Psychotronic Cinemavision: Jason X

In 2008, infamous serial killer Jason Voorhees (Kane Hodder) is captured and incarcerated at the Crystal Lake Research Facility, but over several years of attempting to kill him, it is determined that Jason has the ability to heal all lethal wounds.  The head of the facility, Rowan LaFontaine (Lexa Doig) suggests putting him into cryogenic stasis but before she can, the military stops her and attempts to acquire Jason to study him in hopes of creating soldiers who are indestructible.  Of course, Jason has other plans and kills all the military unit attempting to take him.  He then goes after Rowan who tricks him into a cryogenic pod, but Jason ruptures the pod which causes both Rowan and Jason to be frozen.  In the year 2455, Earth can no longer support life, and humans have left the planet.  When Professor Brandon Lowe (Jonathan Potts) takes his class on an archaeological field trip, they happen upon the frozen Rowan and Jason and it is determined that they can save Rowan, but unfortunately, they also take Jason along with them back to their spaceship.  After reviving Rowan, Jason thaws out and he once again comes back to life, going on a killing spree. He may have met his match losing a battle to KM-14 (Lisa Ryder), a female android, but then accidentally, Jason gets a tech upgrade and becomes an enhanced cyborg (Uber Jason), stronger than he was before.  Rowan and a handful of crew must fight to survive while also finding a way to defeat an indestructible foe.

Jason X is the tenth installment of the original Friday the 13^th film franchise.  It was released on April 26, 2002 and received mostly negative reviews and underperformed at the box office. On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes Jason X has an approval rating of 20% based on 108 reviews, and an average rating of 3.8/10. The site’s critical consensus reads: “Jason goes to the future, but the story is still stuck in the past.”  Metacritic gives it a score of 25 out of 100, based on 23 critics, indicating “generally unfavorable” reviews. While audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of “C” on an A+ to F scale. Roger Ebert gave the film 0.5 stars out of 4, quoting one of the film’s lines: “This sucks on so many levels.”  All that being said, the film still has a following (I am not sure it is at a “cult” level) and is praised for its ability to poke fun at itself and the franchise as a whole.

This is one of those instances where I am going to disagree with the other reviewers, this is absolutely one of my favorite movies from the franchise and within the genre. It is fun, campy and way over the top! And it knows it is.  While the actors are taking their parts seriously, which is essential when doing a parody, there is no doubt that they knew this was meant to be a farce.  With great “tongue in cheek” lines like when Professor Lowe says, “It’s okay! He just wanted his machete back!” or the little details like how hockey was outlawed in 2024 (the future at the time the movie was made) for being too violent.  There is an entire holographic scene created to fool Jason, that parodies 1980’s horror films and the moral tropes warning against drugs and premarital sex.  I understand that this film isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but it definitely is mine, combining humor, horror and sci-fi all into a singular hilarious experience.  This is one of those films I call my “comfort films” and I watch it several times a year (sometimes several times monthly).