436: Freddy vs Jason (2003)

This week we're stepping into the ring with Freddy vs. Jason (2003). We unpack the movie's crossover legacy, dissect the spectacle of watching two horror titans collide, and explore why it still works more than 20 years later. This episode contains spoilers, beginning at 27:48.

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Mentioned in the Episode

Watch the Movie

Kane Hodder Reveals the Surprising Way He Had a Cameo in Freddy vs. Jason

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Music Credits

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:04

That's true. Before we had Clown in a cornfield, we had Jason in a cornfield.

SPEAKER_03 0:11

For more than a decade, two slasher franchises dominated multiplexes, home video shows, and late-night cable. While one stalked teenagers through their dreams, the other rose from a lake to punish anyone who wandered too close. In the early 90s, a single closing image in one of those films teased a future collision, and the studio promised that these two icons would eventually share the same screen. What followed was years of negotiations, competing rights, rotating scripts, and shifting creative directions, which meant the long-promised crossover remained in development limbo. When it finally materialized, the story centered on a dream demon who has lost his power after the town of Springwood erased his memory and suppressed nightmares with a drug called hypnofil. In order to restore fear, he resurrects the killer of Camp Crystal Lake and sets him loose on Elm Street, intending to feed on the panic that follows. As teenagers begin to die in both the waking world and their sleep, the two legends move towards a confrontation that had been teased for nearly a decade. This week we're talking about Freddy versus Jason. Greetings and salutations, and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. If this is your first time listening, welcome to the party. We are a horror movie review podcast dedicated to telling you whether a movie is a hack.

SPEAKER_01 1:34

A total joke, a waste of time, or a slash. Totally killer, pun intended.

SPEAKER_03 1:39

We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, you're rating these movies with the perspective we've gained from our varying walks of life and the flavors of fear we fancy most. My name is Chris, I'm your friendly neighborhood slasher enthusiast. This week I'm joined by the classic horror connoisseur, Sean.

SPEAKER_01 1:52

You know I don't like to be touched after, okay? You're tuning in to Freddie versus Jason, but if you support the show, you'll also get to hear our B side at the end of this episode where we get into some other fun horror icon mashups.

SPEAKER_03 2:06

And that is gonna be a great discussion, particularly in this, the month of our monster madness and our horror games. But for now, Sean, I'm trusting you've seen this before.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

Oh yeah. Freddy versus Jason, definitely one that I've seen many, many times over the years. This is like the Avengers level crossover event that any slasher fan coming out of the 80s and early 90s wanted to see. I feel like it was hinted at since that iconic moment at the end of Jason goes to hell and seeing Freddy's hand pull Jason's mask into hell for what is it? Like a you said a decade. It felt like more than a decade goes by with nothing but hope. And finally in 2003, we get this movie. So yeah, definitely seen it. I was hyped when it was coming out. I remember my friends were hyped, and we just we watched this movie tons of times over the years.

SPEAKER_03 3:02

2003 was such a magical year because you had this movie and you had the Florida Marlins World Series over the New York Yankees. But I remember watching this movie when it came out, saw it in theaters, saw it a million times since then, and man, when I first watched this, I was completely blown away because we had the casting of Jason Ritter. You know who John Ritter is.

SPEAKER_02 3:26

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 3:27

I lived my life in middle school, in particular, getting into high school, making French bread pizzas at 3 a.m., watching Three's Company. So for us to have not only Robert England back at the helmet, not only Kelly Rowan from Destiny's Child, but also to have Jason Ritter, son of the Jack Tripper. I was absolutely floored watching this movie. And when it came time to watch this again, now 23 years later, my God, it is still as fun today as it was then.

SPEAKER_01 3:59

It is definitely one of those just fun movies. Watching this back now, it makes me actually feel a little bit sad that this was Robert England's final performance as Freddie on screen. Kind of fitting that we are talking about it now because there is a lot of interest for Freddie, for Robert to pick up Freddie as a character potentially one more time in a Freddy Krueger film. We don't know if it's for sure happening, but there's a lot of conversation around it. So kind of exciting, really.

SPEAKER_03 4:29

It is exciting, but you also have to look at the fact that this is the first movie in a while where Kane Hodder is not playing Jason. And this movie comes with its own controversy from this. I also need to tell you, very honestly, Sean, this movie was my introduction to Catherine Isabel. And how embarrassing is it that I never realized that it was Catherine Isabel. I watched Ginger Snaps obviously years later. I can't remember if we discussed the fact that we obviously saw her in this movie, but damn, I was watching it this time and I was like, hold on a second. Is that Ginger the Snap herself?

SPEAKER_01 5:04

It is, it is, yeah. That's actually really funny. I was watching this back too, and I was like, oh yeah, that is her. That's wild. That's wild. What also is kind of really fun about this movie, not really any spoilers, but just the opening previously on every fucking Freddy movie you get, just like it's like watching the start of like a Dragon Ball Z season where it's like last season on Dragon Ball Z, and it gives you the entire fucking season leading up to this one-minute like moment that you get. I don't know, wild, but it was kind of fun.

SPEAKER_03 5:37

And the fact, honestly, that it's narrated by Robert England himself, it's narrated by Freddie. I really enjoyed that, but I also enjoyed it because with that opening narration, you have two things that happen. One, it's a victory lap for Elm Street mythology, 100%. But you then have the pendulum swing to the classic Friday the 13th setup. So it's a little bit of a cheesy moment. He resurrects Jason, but we also get to really see what it's like to have these two worlds collide. And you know, we talked about like the end of an era with Robert England. The thing about this movie is even in that moment, you feel immediately that this is communal horror. This is grab a pizza, grab some beer, and yell at the screen with your friends kind of horror.

