The First Two Episodes of "Friday The 13th: The Series"

Being a fan of both horror movies AND the Friday the 13th films, I got curious when I heard there was a show called "Friday the 13th: The Series". I didn't think it was weird because Freddy Krueger had a TV show called Freddy's Nightmares. But it was more or less Tales From The Crypt but with Freddy giving the terrible puns. And only a small handful of episodes had to do with Freddy, otherwise it was just random horror stories. But what would "Friday the 13th: The Series" be about? Would it get into the history of Jason Voorhees? Would it take place on that fateful night he drowned? Would it just feature different campers getting killed each week?

Turns out, nope. It has nothing to do with Jason Voorhees, Pamela Voorhees, or Camp Crystal Lake. OK, then. It's called "Friday the 13th: THE SERIES" so...maybe it's about a rash of weird things happening on every Friday the 13th and a cop, a stubborn reporter, and a train conductor must team up to figure this out!

Oh wait, turns out nope. It has NOTHING to do with Friday the 13th, the day, either. So why the fuck is this show called Friday the 13th: THE SERIES? What is the show even about? Well, hold on to your hockey masks cause you won't believe this shit.

First off, it was produced by Frank Mancuso, Jr. who produced most of the Friday the 13th: THE FILM sequels in the 80's. That's it. That's the only connection. Clearly, the movies were such hot shit at the time that he wanted to trick people into watching the show, discover it has nothing to do with Jason, but also it's 1987 and the only thing on was Where's The Cocaine? so fuck it, let's keep watching.

As to what the show is about, it's about an antique shop.

Wait! WAIT!! Don't go running out yet. It's not just any antique shop. It's an antique shop...full of EVIL items! Made by Satan! HIMSELF!! Or something like that. Look, whoever wrote this first episode, titled The Inheritance, jammed the entire premise of the show into the first 20 minutes then it jumped into the evil relic of the week almost immediately.

The premise is a guy named Lewis Vendredi (according to Google, this is French for Friday. UGH! FUCK YOU, TV show) owns an antique shop. He made some deal with Satan to keep an eye on all of his trinkets, called relics in the show, and in exchange he gets to live forever. Well, the most annoying family ever comes into the shop and has a domestic disturbance in the store. The father loves his daughter too much and the woman, the daughter's step-mom, is kind of a bitch and hates the daughter. The daughter, played by Sarah Polley, hates the step-mom but loves this doll in the store. The doll comes to life and tells Sarah Polley to kill the step-mom. Before she can, the antique owner berates the family, forces them to leave, and throws the doll into a safe. Then a wind machine turns on, some steps are heard, and Lewis is thrown down an elevator shaft. I guess Satan wasn't happy.

The store falls into the hands of Ryan and Micki, nephew and niece of Lewis. They don't want to run the shop so they end up selling everything in the store. Then an old guy named Jack shows up. Jack says he's a friend of Lewis' and was the one who got all the cursed relics together and is pissed all of them are out in the world. So now they have to get them back, one by one, taking about 30-45 minutes to do so.

The first thing they look for is of course the doll, which gets sold to Sarah Polley's father. Sarah Polley's bitch of a step-mom doesn't approve of this and hides it, but Sarah Polley finds it. The doll uses magical powers to kill the step-mom, much to the delight of Sarah Polley. Ryan, Micki, and Jack, deciding to go get the doll, show up at the house right as the doll was killing Sarah Polley's babysitter. Then we find out that none of these bozo's know how to handle kids cause all they say is "GIVE ME THE DOLL NOW!" as if that's going to work on a little girl who has a doll that can kill at will.

The doll causes more wind (I guess they spent most of their budget on a wind machine and dammit they're gonna use it!) until they eventually get the doll back. Sarah Polley cries and they lock the doll up in the safe and the episode ends.

Gotta love those 1980's special effects!

Episode 2 is called The Poison Pen. It's about a pen that when you write down a person's name and describe how they die, that person dies in that way. A monk ended up buying this pen and uses it to kill various other monks. This paragraph is the most interesting thing about this episode. The rest of it was snoozeville filled with SO MUCH suspension of disbelief that I questioned the sanity of everyone on the show.

So the pen was in a monastery, which is full of men. No women are allowed. Micki, if I hadn't said it yet, is a woman. So in order for her and Ryan to get in and get the pen back, they had to wrap up her boobs and pretend she's a man. But all they do IS wrap up her boobs, put her in a monk outfit, and say she has a vow of silence.

But she still looks feminine as hell. I mean...COME ON!

Pictured: Three dudes. Totally. No women or vaginas here. Nosireebob! 

And there are scenes, WHOLE ENTIRE SCENES, where Ryan and Micki are talking to each other IN FRONT OF OTHER MONKS USING THEIR REAL NAMES AND VOICES and no one seems to go "uhh...something is up with these two". Eventually Jack fakes his way into the monastery as well only because he made a fake pen to switch it with the real one.

The whole reason these murders are happening is because some guy who is NOT a monk bought the pen, found out what it does, pretended to be a monk, killed all the monks in line to run the monastery, then sell the monastery for thousands of dollars. That's it. It was a real estate scheme. And it was a fucking monastery. WHY A MONASTERY OF ALL THINGS?! Why not pretend you're a baker? Or pretend you're a manager of a liquor store? Why a FUCKING MONASTERY OF ALL THINGS?!? This episode is dumb.

They get the pen back after switching out the real pen with the fake one, but not before a whole bunch of people die. Wasn't the whole point of this to get these items before anyone gets hurt? At least 4 people died before they got it back.

OH! My favorite scene was one of the monks DOES get suspicious of our main characters so he follows them around. Micki decides to take a shower which means Jack and Ryan have to keep an eye out for other monks. But this monk spots Micki in the show...USING A PEEPHOLE IN THE SHOWER! Like in Porky's! WHY IS THERE A PEEPHOLE IN A MENS ONLY-

You know what, let's just leave that alone.

OK, maybe it's not a peep hole, maybe it's a...ugh, that's worse. Nevermind.

Anyway, those are the first two episodes of Friday the 13th: The Series and so far it's lame. I will keep watching and report back on what else happens but I don't have high hopes for this show.

But until then, enjoy your Friday the 13th! Oh and HEY! Did you know I have a podcast?! ABOUT FRIDAY THE 13th! The movies, not this show. You should totally listen to it now!

-Jason