Amphetamine Reptile Records released records by bands that traversed a path between garage rock and noise-rock....for the most part. However, there were occasionally bands on the label that seemed to be well off that path. Supernova was one of those bands.
My first encounter with Supernova was at the AmRep CMJ Showcase (a yearly event not to be missed) in September 1995 at The Cooler, a club in the Meatpacking District, New York City, which had a speakeasy-ish vibe to it. The line-up was Unsane, Steel Pole Bath Tub, Supernova, Gaunt & Love 666.
I had never even heard of Supernova, and entertained the possibility it was actually Today Is The Day playing under a pseudonym (not a stretch given that 'Supernova' was the title of the first TITD record - released by AmRep only a couple of years earlier).
When Supernova took the stage, they were very clearly NOT Today Is The Day. Very far removed from the heavy noise-rock I was accustomed to AmRep providing for me, Supernova were three....uh....child aliens from the distant planet of Cynot-3 (by way of Costa Mesa, CA), who were in search of tin foil and happened across some of the catchiest, most infectious pop-punk tunes this side of the Andromeda Galaxy.
To describe a Supernova show as a lower-budget version of the sci-fi theatrics of Man or Astroman? (and there was some membership crossover as original guitarist Hayden Thais a/k/a Hank a/k/a Dexter X a/k/a 00zX1 a/k/a 339837X jumped ship to join Man or Astroman? and, later, the similarly-minded Servotron) wouldn't be totally inaccurate, but would be a bit of an injustice. They were incredibly funny, fun, and between their on-stage personas and catchy-as-hell bubblegum punk rock - they were just a damn good time who I couldn't resist seeing over & over again.
One only needs to hear songs like "Calling Hong Kong", "Costa Mesa Hates Me", "Bad Haircut", or the entirety of the 'Ages 3 & Up' LP to know this was a band just as worthy of being heard on your record player as they were to be seen live.
During the time we did 3 Cynical, which, not consciously, reflected our love and obsession for all things AmRep, The Presidents of the United States of America, with Supernova as openers, played Hofstra U.S.A., the "club" on the campus of Hofstra University on Long Island. Although we had just recently graduated, we still knew enough people on campus to be able to get into these "student only" events.
Unlike every other AmRep interview we conducted, this one was not arranged beforehand by the fine folks at AmRep (and I mean that with all sincerity - they could have easily blown off a small, unknown zine like ours - but they graciously arranged every interview we ever asked for and put us on "the list").
We approached the aliens in Supernova - and asked if they would be up for doing an interview. Having apparently found all the tin foil they would that night - they said "Sure!!!".
After the concert (and, by the way, POTUS were excellent that night), we went to a backroom at Hofstra U.S.A., with all of us sitting around a huge table. The only problem was, we were completely unprepared for doing an interview - most notably, we had no questions planned and no tape recorder. Aaron got a pen and wrangled up a bunch of loose pieces of paper, and just wrote furious notes as he tried to keep up with the conversation.
So - I'm not sure I'd consider this an interview as much as I'd consider it an IMPRESSION of an interview - but - as it turned out - I think it captured the comic absurdity that Supernova brought to the world better than any verbatim interview ever could.
Enjoy.
(P.S. my soundtrack for this transcription is the 'Pop As A Weapon' compilation - which compiles all the early pre-first-LP singles...and it's pop-punk gold!).
L-R: Jo (Supernova), Aaron (3 Cyn),
Jeff (3 Cyn), Art (Supernova)
The following is a tremendous paraphrasing/partially fictitious interview with Supernova, one of the latest and greatest exports from Amphetamine Reptile Records. The interview was conducted in a wildly merry drunken state by the forces of 3 Cynical after Supernova's show at Hofstra University in November of this year. Using only a ballpoint pen and not a tape recorder, the interview became three pages of scrawling, violent note fragments. I was advised to fabricate any parts of the interview I was unsure about by Jo, the guitar playing creature. Also present were Art, the bass monsta and about a half dozen odd monstrosities. The drumming manifold, Dave, was not present.