SPEAKER_01 6:30

Oh, yeah, for sure. It's one of those movies, it's full of nostalgia for anyone that grew up watching the uh nightmare in Elm Street films, for anyone watching the you know, Friday the 13th and Jason films. It's full of campy fun, some great one-liners, definitely just fun, the kills, the yelling at the screen. It's all there for sure. It also felt like an end of an era, to be honest, because really, when you think about it, what happened after this movie for both of these franchises? Not a ton.

SPEAKER_03 7:05

Yeah, it's completely fair. It really does feel like the Swan Song. Like this is the last little bit that we're gonna get. We had the terrible Nightmare on Elm Street remake. But the year before that, we had the I think pretty solid Friday the 13th reboot. But then these franchises have just disappeared. Obviously, with Friday the 13th and it's legal battle. Now, Jason Universe coming back into full force. It's also funny that we're reviewing this at this time, obviously, because it's March 13th. We typically, every Friday the 13th, record a property from the Friday the 13th franchise. We didn't last month because we have run to the end of the line of the Friday the 13th franchise. But we probably should have finished the nightmare franchise before doing this. But it just feels like it's fine. We're just out here to have a good time.

SPEAKER_01 7:54

Yeah, we'll figure it out. I wonder if there's enough movies that feature the number 13 that you could start sprinkling in on these.

SPEAKER_03 8:01

You know, what we could do are the Friday the 13th fan films, never hike alone. Those are actually pretty good.

SPEAKER_01 8:07

Okay. All right. Hey, listen, I'm here for it. I'm here for it.

SPEAKER_03 8:10

I want to throw out something though, Sean, that surprised me as I was watching this movie. And it's really two things. One, I'd never really appreciated before. I think I've known it and I've felt it, but I've never really consciously grabbed onto it. Freddie and Jason are two of horror's most iconic slashers. We have Freddie, Jason, Michael, Leatherface, Ghostface, etc., Chucky. But throughout the Fight of the 13th franchise, we have had many conversations about how Jason is a sympathetic killer. This movie for me pushes him more into like the heroic antihero, the sympathetic killer that you're rooting for because he's better than the child predator Freddy. And it was surprising to me watching this now at 36, 23 years after this movie came out, and really appreciating that more than I ever have before. But the other thing that surprised me was getting into this and realizing that there is a specific death in this movie that I no longer feel good about. It's an entertaining movie as a whole, but I completely was lost to how dark this death is.

SPEAKER_01 9:17

For sure. I'm sure we're gonna get into that a little bit later, 100%. And yeah, I mean, it is interesting when you think about the just the dynamic that you get when you put these two polarizing characters together on screen. Obviously, there is that sympathy factor for Jason because, you know, his backstory, he was drowned in a lake, he was bullied. You're always kind of rooting for him in a sense. That's what the Friday the 13th movies are all about. You kind of want to see what Jason can do and rack up the kill count in those movies. Freddy, he's fucking with kids, man. There's something not right about him, but he's kind of funny at the same time. He's got those one-liners, so you're kind of like, I don't like this guy, I don't really want him to win, but I do want to see what he's gonna do and say next, you know, because he's sadistic. He does these weird manipulations in the mind and in the dream. So it's an interesting mashup. I will say, not even going that deep into the thought of this movie, there were a few things that really surprised me that I was just because I was just vibing with this movie, and I will tell you right now, it always amazes me how many people in these movies are willing to just jump into a nasty, stagnant fucking lake in the middle of the night. You couldn't catch me, and I've said this a bunch of times about jumping into lakes and shit, but I'm just gonna tell you, if I'm out in the woods and I'm it's nighttime, even fucking daytime, and there's a fucking lake. Let me tell you something. I'm not jumping into the lake. I don't want to swim in the lake.

SPEAKER_03 10:48

You're gonna have so much bacteria swimming up in you and in the open wound you have. If not, for some weird creatures that might be living in that lake, you might have a gild man lurking in there. Absolutely not. I can't even swim.

SPEAKER_01 11:02

It's true. It just amazes me that some people are just they take such pleasure in jumping into these lakes. Here's the other thing. Over the years, over the years, someone ends up saying some shit that their parents did this shit to Freddie, and now they're paying for it. But let me ask the real question: whose fucking parents was it really at this point? Because we've got like decades of films where this is brought up where the parents did this and we're paying for it in this generation. Motherfuckers, we're at like the fifth generation by now. What's happening here? What's happening with these parents and whose parents are they?

SPEAKER_03 11:36

What's happening here is generational trauma, Sean. The cycle never breaks, it always continues.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

My great-great great great great grandfather.

SPEAKER_03 11:45

Nightmare on Elm Street bloodlines. Absolutely. That's exactly what this is. But and at least in this one, what I appreciate is you have the framing of what happened to Freddie after the bloodlines of it all, and more with how is the town as a collective responding to Freddie? Yeah. Or how do they solve the problem? How do they deal with it?

