Editorials
Looking Back at ‘Friday the 13th: The New Blood’ Nearly 30 Years Later
On the 29th anniversary of its release, we take a look back at Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood to discuss its place in the franchise’s history.
After killing off Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter, producers alienated fans with a fifth entry in which that film’s Jason is actually revealed to be Roy Burns… a paramedic. Audience reception was so poor for Friday the 13th: A New Beginning that Paramount knew they had to bring the real Jason back in the sixth entry. And so they made him undead for Friday the 13th: Jason Lives, putting a highly supernatural spin on the series. But could the undead Jason gimmick last for another film? A lot was riding on the seventh installment, to say the least.
There was initially a cloud of confusion over what the seventh entry of the series should be (including a scramble to come up with new storylines after an attempt at a Freddy vs. Jason crossover fell apart for the first of many times), but Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood managed to inject some new life into the franchise with a storyline that essentially mashed together the worlds of Jason Voorhees and another horror icon: Carrie White.
The New Blood opened up the world of Camp Crystal Lake to other supernatural elements beyond “undead Jason” with the introduction of Tina Shepard, a telekinetic whose immense powers made her quite literally the strongest final girl in the history of the series. Tina, played by Lar Park-Lincoln, proved to be a worthy adversary for Jason Voorhees, embodying the core qualities of the traditional final girl and fusing them together with unnatural powers that rivaled the big guy’s. Simply put, she wasn’t just a final girl. She was a superhero.
Known primarily for his special effects work on some of the best horror franchises of the modern age (including Bride of Re-Animator, Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers, and A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master), director John Carl Buechler had only directed Cellar Dweller and Troll before making The New Blood. He proved to be a great fit for the practical effects-heavy series, as his work led to some great, seamless effects sequences in the film – from the punch through the chest to the awesome revelation of Jason’s monstrous face.
But Buechler’s contributions went further than that.
Buechler served as make-up supervisor on the Renny Harlin film Prison, where he met a stuntman/actor he would bring with him to Friday the 13th: The New Blood. His name was Kane Hodder, inarguably the most recognizable person to play Jason and the only one to play him for multiple films. His presence onscreen is imposing, and his walk and movements lent a personality to the silent, faceless slasher. You could say that Jason truly became Jason once Hodder put on the hockey mask. And we have The New Blood to thank for beginning Hodder’s reign of terror in the role.
The New Blood also gave us perhaps the franchise’s most iconic kill, wherein Jason shoves a camper into her sleeping bag, drags her through the forest, then slams her against a tree hard enough to kill her. The single smash is disturbing if not a bit comical, and made a huge impression despite being heavily trimmed by censors before release – as were many of the film’s kill scenes, which continues to anger and annoy fans to this day. Worth noting, the sleeping bag kill was so memorable that it was recreated for darkly comic effect in Jason X, wherein both the victims and the sleeping bags are doubled up!
The film’s ending, well, it’s a bit hard to defend.
In an absurdly confusing and unintentionally funny climax, Tina summons her dead father from the water to chain Jason and toss him back into the lake. Her father, dead for over a decade under the water but somehow none the worse for wear except for some muddy smudges, yanks him down into the water and then apparently disappears back into his watery grave.
Aside from the strange ending, this film is a noteworthy addition to the series that gave us John Buechler’s best directing work, the greatest performer ever to play Jason Voorhees, and one of the most iconic kills in the Friday the 13th franchise. Not too shabby, if you’re asking me.
The New Blood deserves to be remembered as, even if admittedly not one of the best Friday the 13th sequels, at least a surprisingly solid entry.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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