about. Rowan, like Jason, is cryogenically frozen and finds herself thawed out in the future. I don’t know if that’s enough to qualify her as interesting…but it is enough to put her above the rest of the group.
You can have some measure of fun watching Jason X in that “so bad it’s good” way. I’ve just never been sure who this movie was meant to appeal to. Fans of the franchise want movies that embrace it…not treat it like a joke. Upon its release in 2002 it had been an astounding 14 years since Jason Voorhees had a traditional adventure killing teens at Crystal Lake…now he was walking around a spaceship.
The good news (or…perhaps, bad news) is that Jason X isn’t the worst movie in the franchise. It’s close…but it’s more rewatchable than Jason Goes to Hell. That doesn’t look as good on a poster. It is, however, a far more accurate assessment of Jason X.
Scare Value
Time hasn’t been kind to Jason X. To be fair, time isn’t kind to many CGI heavy films of this era. It looks like a made for SyFy tv movie…and it plays like a knockoff of a franchise that you know and love. Which would be fine…if it wasn’t an official installment of that franchise. There is enough fun to be had amongst the stupidity to recommend watching it. It is, at least, an improvement over Jason Goes to Hell.
2/5
Jason X Links
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Buy on Blu-Ray from Amazon
Jason X Trailer
If you enjoyed this review of Jason X, check out reviews for Part 1, Part 2, Part 4, Part 5 and the 2009 remake…or see where it ranks in our series ranking
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