SPEAKER_02 12:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:07

One of the things that I appreciate about this is how it really blends Crystal Lake and Springwood. I think it does that really nicely. It's kind of fucking crazy that they're uh skip and a hop away when you get down to it. We'll talk about that more in the spoiler zone. The framing of this fits perfectly on a watch with behind the mask the rise of Leslie Vernon, because that is a mockumentary in which all these movies are real and these are real things and creatures and monsters that live in our world.

SPEAKER_02 12:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:38

But something that disappoints me in this movie, we're gonna go back to it again. I missed Kane Hodder because there is something, while this Jason is taller, sure, by a few inches, he doesn't feel as intimidating. So between that and making him feel more sympathetic, there's something about his body language that just feels like wouldn't be that bad.

SPEAKER_01 13:04

Yeah, it's wild what a little body language can really do. I mean, when you think about it, you got a mask on the whole time, you're not seeing facial expression, so it really does come down to those movements.

SPEAKER_03 13:14

It comes down to those movements, it comes down to his little sleepy eye, you know. I don't want to see the eyes that close. He just looks like a little guy who got woken up from a nap. And I totally get not vibing with that.

SPEAKER_01 13:28

Yeah, I hear you on that for sure. I also think it could it be a disappointment, maybe. It's also just an almost an amazement that these fucking teenagers figure out somehow in this movie how Freddy was pulling this shit off literally out of nowhere. It just felt like we were in a scene, and all of a sudden they just had his plan just dialed in. They were just like, Oh, so he's literally doing this. It's like, how the fuck do you know what he's doing? What's happening? It just seemed like too easy.

SPEAKER_03 13:56

Yeah, you had the meeting in the that 70s show basement, and then all of a sudden we're here, we've arrived. What I will say about this is apart from a few good moments, the teenagers as a whole aren't developed nearly enough to elevate the moral stakes of the movie. This like absolutely rests and lives and dies on the shoulders of Freddie and Jason. But I'm okay with that because when you have two iconic slashers, I don't want to be super into all the other characters. I don't have the time or the bandwidth for it. I think that the core group of friends we have, so we you know, we have our leading lady Lori, we have the boyfriend, we have Kelly Rowland is Kia, we have Linderman, they're fine. But the other characters that we add on top of that were I'm like, okay.

SPEAKER_01 14:47

Yeah, for sure. And you know what? I think this one we already talked about at the beginning. Like it's a it's an entertaining, really fun, campy film that you're just wanting to sit down and have a good time. Like get your brews, your sodas, whatever you're drinking, yeah, and you got some pizza, some wings, whatever, you got some friends, some popcorn, and you're just having a good time. You're just vibing with it. I will say this one will have some classic jump scare tactics, nothing super over the top. It's really there, I think, for the fans. And I think with a movie like this, you're really just rooting for the villains at this point. Like, you really want to see the face off. You're either on one side or you're on the other. No one's really on the teenager side. Let's get that real. Like, we're here to see who wins between Freddie and Jason. That's what we're here for. So it really is just more spectacle than scary.

SPEAKER_03 15:37

100%. It this movie being entertaining in a spectacle sense is exactly what I have written down in my notes. So I'm glad we're on the same page there. But this also feels like the escalation of horror meeting pro wrestling.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

It does. There are so many ties to it, I feel like.

SPEAKER_03 15:55

And I'm not a wrestling fan. The only wrestling things I know are that The Undertaker was a person and Hulk Hogan was involved, and mostly what I've come to learn from you and the Wyatt Six. But this movie, with how Freddie in particular engages Jason, it feels like what I imagine people feel like when they're watching really campy, cheeky wrestling, and they're just leaning into the bit. And it makes it fun. It makes it funny, it makes it an absurd escalation, it makes it theater, which I can appreciate.

SPEAKER_01 16:31

It does for sure. It's like the it's like the Rock versus Hogan. That's really what this is. It's a WrestleMania moment, you know? It's it just feels that way 100%. And I would say that this one is, you know, it's conceptually original, but I feel like it's also just structurally familiar. Like it, it's it, you know, you have the first of its kind, really, this mashup versus horror movie, right? You don't really have a lot of those.

SPEAKER_03 16:59

Well, yeah, Frankenstein meets the wolf man.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

Well, yeah, you have mash-ups. But yes, but like for the slasher icons, like this was a big deal. And so it feels conceptually original, but definitely there's a lot of familiarities with this. And I think it's one of those movies that feels groundbreaking on paper, but overall I think it's pretty conventional in its execution. You have to remember this was a true slasher crossover before, like the superhero, even the superhero crossovers were big, really, when you think about that. And I think the idea of horror icons sharing a screen, at least these icons from the 80s, it felt pretty huge at the time.

SPEAKER_03 17:40

It really did. I mean, when you think about the scale of this, this is massive. These are two huge IPs, and we haven't gotten anything that is truly similar to this since. We've gotten some knockoff stuff for sure, but there hasn't been the can the continuity of this. We haven't had Michael Myers square up with somebody, Chucky square up with somebody, etc. The closest maybe we'll ever get is the idea of the Amityville house somehow going to space, and then also Leprechaun went to space that one time, and also Jason went to space. Could you imagine if we had a space crossover? Oh my god. It's fucking insane.

SPEAKER_01 18:19

In some parallel universe.

SPEAKER_03 18:21

Somewhere out there, there is a universe in which that did happen. But I think one of the best things about this movie for me is how it wields that balance the entire time, that scale the entire time, and also wins it even in the ending of this movie. When you walk into a movie like this, you have to wonder like, okay, who's gonna win?

