Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning (1985, Danny Steinmann)

Then, along came "part 5" a.ka. "A New Beginning" - the one many people consider the 'black sheep' of the series, sort of along the lines of "Halloween 3: Season of the Witch". Slasher rule #435: When you have established a particularly enterprising character, such as Michael Myers or Jason Voorhees and you decide to reroute a promising franchise at it's peak, most fans are going to disapprove - i.e. "Friday 5". Yes - Jason is dead for the WHOLE movie. Fake Jason steps in fix the problem that involves a house full of young adults NOT dying...

Tommy Jarvis - now a grown man and different actor - is sent off to a little cabin retreat for troubled individuals... and one mouthy black kid whose grandpa is the chef. Then they all start getting murdered. Didn't mean to spoil that part for ya.

I don't think 5 is quite as 'upsetting' as most people make it out to be. I mean, it's got a pretty massive body count! Many characters are introduced JUST to get killed off two minutes after you first see them - such as the mustached groover and the trashy diner waitress, as well as the guy cleaning the shit out of the chicken coops. Oh, and who could forget the massively useless appearance of a Jheri curled Michael Jackson impersonator getting impaled in the outhouse? "Oooo Baby. Oooo Baby." Why?? He had NO purpose! Everyone remembers the blonde chick's SA-WEET techno- dance moves, right? I think I had an 80s-gasm whilst viewing that scene.

Overall, "A New Beginning" gets a bad rap for the big end reveal that Jason was, in fact, NOT the killer. I will, however, say that "part 5" is nowhere near the best of the franchise and would probably fall in at 2nd worst, but you can still have fun with this one.