3 Cyn: For the love of God, where and when were you guys formed?
Nova: About 3 or 4 years ago in San Diego. We were informed of our serious mission and underwent extensive training.
3 Cyn: Why Amphetamine Reptile?
Nova: They offered the most tin foil. Tom Hazelmyer is our puppy now.
3 Cyn: How about this tour with Presidents of the United States of America?
Nova: It...is....wicked. Landing permission was granted.
3 Cyn: Say something that has something remotely to do with recording, but is impossible to transcribe because it's three weeks later, I was wasted at the time, and the notes from the interview are almost entirely illegible.
Nova: Recorded on tin foil and transferred to vinyl.
3 Cyn: How did you end up on the "Clerks" soundtrack?
Nova: It was sort of by luck. Chewie told us that there was this guy on Earth making a movie...
Amy: I think I got blood on my pants.
(At this point there was a massive solar flare-up which caused tremendous atmospheric disturbance and a vortex was opened up, out of which burst forth numerous esoteric phenomena.)
Nova: Steve Garvey!....Mickey Rivers?@#$%^&^^@!$@^@$^. Our mission from Cynot-3 is to collect all tin foil to build our return ship.
3 Cyn: The answer to the next question...
Nova: 4.
3 Cyn: Man or Astroman? Friend or foe?
Nova: We don't know yet. An upcoming show features us and them in North Carolina.
Jo
3 Cyn: How is the tour going?
Nova: Great. We've had good responses, notably in D.C. and Atlanta. Squirrels.
3 Cyn: Your lyrics often reflect a sound knowledge of pop consumer culture, such as Oreos, and my personal favorite, "Gum Fighter". Is this your eggplant?
Nova: "Gum Fighter" was an attempt to resurrect the old Hubba Bubba commercials which we receive frequent broadcasts of in space.
3 Cyn: You have a 5" out on Sympathy For The Record Industry. ['Monsta!!']
Nova: You are correct, sir.
3 Cyn: Do you like recording with Mac at AmRep?
Nova: Yes, Mac's a good engineer, but our preference is to record outside of AmRep. We have a lot of freedom to do singles. I enjoy the local weatherman. Ken Doll.
3 Cyn: What about that totally typical, stupid and boring issue which people shouldn't write about in zines, talk about amongst themselves, or discuss in public anymore because it's beaten to death, but I'll ask it anyway: the major label issue?
Nova: It's not necessarily a curse. We are getting the best of both worlds. We are on AmRep but we have major distribution, so our music gets out to people who normally wouldn't get it.
3 Cyn: Future recording plans?
Nova: None yet.
3 Cyn staff member Jen
showing off her awesome Supernova
t-shirt
3 Cyn: Philosophize?
Nova: Everyone plays.
(At this point, the disintegration of the Van Allen belt made it impossible to continue. Splintering, fragmented shards of speech rip snort conversation pieces and low tide hamburger made a scene with Winslow.)
Supernova is a totally fun band that plays rock and roll.
The first of four interviews we did for 3 Cynical in the mid-'90s.
I have been a fan of Unsane since around the time the 'Singles 89-92' collection came out. I never got to see them with their original line-up as original drummer Charlie Ondras had just recently passed away. I did get to see them with original bassist Pete Shore a few times - at the original Knitting Factory on Houston St. & CBGB. The first impression is just how crushingly loud they were.
Soon after, bassist Dave Curran replaced Shore - and the line-up of guitarist/vocalist Chris Spencer, bassist Dave Curran & drummer Vinnie Signorelli have remained a constant right through what appears to the band's final album - 2017's 'Sterlize'.
This interview was conducted after the release of the band's third full-length, 'Scattered, Smothered & Covered' - which is generally considered to be the band's finest album and made Decibel magazine's "Hall of Fame" in 2012.....and which I'm listening to right now, over & over, as I'm re-typing this whole thing out for a little inspiration.