SPEAKER_02 18:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:42

But I think in reality, when you get to the end of the movie, I think everybody kind of wins. Like, this is the best case scenario for the movie, for the fans, for every character in the movie. It's just some people live, some people die. We'll get into the spoiler zone if you somehow haven't seen this later, so hang tight. But this was for me such a satisfying end to this movie.

SPEAKER_01 19:06

It's really interesting that it is so satisfying because you know, outside of the ending, I mean, I guess you could say that it's about what you would expect from a movie like this. I guess some might say, some might differ on that. I don't know, but it is interesting how satisfying it is because it is deliberately unresolved. I feel like it ends on this almost comic book style energy that gives you a reason to stay on either side of the fence. Like it doesn't really give you a definitive here's the end. And you know, it is very comic book style. Maybe it was intentional, maybe they wanted to open the door for a potential sequel of some kind if it was gonna happen or a rematch of some kind, but it was kind of fun. I will give it that.

SPEAKER_03 19:50

Well, regardless of the fun, I can't wait to see how that shakes into its ratings. But for now, Sean, how would you rate the gore score?

SPEAKER_01 19:58

Well, there is a fair amount of bloodshed in this one for sure, just about what you would expect from either of these slasher franchises. And with two icons at the helm, there is plenty of gore to go around. Was this the last slasher where the gore felt celebratory instead of punishing? I don't know, because it sits right before the shift into a darker, grimmer, like 2000s horror that we got, moving a lot like kind of a departure from the campiness of it all. Either way, I do think this one earns itself a pretty solid medium gore score because despite the amount of kills and bloodshed, it is just campy enough to stay fun. And so I think that's where it kind of lands for me.

SPEAKER_03 20:48

And what about the animal report?

SPEAKER_01 20:49

The animal report, I would say we are all good in the hood with this one.

SPEAKER_03 20:53

Let's go ahead and get into our ratings then. Freddie versus Jason from 2003. Was it a hack or a slash?

SPEAKER_01 21:00

Well, listen, after years of teasing and playground debates, essentially, watching Freddie Krueger and Jason Voorhees finally collide feels like a main event horror spectacle. It truly does. It feels like Godzilla versus King Kong from 1962. You know, it was big. The fights are big, the gore is flashy without being, you know, too mean, and the tone leans fully into this camp, which just feels really fun. And the movie knew, like, we aren't watching this for nuanced character arcs. We really came to see the dream demon versus the machete tank. That's what we came for. Like we wanted to see these two fight it off and see who could come out on top. And on that promise, I think it definitely delivers. And that's what I really love about this movie. I think the cornfield chaos, the fiery dock finale, I think it all plays out like. Almost like a celebration of slasher mythology rather than an attempt to reinvent it. And I think more than anything, though, the film radiates just nostalgic fun. It truly does. It feels like the last fireworks show of the 80s slasher dynasty before horror shifted into those remakes and grimmer territory, right? I think the there's an undeniable end of an era vibe here. There's a curtain call for two icons who defined a generation of literally VHS nightmares. And I think it may not be the scariest entry in either franchise, but it is pure unapologetic fan service done with some swagger. And I think you can't help but have a good time watching these two worlds collide and how everyone getting caught in their path is just fucked. You're like, you're just done. You get caught in the middle of this fight, you're out of here. You're toast. And you know, this isn't just a clash, it is a slash, and it slashed its way right into horror history.

SPEAKER_03 23:05

Listen, if there is anything that people who have listened to this show for a significant amount of time have come to learn about me, is that I'm a sucker for a mashup. I am a sucker for any glee cover that takes two songs that don't belong together and puts them together in a beautiful way. And that's exactly what this movie does. I want to actually introduce you to a few other crossovers or mashups that we've gotten in the past in media, period. Just so you can really see what this has done. We had the new Scooby-Doo movies, Batman and Robin episodes from 1972. We had the Jetsons meeting the Flintstones in 1987. We had in 2003 as well Rugrats Go Wild, which was the Rugrats and the Wild Thornberries. We had Frankenstein meeting the Wolfman in 1943. We've also had King Kong versus Godzilla in 1962, Batman versus Predator in 1991, Superman versus the Amazing Spider-Man that was a comic in 1976, Archie meets the Punisher in 1994, Archie versus Predator in 2015. So there's been a lot of ground covered in this versus that. And when it comes down to it, taking the slasher spin on it, putting Freddie against Jason, you get something that is imperfect, it's messy, it's totally uneven for sure, but it delivers the event that it promises, which is more than you can say even about maybe Scream 7. It's a franchise spectacle done with conviction and a backbone and leaning into exactly what it wants to do. But Freddie versus Jason works because it reframes Jason as the lesser evil and Freddie is the manipulative architect. And it shifts the sympathy in a way that makes a crossover emotionally satisfying without ever redeeming either person in this. Instead, we get to see a group of characters who kind of live vicariously through as they are passengers to the experience of two titans of horror collide. It's spectacle for sure, but it's spectacle with intention, with flair, with theater, with pizzazz. And I absolutely love every second of it. I feel exactly the same about this movie, barring one moment that is hard to swallow now that I did when I was a 13-year-old watching it in 2003. And it's undoubtedly a slash. With that, Freddie vs. Jason from 2003 has earned a universal slash. Now you can find this movie plenty of places online. Go check it out and join us in the second half so we can get into all these spoilers together. We'll see you in a bit.

