Crystal Lake is making Jason Voorhees more sympathetic than the Friday the 13th movies ever did. The prequel puts a sweet, bullied young Jason and his protective mother, Pamela, at the center of its story, giving it room to develop the child whose suffering became the movies’ explanation for so much bloodshed.
The sympathy was there in 1980. In the original Friday the 13th, Jason is a child with a physical deformity who drowns at camp while the counselors responsible for watching him are having sex. Pamela commits the murders that follow, seeking revenge for her son’s death.
Jason’s appearance at the end, bursting out of the lake, plays as a nightmare. The adult killer who dominates the franchise takes over in Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981), with his mother’s death adding another grievance to his backstory.
That early, sack-masked Jason still has a human vulnerability. His attachment to Pamela, isolation and sometimes childlike behavior leave traces of the boy he was. As the sequels turn him into an undead killer who survives almost anything, those qualities take up less space than the murders.
The 2009 reboot gives more attention to his trauma and desire to be left alone. Freddy vs. Jason sometimes positions him as the lesser evil. Those approaches give viewers reasons to feel for him while keeping him in the role of a slasher villain.
Crystal Lake builds its story around Jason before that transformation, with Pamela protecting a child who’s being bullied.
