With the impending release of Scream Factory’s massive Friday the 13th boxed set, fans are set to dive into what may be the definitive presentation of this iconic horror series. Boasting new scans for many of the films and a treasure trove of bonus features, this collection is sure to be one of the physical media highlights of this upcoming spooky season.
However, one particular and particularly exciting bonus feature hasn’t gotten much in the way of ink in anticipation of its release: Jason Lives director Tom McLoughlin is set to unveil a collection of 18 pieces of concept art for Jason Never Dies, his pitch for a Friday sequel that’s meant to act as a direct follow-up to his 1986 horror comedy classic, widely considered to be one of the stronger entries in the franchise. In advance of the boxed set’s release, Mr. McLoughlin was kind enough to sit down with Bloody Disgusting to share an early peek at a few pieces of the concept art, as well as outlining his story and approach to Jason Voorhees all these years later.
So how was it that the director of Jason Lives came to craft another go-round with everybody’s favorite hockey-masked killer? Mr. McLoughlin explains: “Originally, the title of Jason Lives was Jason Has Risen. Paramount thought that we might piss off a certain amount of the folks out there, and they had enough problems with the Jason franchise as it was. So they told me to come up with something else, and I came up with Jason Lives. So when I decided I was going to go for this sequel, the title went back to that – Jason Has Risen. But then I thought, ‘No, I love Jason Never Dies, because that’s kind of what’s happened now. There was something about that that I thought was cooler than Jason Has Risen.
“When I finished Jason Lives, and the screenings and opening day went so well, Frank Mancuso Jr. said ‘Would you like to do another one?’ I went, ‘I’m dry. I put everything I knew into it.’” After a possible iteration of Freddy vs. Jason and a crossover with Cheech and Chong were both shot down for various reasons, Mr. McLoughlin moved on from the franchise. And yet… “Cut to thirty-two years later, I’ve been thinking about this and had a bunch of different ideas that finally came together. I thought, ‘I’m going to do this.’ I know that the lawsuit’s been going on for seven, eight years? But it looked like they were getting close to some sort of compromise. I was getting word that it was going to get worked out. In that amount of time last year, I went and wrote it. By the time I was done with it, the deal fell through and the court thing continued, and nobody really wanted to take a look at it. I’m talking the studios, like New Line and Warner Brothers. No one wants to mess with something without having the rights. I thought that I could either just sit on this, or at least I can share what I’m doing, and why I’m doing it.
“Basically, I’ve always loved the fact that these movies work better, to me, in period, rather than modern day. People love that whole look of the 80s and 90s. And I thought, ‘Okay. First thing, I wanna take back artistic license and place this thirteen years later after I put him down in the lake.’ Through this series of circumstances, once again he comes back. This makes it 1999. That was a paranoid year for a lot of people. We thought, in 2000, all the shit was going to hit the fan. Even though my story has nothing to do with that.’”
Mr. McLoughlin notes here that his story wouldn’t have actually dealt with any Y2K paranoia directly. Rather, his tale follows a group of Catholic high school girls who are supposed to go on a Catholic retreat over the Thanksgiving Day weekend. “The road gets snowed in, so they have to go to an alternate camp, which is in the area of Camp Crystal Lake. It isn’t the actual camp, but another one across the lake. They’re sitting there, completely oblivious that there’s any person named Jason, any of the history, unlike Jason Lives where people were savvy to it. And the stuff starts to hit the fan! These are all girls that are on this retreat because they’ve done a number of things that are going to cause them to not move up a grade. They have a very stern-ass nun with them. So we have all of these kickass girls, and putting them up against someone like Jason. Setting it in winter, on Thanksgiving night – it’s kind of my version of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?”