SPEAKER_00 26:06

Live from the only arena built on a burial ground and a condemned summer camp. Featuring a Death Scout Anywhere matched. Will the human machete highlight reel prevail over the Texas chainsaw technician? What about the pain and pleasure submission match? It's the high priest of hooks versus the Jedi King with a boomstick. One promises you suffering beyond imagination. The other promises you stop smart, stop S smart. Don't forget about the final girl rumble, brother! 30 survivors enter, only one is the last one standing. Weapons hidden under the ring include a cursed videotape, a post desk doll, and a haunted house deed with adjustable rate mortgage. And for our main event, don't miss Freddy's Boiler Room Brother Brothers! It's the tape of Haddonfield taking on the one and only dream demon of Elm Street. One stalks you while you're awake, the other stalks you while you sleep. Will Michael win with the Haddonfield hammer? Or will it be Freddy's Elm Street elbow because sweet dreams are made of these? You think you've seen horror crossovers? This is where franchises come to fight for canon. TWF, where the reps don't see everything because sometimes they're already dead. Order the pay-per-view now because when the lights go out and the bell tolls, there's no safe words in the squared circles, only screams.

SPEAKER_01 27:59

Well, while this is a clash of two icons, Jason definitely wins the numbers game in terms of the number of kills under his belt in this one with somewhere around 18 kills. But where Jason wins the numbers game, Freddy brings the flare, I would say. His nightmare theatrics only give us around two or three kills, but his impact doesn't feel any less grand. And between the two of them, really, we have a total of 19 kills in this one, and there are plenty of wild kills full of slasher fun. So listen, everything from machete hacks to decapitations and really everything in between. So, Chris, let's talk about it. Which one of these kills had you dreaming of Camp Crystal Lake?

SPEAKER_03 28:46

Wow, there are so many. I mean, even the first kill is a great setup for Camp Crystal Lake. But something that I want to point out real quick, going back to your dynamic of how we have Jason and Freddie split. I also want the count of how many alley oops Freddie gave to Jason because you know he'd really just set them up for him. He teed him up, and Jason got to finish them off.

SPEAKER_01 29:09

It is true. It is true. There was just a lot of setups for Jason, but you know, he he got them.

SPEAKER_03 29:15

Yeah, you set him up, you knock them down. You miss 100% of the shots that you don't take. I struggle with which of these is my absolute favorite kill because there are so many good ones. But something that I really did enjoy, and I am probably gonna have to fight very hard not to just talk about this scene later, but it's the Cornfield Rave massacre. It is it is Jason turning around, slicing his machete machete everywhere. There's just so many incredible deaths. One that I struggle with is Gibbs' death. We'll talk about that a little bit later. But the guy specifically that is flung off of her and into the abyss, yeah, that one might take the number one spot.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

That was really good for sure. There was a lot of just really fun kills in this one. I mean, you have Blake's father getting decapitated, which was kind of fun. You had Mark getting set on fire by Freddy, then face like getting his face slashed and killed by Freddie. But also, like, you had Freddy's back burned into his back with just like, come on, like Freddie's back? Burned into his back?

SPEAKER_03 30:27

That's fucking crazy. That's crazy word.

SPEAKER_01 30:30

Come on. Come on. That's just Freddie at his finest for sure. But what the interesting one was somehow Jason was able to kill Deputy Stubbs by electrocuting him through himself. So he was just like, let me let me just take some of this and give it to you, you know?

SPEAKER_03 30:47

It is absolutely absurd. Some of this shit in here is honestly some of the weirdest stuff we've seen. I'm thinking even about the moment where we have we see Freddy in like a worm kind of like figure, like on the floor when this guy is like tripping balls. Ridiculous.

SPEAKER_01 31:03

Yeah, it was wild. I think was it Kia that got literally like baseball batted with the machete by Jason towards the end of the film? Just the home run.

SPEAKER_03 31:14

She got got a few times because if you remember, she got flung in the burning cabin and then got flung to her death against a tree.

SPEAKER_01 31:22

Yeah, that's true. That's true. Oh my god, just wild. People are getting cut in half. It was a wild time for sure. The machete was the star.

SPEAKER_03 31:31

It really was. I'm the flaming machete. Okay, that's what I was about to get to because we had this guy with some quick thinking dousing Jason in alcohol, lighting him on fire. Then you have this incredibly beautiful shot of him running through the corn stalks, and you're on an aerial view. You see Jason's path scorched in fire, he's running for help, but then you get the flaming machete to the chest, penetrated, fantastic shit. It's peak Jason, but I never knew that I wanted Jason in a cornfield. Move over, friend of the clown. You got Jason Voore. He's encroaching on your territory.

SPEAKER_01 32:14

That's true. Before we had Clown in a Cornfield, we had Jason in a cornfield.

SPEAKER_03 32:19

We really did. And just going back really quick, I mentioned that obviously this movie was my introduction to Catherine Isabel. Gibbs Gibbs' death was it already sucked in 2003. Let's be clear. She's the person that I felt almost the worst for in this entire movie. But now it hurts even more. Just I don't know, maybe the experiences that I've been through, maybe just like being an older woman, but whatever. She's passed out drunk and she's being terrorized in her dream, in her drunken sleep, in her stupor. But being terrorized in that dream, she's being physically assaulted by a guy at a party. Oh, yeah. Thank goodness. Which feels so fucking weird to say in this context. But thank goodness a serial killer was there to stop this guy from growing further. She's already dead by Freddie. I mean, let's just be honest about it. But she has the final moments I would never want to have. It's adding insult to injury. It's bad enough she's being preyed upon by Freddie, and then Jason ends up getting her. But to have that guy just like crouch over her, being a fucking creep in the dirt, it was hard to watch.