Here we go......exactly as printed in the one & only issue of 3 Cynical.....including those photos - photocopied using a Xerox. How times have changed.
Driving along the pitted and decayed wasteland of the BQE towards the Williamsburg Bridge, I looked out the window to the West where the poison orange sun sunk over the skyline of Manhattan. With its jagged and jaded razor sharp landscape, the city is the total embodiment of the modern age. Grays and blacks mold together to form a monolith of ruin, a bleak trophy of industrialization. And then a sound. A bellowing, a wail, a guttural scream not human, but elemental. The sound of metal on metal, a raging furnace of noise. And then I realized. Unsane is New York City. -- Aaron Pagdon
Unsane were interviewed by Jeff and Aaron at CBGB in New York City on November 4, 1995. Unsane are Chris Spencer (guitar, voice), Dave Curran (bass, voice) and Vincent Signorelli (drums).
The interview started in the back of CBGB. Vincent had a black eye from being sucker-punched by some guy at a bar in New Orleans. This was the topic of conversation. Some band started sound-checking, and the interview got moved next door to the Pizza Boutique. Vincent had to go...this is where we join the interview, already in progress.
3C: 3 Cynical
CS: Chris Spencer
DC: Dave Curran
3C: So finish up telling us what happened.
CS: We went out, we had a night off. We went to a party and all these bands were playing and they wanted us to play. Vinnie took a pill, which shall remain nameless, so he was feeling good, walking around, talking to people. We didn't play and we went to this other bar afterward. Vinnie bumps into some jock motherfucker so the guy clocks him in the face totally out of the blue. Then, I'm ordering a drink. I'm hanging out with some friends of mine out front. I hadn't been drinking or doing anything all night. I had one drink - took a sip - I hear all this shit. I put it down. I run inside and there's Vinnie with a pile of four guys on him. So I run over and pull these guys off, and Dave's behind me helping out. I pulled three guys off, and there's this one huge guy who has Vinnie in a headlock, he had already been punched in the face. I'm like, 'let him go'. He saw that since he had him in a headlock that either I was going to punch him in the face or Vinnie was going to attack him. He looks at me and says 'look let me get out of here'. I could tell that he hadn't been a part of the fight, he just wanted to stop it. So I said, 'OK, go ahead, just get out of here and I'll calm him down.' So the guy lets go of Vinnie, I grab Vinnie so he won't hit him. The guy runs out, Vinnie grabs a chair and tries to go at him, we made him put it down. Then I ran outside...it was total chaos...I ran outside, the guy that's working there is an ex-cop, he's yelling shit. Vinnie comes outside with his eyes all fucked up. He picks up a stool, we made him put it down. They were dicks, the big college macho-jock types. Everyone calmed down after awhile. Vinnie wanted to talk to the guy, but the guy just wanted to kill him. I told Vinnie not to even bother. Everything calmed down after that. I left, these guys went out and had a totally crazy night. Vinnie ended up talking to the guy eventually, and shaking his hand. Vinnie actually hit the guy after he had hit him. These guys went out to another club and Vinnie almost got in another fight.
DC: I had a friend down there who was showing us around. He takes us to this bar, a nicer bar, a little fancier, he gets us in without cover. We're in there for about three minutes and Vinnie goes to the bathroom...apparently what had happened, he was kinda wobbly and fucked up, he bumped into some guy, the guy touches him on the shoulder. Vinnie says, 'Oh, sorry', and the guy goes, 'Don't touch me, motherfucker.' Vinnie goes, 'Look, I'm sorry, just calm down.' The guy's freaking out on him. 'Don't tell me to calm down!' Vinnie comes back and goes, 'Give me a bottle.' We're like, 'Vinnie, what the fuck are you talking about? Give me a bottle? You're not going to get into trouble again.' As soon as I said that, the guy shows up and is all in Vinnie's face, yelling at him. Vinnie goes, 'Look, I just want to know what's the problem.' The guy goes, 'You've got a pretty big motherfuckin' problem.' There's a bunch of huge looking guys all standing around him, there's one guy completely staring Vinnie down. He was just ready to pounce and kill him. The bouncer came by and sneaked us out.
