Right...they brought Jason back from the dead and then dumped him into Crystal Lake with an anchor and that seems to put him in a coma or something. This series is getting pretty bloody stupid, so let's see what they do next.
Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood
Director: John Carl Buechler
Cast: Kane Hodder, Lar Park Lincoln, Kevin Blair, Susan Jennifer Sullivan, Susan Blu, Terry Kiser
Plot: Tina is a young woman who, in moments of extreme emotion, can move things with her mind. Also Jason is murdering people again.
Review: What's weird about this one is that they don't do anything to link Tina (Lincoln) to the established story, because it feels like a totally different movie they threw Jason into for the sake of keeping the franchise going. Or perhaps this was an attempt to create a nemesis for Jason since Ginny didn't come back and Tommy has vanished without a trace.
Anyway, we are introduced to Tina as a child witnessing a bout of domestic violence and escaping onto a boat on Crystal Lake. Her anger at her father manifest as a psychic attack and her father gets pulled into the water. It's weird that Jason has nothing to do with this. It's actually unclear what happens, it may have just been the dock collapsing. Then we cut to Tina as an adult returning to Crystal Lake to be studied by Dr. Crews (Kiser). Next door is a bunch of teens having a party, basically canon fodder.
They do at least attempt some character work in this one. Tina joins the party but gets bullied by the Mean Girl. It's not much, but at least these characters have some semblance of distinct personalities. We haven't seen that since Part IV. None of them are interesting, but they at least fit basic stereotypes. Dr. Crews is enough of a creep that we want to Jason deal with him. After the past few adventures in Jasoning, this feels special.
At the end we get a big battle between Jason and Tina, with Tina flinging everything not pinned down at the murderer. Some of it is laughable, furniture slowly wobbling around on strings, but it's cool seeing Jason fight someone who stands a chance. Then things gets stupid. As they face off on the pier her long dead father leaps out of the water and grabs Jason. Has he been possessed by Crystal Lake? Is it his ghost? There's just no explanation for this silliness.
This isn't a terrible entry into the series, but what made the original films interesting is long gone. Oh, and this is the first film featuring Kane Hodder, generally considered to be the definitive Jason. Pretty hard to tell any of them apart though.
Jason's Best Kill: Killing Dr. Crews with a trimming saw is the best one, simply because Crews was such a smarmy prick.
