#8 - Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981)

Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981)

(dir. Steve Miner)

Two months after the events of the first film, Alice is still traumatized by the ordeal she went through. She is haunted by memories of that night, told through flashbacks that conveniently recap the ending to the previous film. Unfortunately, it seems that there may have been someone there to witness her beheading Mrs. Voorhees, and now they want revenge... Flash forward to five years later, where a group of young counselors are assembling for a training program at a camp next door to Camp Crystal Lake. You can probably guess how well that works out for them.

The basic structure of the plot is the same as the original, from the "you're all doomed" guy at the beginning to the surprise scare at the very end, but in my opinion this is the superior film in just about every way. The pacing is way better and there are some excellent scares, and the characters are either better written or just don't get enough screen time to get annoying. The makeup/gore effects are less prominent and not as good (no Tom Savini this time), but the film compensates for this a bit by upping the body count, a trend that will continue throughout the series. Jason is also a way better villain than Mrs. Voorhees, even though instead of the hulking unstoppable force that he becomes in later films, he is basically just a regular guy here with a bag over his head.

Probably the biggest problem I have with this sequel is that the setup not only makes no sense, it also retroactively makes the plot of the first film not make sense either. Here it is revealed that Jason never actually drowned all those years ago, and instead has been living in the woods the whole time. Why wouldn't he just go to his mother? She was working at the very same camp! He followed her around enough to be there to witness her death, so it's not like he didn't know who or where she was. And at the end of the first film we see him as a little boy, even though he should've been at least 30-35 years old at that point. It could be that Alice just dreamt that part, or it could be crappy writing.  I'm leaning towards the latter.

Anyway, a very worthy sequel. Looking forward to Part 3 next!