3C: Does this stuff happen to you often on tour?
CS: No, I used to get in a lot of fights...
DC: You've calmed down...
CS: ...one time I got mugged in Dallas, but that was my own fault. I was in a project and I was just up to no good. Let's leave it at that.
3C: He's looking all guilty.
CS: I know, I know. I missed the show the next day.
DC: We had to cancel the show. He got clocked and woke up in the bushes the next day.
CS: It took me three hours to get out of the neighborhood because no cabs would go there. I had no money....it was just hell. I couldn't page anyone because you couldn't page back on the public phones.
DC: The rest of the tour was OK, though.
3C: You guys have had a good time on this tour?
CS: Yeah, we're with Guzzard. They're fucking great guys. Every night I watch them. They're good.
3C: What's after the tour?
CS: We're going to Europe next Tuesday. We did a single and a video on this tour. We had one day off to go in and record all night in San Francisco. We did a single for [Frank] Kozic's label, Man's Ruin [edit - this would be the "Sick"/"No Soul" single]. We did a video in Chicago all day before and after soundcheck and they shot the show.
3C: What song?
CS: "Alleged", it's on the new record. The one with the harmonica.
3C: Where did the harmonica come from?
CS: I've been playing harmonica for three or four years.
DC: It came from his ass.
CS: With our kind of music, you can't play that up too much. I can play harmonica a lot better than I do on the record, but you gotta play it down so it doesn't sound bluesy too much. It does sound Unsane. It can cross over from sounding bluesy to sounding like cheese.
3C: It would almost change the style of the band.
CS: Exactly.
3C: Despite the line-up changes, whether you put on the first 7" or the newest album, it's Unsane all the way.
DC: It's weird, it's 50/50. Some people think it's really different, some people think it sounds kinda the same.
3C: You can always tell it's you guys, though.
CS: The production's got a lot better. If we could have made the record we made now back then, with the sound we got out of the new record, we would have in two seconds. Everything used to sound so compressed and muddy.
3C: Don't you think that works for the band, though?
CS: Yeah, it does. I like the old records. The only record I have a problem with is 'Total Destruction'. It was the whole time period for this band. We took too much time for it, it wasn't written spontaneously like everything else we had done. This new record took two weeks. It's the only thing I'm not happy with. The singles collection is cool, the first record I like, that came out fine.
3C: The stuff you're writing now, the newest stuff, you're sticking to the same style?
CS: We write music they way we write it.
3C: Do you ever find it limiting? You have such a distinctive sound, no other band sounds like you...
CS: We just rip off other bands riffs. [laughs]
3C: ...do you ever feel like you want to write songs outside of this style, or you'll run out of ideas?
CS: No, as long as I'm alive I'll keep 'em coming. I'm going to write music like this, this is what I like to do. It's what I've always like to do. It's just personal preference. Dave is into the big heavy, smelly bass riffs. It's cool - it complements the whole thing.
Charlie Ondras (1965-1992)
3C: You lost your drummer, Charlie [Ondras] awhile ago. I was wondering how that affected the band.