SPEAKER_01 33:29

Yeah, it it was definitely rough. It's like a trifecta of just nothing good happening. It's like the inception of being fucked over, man.

SPEAKER_03 33:38

You literally, but what I appreciate about this movie is that it doesn't feel gross with it. This movie manages to have that and still feel light and still feel fun. I maybe just respond to it a little bit differently now, just with my fucking life, but I can appreciate that this movie handles it. And also the guy has great come up and he literally gets fucking flung in the cornfield. Yeah. This is, I think, if you want to do that kind of thing in this movie, I think this is almost the best way to handle it. It's cut short before anything even worse happens. Sadly, we lose Gibbs, but we lose her, and it really pisses off Freddie because Jason's got her.

SPEAKER_01 34:17

Yeah, it is very true. There's one more kill, too, that I think, and maybe this will come up in scenes too, but Trey getting literally stabbed to death with the machete in bed. Somehow the bed just folded up on him and bent him the wrong way and snapped his spine. That was pretty wild.

SPEAKER_03 34:36

Trey was such an asshole, and I was so happy to see him go. Incredible work.

SPEAKER_01 34:42

He was such a dick. Oh my god. He had it coming for sure. But wow, what a great kill. Kind of like a callback, you know, to the OG nightmare on Elm Street with Freddie, you know, with the in the bedroom, and not the bloodbath, really, that you know, we got at that time, but it was a cool little bedfold scene, it's a little sand tray sandwich that we made there.

SPEAKER_03 35:02

So yeah. But the real question is, Sean, how do you feel about the non-kill of Freddie at the end with the headings?

SPEAKER_01 35:10

I know. I really am not mad at it. I think it was kind of a fun thing. You know, Freddie really did take a beating at the end of this movie. He got beaten up, his arm was ripped off, he got impaled by Jason's own fucking hand, and then got impaled again by by his own, like by Freddie's own fucking hand, and then he was decapitated by Lori. Like he was just getting railed all over the place. And and by the end of it, who got the last laugh? We don't know, man, because Freddie's head was decapitated for sure. But that little wink in there, we're not sure.

SPEAKER_03 35:44

If you want to know what happens next in this franchise, look no further than the Freddie versus Jason versus Ash comic book, which is great. It picks right up with Lori and what you see what happens to her. I need you to read the comic, Sean.

SPEAKER_01 35:57

I know. I have not read it. I'm surprised I haven't read it by now, but it's definitely it's on my list for sure. I will get to it.

SPEAKER_03 36:04

One thing that I love about this movie, especially with we're talking about that ending with the beheading and Freddie winking. It's honestly the color treatment and just the way this entire movie is shot, but you have fire and water throughout the final act. You have blue versus orange lighting very cold and warm at the same time. That contrast is so fucking great visually. But then you have obviously the visual difference even between Robert England and and Jason. It gives off what they intended to, and this is why they didn't hire Kane Hodder. They wanted to have a more David and Goliath visual contrast to reinforce the idea that this is less of a horror film and more about mythology.

SPEAKER_01 36:47

Yeah, I mean I could see that, but they you know they can make that happen on screen somehow. Like they can do movie magic. We see Tom Cruise is a short guy, he's perceived as tall in some films. Like, you know, we make it happen. We make it 100%.

SPEAKER_03 37:00

To be clear, Kane Hodder's not fucking short.

SPEAKER_01 37:03

Right.

SPEAKER_03 37:03

He's just not as tall, he's just super fucking muscular, which honestly would have made Jason scarier.

SPEAKER_01 37:09

That's what I'm saying. But I agree with you. I think the color use is exactly what I had in my mind when it came to like the best element of this movie, outside of just how fun it is and just really getting to see the action, because I think some of the kills and the practical effects that we got were really fun. But yeah, I really did enjoy the use of those colors in the movie. Jason being represented in the cool blue realism type feel, and like the dark only being contrasted by the moonlight. There were some really great shots that were happening. Freddie being in those warm reds, the hellish glow, the visual contrast. It does a lot of the heavy lifting in this film. It instantly does tell you whose world you're in, which is very clever. And I think it makes the fight feel mythic, almost elemental, like you said, fire versus water, dream versus flesh. It was very, very cool to see. Yeah, I just, you know, you don't see a lot of that in these types of movies, so very, very fun for sure.

SPEAKER_03 38:07

You know what else is fun? Even though Kane Hodder is in Jason, he has reported that he's still technically in the movie.

SPEAKER_01 38:13

Wait, what?

SPEAKER_03 38:14

He was a stunt double for Leatherface in Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3, and that exact scene he was in was played on a TV in the asylum.

SPEAKER_01 38:23

Oh shit. I don't even know if I caught that.

SPEAKER_03 38:26

He fucking snuck his way in there, my boy. At least according to him.

SPEAKER_01 38:30

That's hilarious.

SPEAKER_03 38:32

You know, you look up Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3, you're gonna see the guy who plays Leatherface. So Kane Howder insists that this was his moment in his scene that he was doubling in.