Skipping directly from 1986’s Jason Lives to this new story would disregard not only the events of 2009’s remake, but also the continuity set forth by every sequel which followed McLoughlin’s initial entry. Given that such retconning has become a popular if polarizing option for reinvigorating long-running franchises, does Mr. McLoughlin see this approach as being a bit of a hurdle for both fans and the rightsholders? “I think it’s gonna be an issue. I can honestly say I can only create something which I feel really good about, and makes sense to me, and has the Friday the 13th horror logic to it. I’ve also set this up in the beginning of the script, that this story is based on documents that were found in this basement of this old parochial school. These are supposedly facts, but some of the details are really sketchy. So this could be, in a way, a kind of standalone Friday the 13th. At the same time, I wanted to take one of the elements that was in Jason Lives, that people ask me about all the time, and kind of pay it off. So there is that continuity to mine. I really wrote this as a fan sitting there, and this is what I’d love to see onscreen, and went with it that way. But I also tried to build into it that, if you’d never seen a Friday the 13th before, or saw mine, if would still work as a film. But, if you were a fan, there’s lots of things that go on that you go ‘Oh yeah, that’s from Part VI.’ I tried to include that kind of dark humor and some of those elements.”
Even for the presence of that dark humor, Mr. McLoughlin notes that Jason Never Dies would be less of a horror comedy than its predecessor. “It’s going to be less of a horror comedy than Jason Lives. Part of that is because these girls are oblivious to the whole mythology of Jason. But, they have a really dark, wiseguy kind of humor about them. Or wisegirl kind of humor. And they bounce off each other in that sort of insulting but funny way. That’s how they bond. So it’s a different kind of humor that’s there.”
Mr. McLoughlin goes on to point out that, should Jason Never Dies get made and go on to be a hit with viewers, there would be more direct follow-ups to come. “I do some things that I think [will shock people], but everything is fixable. I leave the ending in such a way that you know this is going to keep going on. There’s no question. I wanted to make sure that the thing stayed open-ended and can continue.”
To help illustrate his approach to this new story, Mr. McLoughlin employed a talented artist to render some exciting images of Jason and some of the film’s setpieces. “When I finished the script, I really wanted to start visualizing some of the ideas that I had. I reached out to a young, very talented artist named Walter Figueroa to collaborate on these ideas. We ended up with a lot of different concept drawings, and some fully storyboarded sequences. I’d been sitting on these, but then I thought ‘Y’know, I don’t know when the lawsuit’s gonna end, so I’d love to share some of this with people.’ So when they asked me at Shout Factory to show some of this stuff, I said ‘Sure, why not?’ So we’ve got eighteen concept sketches that will be in the extra features. Since I’m such a huge fan of Bloody Disgusting, I wanted to give you guys a sneak preview of what you’re going to see in that box set. There are three pieces: one a particular sequence that you see three frames from, with the girl making a phone call and guess who finds her?; another that has a dark, pseudo-religious overtone with the way that Jason kills one girl; and then another one just of him, using two weapons! So these three sketches are indicative of the direction I’m going. And the truth is, Jason’s going to have a different look this time around. Nothing drastic, by any means. But I looked at it from the standpoint of – okay, if you were down in scummy Crystal Lake for thirteen years, what would you look like? Adding that with the idea that he’s coming up into the freezing cold, it’s going to give him a different vibe from what he’s had before.”
With the lawsuit remaining a major obstacle with any Friday the 13th film moving forward, what does Mr. McLoughlin feel is the likelihood that Jason Never Dies will come to fruition? “Truly, your guess is as good as mine. I’ve been asked about this for thirty-something years. It took me this long to come up with something that I was truly excited about. If it isn’t the first movie they make, maybe it’ll be the second one they do. I don’t know. I have no idea how that’ll play out. I’m holding out hope that I’ll get to make this as an official Friday the 13th movie that’ll get released to theaters. Or the drive-ins, given where the world’s going!”
Mr. McLoughlin wraps up our talk with another fun tease, describing a clever sequence from his screenplay. “I’ll reveal one other secret! Many times, including my movie, we see Jason Voorhees go into Crystal Lake. In this new one, because of it taking place in the winter, Jason is going to be chasing somebody across Crystal Lake. Obviously, you know if you’re trying to run fast across a frozen lake, you’re slipping and falling. This will be one of the rare times where falling as the monster is chasing you will make sense, because it’s usually like ’Why did you trip?! Come on!’ Of course, this doesn’t bother Jason. He just keeps coming like a freight train…”
Special Thanks to Mr. McLoughlin for his time, and for providing the included images.