CS: It changed the band more than the loss of Pete [Shore, ex-bassist] did. It changed the band's sound a lot. Originally, I'd start out by showing Pete how to play songs, how to play in a band, taught him some bass. I would say I taught him, but he didn't do shit on his own. That was really getting stagnant, the input was something I would do anyway. His own style was like...he would do stuff on a 4-track and it was joke kind of stuff, he wanted to start playing stand-up bass. Towards the end he was just doing it because he didn't want to drive a cab. He liked being in the band, but musically, this is what I was saying about 'Total Destruction'....I'd come in and be like, 'Here's a couple of riffs I got. What can you do with it?' Vinnie would start working off of it. We'd ask Pete, 'Do you have anything?' Week after week after week he'd be like, 'No, uh-uh'. It was stagnating. I realized that it wasn't my fault. I'm just as productive now, if not more so, than I ever was. I don't wanna say that it was him that was making me lazy, but...
3C: How did you find Vinnie?
CS: We played in a band called Anal Nitrate, with Unsane playing, two drummers - Vinnie and Charlie, and Jim Thirwell singing. We did one 15-minute song called "The Building" or "26th Street" or something like that...it was one long noise epic, Jim was like, "AAAAIHG:IPHEGP:IEH!!!" All this crazy shit, he never even practiced with us. He heard the tape that we had done in the practice space, he walked in and said, "Hey, I can do vocals for this." He did them, we got paid like $1800 for 15 minutes. That was purely our motivation. We played and got along with Vinnie. So, when Charlie died, we still had a European tour left to do. We tried out one guy from Boston who sucked, he emulated Charlie's style perfectly, but the guy's personality was crap.
Vinnie Signorelli (photo by Marc Broussely (2011))
3C: Charlie had a very interesting style, for example, he would use the floor tom in place of the ride cymbal. Did Vinnie have to adjust his style to replace Charlie, or has he played like that all along? Because he plays just like Charlie probably would have on 'Total Destruction'.
CS: Yeah, exactly, exactly. WE wanted him to do exactly what he would want to do, it didn't matter to us if it changed the sound of the band because that's how it is - Charlie's dead. But then Vinnie, himself felt he had to fill big shoes in terms of the crazy tom stuff, so he started doing more of that. That's not really his natural style, he can do it, though. On the new record there's more hi-hat, kick, snare....heavier beats.
3C: Where did you get Dave?
CS: Dave was our soundguy, we were friends. All this shit went down with Pete, he moved to L.A....
3C: Did he get kicked out?
CS: Well, that's debatable. It could go either way. He told Vinnie he didn't want to tour. We went on tour with Biohazard for three days. Pete flies out to L.A. to be with my ex-girlfriend. He was like, 'I'm moving to L.A. I'm getting married, fuck Chris, fuck this tour, I don't want to go, we're not doing it.' After months of this, plus the musical thing I was talking about before, me and Vinnie knew that this was the end. We said fuck it, let's try and find a bass player. Dave came out to do sound for us on the tour, so we got this guy from Seattle, he was lazy as fuck. We did four shows with him, he fucked everyone up. So me and Dave would sit around. We had played a little bit in hotel rooms and stuff. Meanwhile, this guy's fucking up shows and I keep saying to him, 'Look, I've gone over this song a million times with you, just play it right, that's all I'm asking.' He would go, 'Oh, shut up - you've acted like I've never played in a band before.' I was like, whoa, this is a big ego thing, the guy had to play the songs right. So Dave and I are jamming, this other guy is a total pathetic piece of shit. So Vinnie can't take him anymore, he was sharing a room with him, and he booted him. He was like, 'I don't care what happens - you're out of here.' So we sent him back to Seattle. Now we had between Las Vegas and L.A. Dave and me had been jamming, we knew he could do it, we taught him seven songs in the back of the van while we're driving to L.A. and we'll play the set tonight, and then we'll work it. He knew the songs, all it took was a little bit of practice. Seven songs later, we did the show in L.A. better than the other guy played any of the shows. We get along really well, and we write really well together, too. The single we just did, we wrote a song in like 5-10 minutes. To me, it's amazing.
3C: Did you, Dave, help with the writing on the new album, or were the songs already written?
DC: We wrote the riffs for the album together, except for three songs which were already written, "Get Off My Back", "Blew", and [illegible].
