The Friday the 13th franchise had a lengthy run, but it’s experienced trouble getting back on its feet in recent years, which has included some unusual takes on the slasher series.
Ever since its debut in 1980, the Friday the 13th series has become one of the definitive franchises in the slasher genre. Other series like A Nightmare on Elm Street and Halloween are certainly popular, but Friday the 13th is the only one to send its murderous juggernaut to places like outer space or hell. The Friday the 13th series has experienced its ups and downs over the years, but it’s still been able to amass a dozen films that have turned Jason Voorhees into one of the horror genre’s greatest icons.
In spite of the popularity and resilience of the Friday the 13th films, it’s been over a decade since the latest entry in the series, 2009’s Michael Bay-produced reboot. Since the release of 2009’s Friday the 13th there has been interest and efforts to put another outing for Jason Voorhees together, but legal disputes over the rights of the film series and creative disagreements between parties have kept Friday the 13th dormant. Even though a new entry in the series hasn’t come to fruition, there have been some extremely interesting angles under consideration. While some approaches played around with time periods and locations, one of the most contentious ideas was that Friday the 13th become a found footage horror film.
Paramount Was Eager To Jump On Found Footage Trend With New Friday The 13th
In 2013 there had already been a few failed attempts to get Jason back on his feet, but the rights for the franchise were now held by Paramount, who were optimistic they could make things work. 2013 was far from the start of found footage horror films, but it was a time when creative new angles on the structure were starting to make waves. Paramount was interested in how the found footage angle could rejuvenate the franchise, but the producers for the reboot, Brad Fuller and Andrew Form, were not fans of the approach.
Fuller and Form’s problem with turning Friday the 13th into a found footage film is that the movies are all about watching people who are being stalked and in danger. To shift things where the viewer is ostensibly the prey removes that dimension of the film and kind of messes with the structure of those movies and why they’ve worked in the past. Even though Paramount looked at pitches for the idea, Form and Fuller were able to convince the studio to drop the idea. However, in spite of Fuller and Form’s optimism for the future of the franchise, a new Friday the 13th film failed to materialize. Several more rejected angles for reboots (including a television series on the CW) never came to pass and even now in 2020, there’s yet to be a feature film return to Camp Crystal Lake.
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