What better time than now to announce a new chapter in the classic horror franchise, Friday the 13th? But this won’t be another in a long line of horror sequels, even though I pray for a Jason X sequel someday. No, this will be a prequel series, Crystal Lake, that will be headed to Peacock.
Bryan Fuller, known for series such as Hannibal, Pushing Daisies, and my favorite, Dead Like Me, will team with A24 on Crystal Lake, a prequel to the Friday the 13th movies that began in 1980. Of course, we know that, eventually, a hockey masked Jason Voorhees would begin stalking and killing kids at Camp Crystal Lake, payback for dying there as a child due to camp counselor negligence.
“I discovered Friday the 13th in the pages of Famous Monsters magazine when I was ten years old, and I have been thinking about this story ever since. When it comes to horror, A24 raises the bar and pushes the envelope, and I’m thrilled to be exploring the campgrounds of Crystal Lake under their banner. And Susan Rovner is simply the best at what she does. It’s a pleasure and an honor to be working with her again,” Fuller said.
Sounds like Jason’s mother, who led the initial killings in the first movie, will be returning.
Also aboard as a producer is original screenwriter Victor Miller, having won a recent lawsuit regarding rights to the first movie. Sounds like he’ll be involved with any Friday the 13th project for the forseeable future. Miller has said that he has never seen any of the sequel films because for him the killer was always Jason’s mother, Pamela Voorhees.
Fuller is an interesting choice to be involved with this. While his shows have often been very successful, he tends to not stick around long for various reasons, but it usually boils down to creative conflicts. We’ll see how this project goes.