3C: I want to ask about the Jabberjaw comp (which "Blew" is also on). How involved were you with Jabberjaw [a club in L.A.]?
CS: L.A. has always been a hard place for out-of-town bands to play, especially new bands. When we first started out, Jabberjaw was the only place we could play. We'd play there and the place would be packed. It's a little cafe in a bad neighborhood in L.A. The guy really helped us out, he gave us a lot of early exposure out there. We appreciated it, so when they asked us to be on that benefit compilation, we said sure, of course.
DC: He lost a lot of money...
CS: Well, he never lost money on us before. It's now when they unannounced shows and no one even knows we're playing. It was secretive this last time. We played the Whisky and then Jabberjaw the next night, and no one knew we were playing there. There was only like 40 people there.
3C: How was the whole major label experience?
CS: It's over!! Thank God!
3C: Was it the kind of thing where you said, "Why not? Let's try it, and if it doesn't work, OK?"
CS: No, what happened was that Matador Records became a subsidiary of Atlantic, and Gerard [Cosloy] said to us...well, this is how it was told to me....that all the bands on Matador were going to Atlantic. We were supposed to be the first rung to deal with that. We were duped into thinking that everyone was going, so we did it. We wouldn't have done it had we known we didn't have to. Pete had done a lot of the Matador crap. I realized that had I been doing it, a lot of things would have happened differently. There are some really cool people at Atlantic, but, in general, all major labels are out for is money. They don't think about the music. Like, Amphetamine Reptile, Tom Hazelmyer signs bands he likes.
3C: You've known him for awhile, right?
CS: Yeah, I've known him since us, the Cows and Babes in Toyland were on Treehouse.
3C: I wanted to ask you about Treehouse. I interviewed another band who also started out on Treehouse, and they basically said that the guy wasn't really on the level.
CS: He's a piece of shit. We got dicked by labels right and left for the first few singles. Sub Pop tried to dick us, but they ended up paying us a year later. This sums a lot of this up: 'Total Destruction' took over a year to come out because we had to deal with lawyers and contracts and all that shit. We had to play the same songs on tours over and over. This new record we recorded in two weeks in the studio at the label and it comes three and a half months later.
3C: It seems like a long time in coming....it seems you should have been on AmRep from the begining.
CS: You would think so. It was a three paragraph contract...
DC: ....and Shannon from the Cows burnt it. None of those bands have contracts, it's all verbal.
3C: So how did you get off of Atlantic?
CS: That was the whole thing with Pete dealing with Matador. They wouldn't put out the record, they're still asking for royalties on certain songs like "Blew" and "Alleged". We're on AmRep. They're SCUM!!!! They're being SCUM!!!!! They did let us off, and it was the best thing that ever happened to this band.
3C: We were talking about this as we were driving into the city and listening to the new record....[see prelude to interview]....and it just seems that Unsane could have only come from New York City.
CS: A lot of the songs are about experiences from here. There's a lot of rage and frustration.
3C: Who has all the ideas for the infamous album covers?
CS: Some I did, like the new one, some are police photos, like the first album.
This blog has led me to a podcast gig! A couple of months ago, Brian Cathy posted in a Dischord Records Facebook group that he was starting a podcast that would go record-by-record through the Dischord catalog. I got in touch with him to let him know that I was really looking forward to it & I pointed him in the direction of this blog, where a couple of years ago, I had made an attempt (quickly aborted) to blog my way through the Dischord catalog. He read the posts I made and liked them & mentioned this blog in an early episode of the podcast.
He & his original co-host made it through nine episodes (up through the Youth Brigade 'Possible E.P.') before his co-host decided to leave the podcast. Brian reached out to me about possibly guest co-hosting a few episodes with him, but I saw a window of opportunity and suggested that if it went well, why should it be a "guest" situation?
