Despite its outrageous success and the presence of Kevin Bacon, the first Friday the 13th is actually spectacularly badly made, so calling calling Steve Miner's sequel "Better Than the Original!" could be damning it with faint praise. Fortunately, it's also "One of the Best Slashers of the 1980's," cleverly turning the events of the original summer camp massacre into a campfire story for new characters and new audiences, thus deftly glossing over the first film's flaws. Part 2 also deserves praise for introducing the world to the scariest Jason Voorhees to date, but also making him sympathetic at the same time, making this sequel even more historically important that the original too. The strangest thing is that Miner gave us "The Best Friday the 13th of All Time!" and then proceeded to give us the absolute worst in Friday the 13th Part 3-D, first raising and then immediately lowering the bar for every subsequent film in the franchise.
Despite its outrageous success and the presence of Kevin Bacon, the first Friday the 13th is actually spectacularly badly made, so calling calling Steve Miner's sequel "Better Than the Original!" could be damning it with faint praise. Fortunately, it's also "One of the Best Slashers of the 1980's," cleverly turning the events of the original summer camp massacre into a campfire story for new characters and new audiences, thus deftly glossing over the first film's flaws. Part 2 also deserves praise for introducing the world to the scariest Jason Voorhees to date, but also making him sympathetic at the same time, making this sequel even more historically important that the original too. The strangest thing is that Miner gave us "The Best Friday the 13th of All Time!" and then proceeded to give us the absolute worst in Friday the 13th Part 3-D, first raising and then immediately lowering the bar for every subsequent film in the franchise.