SPEAKER_01 38:41

Oh my god, hilarious. That was good. Man, I did not catch that.

SPEAKER_03 38:45

Eagle had Sean sleeping on the job.

SPEAKER_01 38:47

What are you gonna do? What are you gonna do? Man, but let's talk about some of these scenes because there were some really fun scenes in this one, and I think you know, even just that first dream sequence in the police department, you get very fun scenes, little here, little snippets where you see like all the missing person flyers. That was a really fun scene. There's a lot of really good little scenes in here. Which of these were some of your favorites, Chris?

SPEAKER_03 39:11

Okay, I already mentioned the Cornfield Rave Massacre, which was just freaking iconic. The second one that I really loved is kind of fucked up. And I think it's because it does better than what we saw in Jason Takes Manhattan, which was Freddis discovering he can psychologically break Jason in the dream world. He gets him a little wet, and all of a sudden you have little baby Jason and his little baby mask, just all shriveled up in the fetal position, real sad boy stuff. And I think it was a better take for me. Because again, we saw that in Jason takes Manhattan, and it became like, oh, okay, what are we doing here? Because you just see Jason just being vulnerable. But to have this done to him here at the hands of Freddy, which also weird layers there, because then what kind of joy is Freddie getting out of this knowing that he's a child predator?

SPEAKER_01 40:06

Of course.

SPEAKER_03 40:07

He's a child murderer. So he reduces Jason down to his inner child, and he's just having a field day. It's gross.

SPEAKER_01 40:14

Yeah, it was a great scene. It was the whole setup to all of that. Jason getting tranquilized and entering Freddy's dream sequence in that boiler room, and the battle still kind of begins. He chops off Freddy's arms, but it's not really any use because they just grow back and it's full of these cheesy one-liners from Freddie. It's actually really fucking great. But yeah, when he figures out that Jason is afraid of water, and you know, then you see Jason as a kid trembling and all that stuff, and he takes off the mask, and then he says, like, now that's a face that only a mother can love. I mean, these are the things you expect from Freddy, which I think that moment was definitely kind of fun for the fans. It was iconic for sure. You definitely another moment where you're like, okay, like maybe we're rooting for Jason a little bit more in that moment. Let's fight back somehow, that kind of thing. It was very, very fun. Even okay, even the stoner bug thing in the morgue or the hospital or whatever the fuck that was was fucking hilarious. Like, there was some wild shit going on in this movie.

SPEAKER_03 41:14

That continues to be the weirdest looking thing in the movie for me because for all the weird shit we get in this, it is the most CGI, but also I get why it's the most CGI. Well, besides that, and the fucking title cards at the beginning of this oh my god, the caught up flesh. Yeah, it was gross. But I get it, and it makes sense, and it feels appropriate for a 2003 movie, so it's still fun. Yeah. But oh man, I'm even thinking about just how fun the opening kill was earlier in the movie. It posed honestly, and it was so funny looking at this. I was looking at this and and and examining how it frames up the whole dream of it all. Because you have Jason stalking this woman, very camp crystal like. Yeah, but then he taps her through the machete, and then the machete goes all the way through this big ass fucking tree.

SPEAKER_01 42:06

So much force.

SPEAKER_03 42:07

Well, it's not that long. That's the thing. It's not that long, it's it's not about the force. Like, I believe. I believe in the force. But what it was was Michael pinning a man to a wall with a knife.

SPEAKER_01 42:19

Yeah, that's what it was giving.

SPEAKER_03 42:21

I'm not gonna be mad at it. I get it, I get it, I get it. Oh, she's gonna avert my eyes, look the other way.

SPEAKER_01 42:25

You just gotta you just gotta believe, you know.

SPEAKER_03 42:28

Let sleeping dogs lie.

SPEAKER_01 42:30

For sure. The even the final showdown between the two with the cabin on fire all around them. What an iconic moment. What a way to end the film for sure. Actually, Freddy's makeup actually melted onto his face because it was so hot during that scene. So, like, when he had to go take that off, it was literally melted to his face. That must have sucked getting off.

SPEAKER_03 42:51

Oh, that is terrible. And it sounds really goopy.

SPEAKER_01 42:54

Yeah. Can you imagine trying to like whatever the whatever they had to do to try to like loosen that up? I don't know if you have to scrape, peel, use some kind of alcohol solution or something. It I can tell you from experience, putting a bunch of face makeup on and stuff like that. It takes a long time to get it off of you. Like Halloween nights, they're tough, especially when you're out drinking the whole night, then you come back, you gotta try to take it all off while you're not fully sober. Not the best. Now, this guy had professional work done probably for a long time, and he's got to try to figure this out afterwards. That's a lot, and he's probably shooting 12 hours. Who knows?

SPEAKER_03 43:30

Yeah, I cannot imagine. I've never had that kind of makeup on my face, so that sounds absolutely horrific.

SPEAKER_01 43:38

Yeah. Maybe this is why it was the last the last appearance as Freddy's like, you know what? I'm done with this.

SPEAKER_03 43:44

I'm getting too old for this shit.

SPEAKER_01 43:46

Yeah, I'm getting too old for this shit. Oh my god. But yeah, if you really think about it though, this was the last time that either of these two characters truly felt dominant on screen.

SPEAKER_03 43:59

Ooh, what? That's it? Well, no, for sure for Freddie. For sure for Freddie, because the remake that we got was trash.