We recorded & released our first episode this past Monday - covering Side A of the classic 'Flex Your Head' comp. It went very well and I received a lot of positive feedback and tomorrow, the episode covering Side B will be released. I'm now on board for the long haul and look forward to bringing the same type of content you would have received here had I decided to stick with my original concept a couple of years ago.
The podcast is called 'End On End' - and you can find it anywhere you listen to podcasts. A direct link to the episodes can be found here:
As far as the blog is concerned, the next four posts are going to be reproductions of interviews done a long time ago for a one-off zine I did with some very close friends around 1996 or so called '3 Cynical'. We only did one issue, which I'm very proud of, although a second issue was completely done - but I wanted the zine to be free and I was looking at expenses I realistically couldn't handle to get it to the finish line.
The zine, unintentionally, turned out to be something of an Amphetamine Reptile Records fanzine. The issue that came out had interviews with Unsane, Supernova & Guzzard. The issue that never came out had interviews with Gaunt, The Cows and Hammerhead. Those interviews, unfortunately, are lost and were never published. I hope to find them some day - maybe they're in a dusty old box in my father's house somewhere. I don't know. I'd love to have them back. I'd even happily transcribe the tapes if I could ever find them.
But for now, I'm going to republish the interviews that were featured in issue #1 - which although published - so few people ever read them that I thought it would be fun to feature them here. Keep in mind the interviews are almost 25 years old and, to be honest about it, I wasn't the best interviewer. Aside from the three AmRep bands mentioned above, there's also an interview with Pacifier, a Long Island band from that time who were quite noisy and fit in well with the unintentional AmRep-thing. Those guys are also all close friends to this day, so I'm sure it'll be fun for them to read as well.
A quick shoutout here to the people who helped me with that zine - almost all of whom remain friends to this day: Lloyd Zare, Aaron Pagdon, Kerry Crandall Zion, Marc Lopez, Phil Lerman, Jen Maler, Ron Zion, Richard Gilman-Opalsky, Vinny Segarra, Suzanne Stillinger & Adam Zare.
So - the first thing here is that I was born on a Friday the 13th. I thought that might be a fun reveal at this moment. Perhaps it's why I gravitated to trying to cover this series, I don't know.
What I'd like to know from everyone is - what's your favorite & least favorite Friday film? Where do you think this franchise lands compared to other big horror franchises? Where do you think Jason lands as a villain? Would you like to see more Friday films....or have they exhausted the concept?
I really enjoyed doing this. Some films I had seen before, some I hadn't. But I think I enjoyed the experience of going through the films knowing I was going to try to write about them more than I enjoyed actually watching some of these films.
The experience satisfied two sides of my personality. There is the side of me that likes to intellectualize and analyze....but there's also the side of me that has fun watching boobs and blood. These films weren't meant to withstand critical scrutiny, but they are no doubt fun to sit back when you've had enough of the world and just have some fun for a little bit.
It's an interesting series in that we, as the audience, are really a lot more like Jason than we are his victims. We watch Jason slash his way through 12 films made over the course of 29 years. Of the 146 people Jason killed, it's hard to think of a single death that had any consequence or left any mark. Even in horror films, death can make an emotional impact. But as Jason felt no emotions or empathy towards any of his victims.....neither do we. We watch waiting and looking forward to the next kill....not caring at all about the consequences of those kills.
What is also interesting, yet a failure of the series, is that for all this time we've spent with Jason, we barely know a thing about him. We know nothing more about his history or family than what can be said in two sentences. He never speaks & hardly ever shows signs of having any sort of humanity. He is neither a killer we are actively rooting for or against.
As a whole, I'm sure some of the stronger Friday movies were better than some of the Halloween or Nightmare films....but Friday NEVER made a film as good as the original Halloween or Nightmare films. It never had that ONE movie that was truly a work of art. The failure to ever take the concept and expand on it in a truly successful way is the series' shortcoming. But perhaps with a villain as silent and inhuman as Jason, maybe that's a limiting factor that even the greatest filmmakers would have trouble overcoming.
