It has been a decade since a Friday the 13th film has graced the silver screen with its particular brand of slasher nuance. That 2009 reboot of the franchise, while not awful, didn’t exactly do gangbusters at the box office. There was an attempt in 2018 to make the 13th effort in Jason’s filmography, but that try was ultimately derailed by the ongoing lawsuit between Sean S. Cunningham, director of the first movie, and Victor Miller, writer of the original entry. Last fall, courts granted ownership rights to Miller. Now, Cunningham is filing an appeal to that ruling.
Entertainment lawyer and star of Friday the 13th Part III Larry Zerner posted on Twitter to update the masses on the ongoing lawsuit. Unfortunately though, the news is not what fans wanted to hear: there was no deal between the dueling creators during mediation, which means that Camp Crystal Lake will not be returning to theaters anytime soon. I guess that puts LeBron James’ oddball idea on ice, too, huh? Maybe he could help out with arbitration somehow? He seems like the renaissance man Hollywood could use right about now.
While Jason hasn’t been filmed for a while, his exploits were turned into a modestly successful if not inherently divisive video game a few years ago, which was also affected by this lawsuit. As you may’ve heard, no new content will be produced for the game post-July 2018, including the completed map for the Grendel spaceship and playable Uber Jason, both from campy guilty pleasure Jason X.
The weirdest part about this case is the fight over Jason himself. The hockey masked version of the notoriously deformed killer debuted in Friday the 13th Part III, and Jason as an adult first popped up in Part II, which Miller didn’t write. So…I don’t know. I’m no legal expert. Heck, I hate the law! Yeah, I said it. But this seems very silly, and I don’t know why the courts sided with the writer on this one.
Well, I guess I do, but I don’t agree with it. At this point, I just want another Friday the 13th movie.