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Who wants to go on a cruise to NYC!?! Jason certainly does, and will cut down anyone who gets in his way! Cory and Nathan are going to keep a steady footing and they make their way through this instalment, “Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan”, to find out if Jason is another New York success story or just a tragic end the lost franchise, desperate for someone to save it.
Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989):
Two graduating high school students are aboard a houseboat on Crystal Lake. Jim tells his girlfriend Suzy the legend of Jason Voorhees, before playing a prank on her with a hockey mask and a prop knife. The boat’s anchor damages some underwater cables, which shocks Jason’s corpse and revives him. He sneaks on board, takes the mask, kills Jim with a harpoon gun before impaling Suzy, who tries to hide from him, with a barb.
The next morning, the SS Lazarus is ready to set sail for New York City with a graduating senior class from Lakeview High School, chaperoned by biology teacher Dr. Charles McCulloch and English teacher Colleen Van Deusen. Van Deusen brings McCulloch’s niece Rennie along for the trip despite her aquaphobia, much to his chagrin. Jason sneaks on board and kills rock star-wannabe J.J. with her guitar before hiding in the bowels of the ship. That night, after a boxing match, a young boxer who lost to champion Julius Gaw is killed when Jason slams a hot sauna rock into his abdomen while Rennie, searching for her pet Border Collie Toby, discovers prom queen Tamara and Eva doing drugs. McCulloch nearly catches them moments later and Tamara pushes Rennie overboard, suspecting she told on them. She then uses video student Wayne to record McCulloch in a compromising situation with her but rejects Wayne’s advances afterward. Tamara is killed by Jason with a shard of broken mirror when she goes to take a shower.
Rennie begins seeing visions of a young Jason throughout the ship, but the others ignore the deckhand’s warnings that Jason is aboard. Jason kills Captain Robertson and his first mate. Rennie’s boyfriend and Captain Robertson’s son, Sean, discovers them and tells the others before calling for an emergency stop. Eva finds Tamara’s body and flees, but when she goes into the disco room, she is followed by Jason and violently strangled to death. The students agree to search for Jason while McCulloch decides that the deckhand is responsible; however, the deckhand is found with a fire axe in his back. Miles, one of the students, is tossed to his death by Jason and Julius is knocked overboard. Elsewhere in the hold of the ship, Wayne comes upon J.J.’s body and is thrown into an electrical box by Jason; his corpse catches fire and begins a chain of events that causes the ship to sink. With the other students dead, McCulloch, Van Deusen, Rennie, and Sean escape aboard a life raft and discover Toby and Julius are alive as well.
They row to New York where Jason stalks them through the streets. Rennie is kidnapped by a pair of junkies and the group splits up to find help. Julius tries to fight Jason with his boxing skills, but becomes exhausted after Jason does not go down; he is then decapitated by a single punch from Jason. Rennie escapes from Jason when he kills the punks that kidnapped her. She runs into Sean and they reunite with the teachers and the police before Jason kills the officer who is helping them. Rennie crashes a police car after a vision of Jason distracts her. Van Deusen is incinerated in the car when it explodes, and it is revealed that McCulloch is responsible for Rennie’s fear of water, having pushed her into the lake as a child. They leave him behind and Jason kills him by drowning him in a barrel of waste. Jason chases Rennie and Sean into the subway where Sean incapacitates him by knocking him onto the electrical third rail. He is revived again and chases them through Times Square where they try to escape through a diner. They flee into the sewers and encounter a sewer worker. He warns them that the sewers will be flooded with toxic waste at midnight before Jason appears and kills him. Sean gets injured in the process and Rennie draws Jason off, wounding him with a splash of acidic waste that forces him to take off his mask, horrifying Rennie. She and Sean climb the ladder as Jason staggers to get them, but just as he is about to kill them, the sewers flood and engulf him. Rennie sees a final vision of a child-form of Jason as the waste recedes.
The two of them then escape to the street, where they are reunited with Toby, who had run away earlier, and walk off into the city.
Summary:
This is 2 films really. It should be one of the better instalments but it’s downfall is that more than half is set on a boat and full or tropes. The movie doesn’t come alive until Jason reaches New York and thats the finally 20 minutes only. Having said that, once again the kills are fun throughout (campy as usual) and the 80’s style is at it’s peak with the feels of Seattle grunge creeping in. By no means is this movie unwatchable, but I doubt everyone would agree with me.
We really thank the fan sites out there for everything they do. They really help us with our research! Check out the Friday the 13th Wiki which have pieced together the timeline and the Horror Wiki for the list of kills! Fun for everyone!
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