Why was the Friday the 13th franchise so popular and so successful and ended up resulting in, to date, 12 films? I have to think that a large part of it is simple marketing. Jason looks fucking cool. He makes for a great image and the hockey mask has become so iconic that it has carried the franchise. Where would that series be without that mask? I think this is a rare instance of the parts being greater than the whole.
I'm going to try to attach a mathematical score to the franchise through a very simple rating method. 1 point for a film that I felt was genuinely good & fun. 1/2 point for a film that was OK...glad I watched it...wouldn't watch again. 0 points for the dreck.
I'm giving 1 point to Parts 1, 2, 4 and 6. 1/2 point to Goes to Hell, Jason X and F v. J 0 points to 3, 5, 7, 8 and the 2009 remake.
That's 5.5 points out of a possible 12. Which gives the series, overall, a 4.8 out of 10.
I actually can't believe I stuck with this & made it through this franchise. I'll post one more wrap-up after this where I'll try to gather my thoughts on the series as a whole....but for now - let's deal with the reboot or remake or whatever this is.
Having watched this entire franchise over the course of two weeks, the movies are all fairly fresh in my mind & I was looking forward to seeing how this one dealt with the old ones. I saw this in the theater when it came out and only remembered one thing about it - and that is what I consider to be about the most brutal death that Jason has doled out. These are campy films with campy deaths....but being strung up in a sleeping bag over a campfire and being slowly roasted to death is about as horrible a death as I could think up.
Oh...and also....there is Amanda Righetti.
They did a decent job of hitting some major plot points (to the extent that these movies have plots) of the first four films, so it's hard to classify this as a straight-up remake of the original film. But it also fails to acknowledge much of what came after Part IV, so it's also not really a sequel. It's a bit of this & a bit of that.
But, as with all of the post-Paramount films (although this film was actually a co-production with New Line Cinema), these are not so much Friday the 13th films as they are horror films featuring some version of Jason that isn't quite the Jason of the original films.
The Jason of this film is simply too conscious, too plotting & planning, and....too fast.
One thing that has made most of these films somewhat boring is that Jason seemingly has no Achilles heel. I mean, what villain doesn't have some method - no matter how small - of defeating them? Jason's only kryptonite appears to be the memory of his mother - it is the only reveal that Jason may have an iota of humanity. But this idea, which could have been interesting, has only ever appeared, until now, in Part 2. This idea, which could have been explored throughout the length of the series, ends up being nothing more than a plot device, a way to exploit his last remaining humanity for the final escape which we know must eventually come. The idea that Jason would actually take Whitney hostage is such an incredible betrayal of the character. To what end is he holding her? If he has enough intelligence to take her hostage, isn't he aware that his mother is already dead? I mean - he cares for his mother so much he keeps her decapitated head....above the toilet? Is Whitney being given food & water? She must be....for someone held captive for six weeks, she seems to be fairly healthy.
Giving Jason some actual humanity, some actual intelligence, wouldn't have been a bad thing to explore over time, and I'm surprised no film ever really tried it until now. But it's half-baked and leaves the film confused.
I know characterization isn't a big deal with these films...but let's talk about the group of friends - the one led by Trent, whose father owns the nice house on the lake. How are these people even friends with each other? Trent is the good looking rich kid with the big house who seems to hate fun and every single person who he took on vacation with him. "Don't touch that table"...."beer pong should be played outside"...."I don't want to go hiking"...."don't touch my boat". Not to mention how he treats Clay in the beginning of the film who just wants to find his missing sister. Fuck you, Trent....fuck you. You suck and I'm glad you're dead. One of the least likable characters in the entire franchise....his "friends" deserved better.
Cool to see Ben Feldman who plays Richie in the prologue of the film (the guy who gets his foot caught in the bear trip and whose girlfriend burns to death) who was great in Silicon Valley.