SPEAKER_01 44:07

I guess, yeah, the remake was trash, but the Friday the 13th one, yeah, I'm with you. Yeah, that one maybe.

SPEAKER_03 44:14

We had survivalist Jason when he had this when we got Sackhead Jason in that movie running towards that woman at after already massacring the rest of her friends. Ugh. That movie was fucking great. That was a great Jason.

SPEAKER_01 44:31

Yeah, that is true. So maybe there's one more for Jason there. But it really was kind of like the end for the franchises as a whole, collectively. I mean, there wasn't much that happened afterwards, so it did kind of feel like one of the last appearances, but really a good send-off for sure.

SPEAKER_03 44:50

Yeah, what we should have done, we obviously we reviewed these movies in release order, but what we should have done was reviewed them in chronological order, because then we could have had Jason X after this, because they did Jason X obviously in 2001, but set in the future just so that whatever happened in this movie it would still be safe for that film.

SPEAKER_01 45:11

Oh, that's true. That's true. Well, what are you gonna do? I'll cycle back around somehow.

SPEAKER_03 45:15

Can I tell you what else disappoints me though? When we look at the characters in this movie, we've talked a little bit about the teenagers, but I also want to throw back to that opening scene again where Freddie is talking to Jason. But he's talking to Jason as Jason's mother, and Jason's mother is not played by Betsy Palmer.

SPEAKER_01 45:34

Ooh, fine.

SPEAKER_03 45:36

And was asked to come back, and she was like, nah, no thanks.

SPEAKER_01 45:40

Yeah, because from what I read, it wasn't a big enough role for her. Like she wanted more significance in the movie, which I get. I get. But listen.

SPEAKER_03 45:48

Yeah, I also understand it. It's just, damn, what might have been Rob Zombie also considered for this, and Sir Peter Jackson, Rob Botton, Guillermo del Toro were also considered directed in the 90s when this idea was floating around.

SPEAKER_01 46:03

I can't even imagine. That's wild. Any of those people, it could have been a a completely different film, you just don't know. That's wild to think about. Rob Zombie might have been a little bit more, maybe a little bit more brutal and less campy for sure, you would have to imagine.

SPEAKER_03 46:18

Yeah. Another character we were supposed to have back was Tommy Jarvis.

SPEAKER_01 46:22

Oh shit.

SPEAKER_03 46:24

Yeah, but there was Tommy Jarvis, another character that was going to be portrayed by Catherine Isabel, but the role was then swapped and then they consolidated down the script because they felt like it was too long. So we didn't get Tommy or this other character. I honestly think, sure, maybe the script was too long. I get it, but also maybe we needed the script to be longer because I I could have done with more. I could have loved having Lori, Will, and friends and Tommy.

SPEAKER_01 46:54

I could have seen it explore a little bit further, a little bit longer. I feel like we got to this place where by the time we actually got Jason and Freddie like facing off truly, uh, it felt like we we were like we wanted a little bit more of like what that could have been, and we were kind of it was kind of over, you know, before it even began in a in a sense.

SPEAKER_03 47:15

Yeah, again, Grease 2, just when I found you, I lost you. And I get it, because the characters in this movie don't need to be transcendent, right? They just need to be serviceable, they just need to be fine enough to get these two stars to collide, and the stars of the show are Freddie and Jason. As cool as it would have been to get Tommy Jarvis, I also understand that he would have pulled focus. So I get it. I would have wanted it because the fan in me wants it, but I also understand that's like asking Lori Strode to show up here in Haddonfield while facing off with Pinhead.

SPEAKER_01 47:50

Yeah, that's true. You don't want to pull attention from the stars here, which is really the Freddy versus Jason of it all. We don't need any of the survivors from previous installments. We just want to see these two kind of go at it, which that's why I'm saying it could have been a little bit longer. Not necessarily what I think is the worst part of the film. I think for me, the worst part of the film is really that we're left with the possibility of more, but we never actually get it. I wish we could have gotten another follow-up to this. I I, you know, I haven't read that comic, but how crazy would it have been to get a Freddie versus Jason versus Ash and have Bruce Campbell come into the mix would be iconic. I think this was definitely a really fun thing to do, and it's just sad that this was really just the last time that we got to explore this, you know, the one and only time we got to explore this.

SPEAKER_03 48:48

Yeah, I do wish there was more. I absolutely do. I think the worst part of this movie is that it does end here. I wish we could have gotten some more continuation. Obviously, the comic book is really fun, but it's not enough when you have this much joy and just your delight in a slasher. This could be the next like big box office thing that I would love to see at the theaters. But for as honestly insignificant as that criticism is, this movie is ridiculously re-watchable. And I absolutely love getting to enjoy this. I was delighted when this came up in our lineup. I popped it on in my T on my TV in my living room, had some popcorn, and just got to relax and transport myself back to simpler days when the world wasn't quite as complicated as it is now. Not that it was a fucking walk in the park in 2003, but this movie with its characters, with its execution to bring two titans together, it's just a lot of fun and is really funny on top of that.

SPEAKER_01 49:53

Yeah, that's the key word is fun, and this is just a fun one to watch. I think you don't have to watch any of these movies in any specific timeline, right? You don't have to do that. Although you could watch this like after certain movies, specifically after Jason goes to hell and just kind of have a fun time with it. But overall, you can really just plop this one on anytime and just have a good time with it. And so, yeah, it's something that I think anyone should be able to come back to and just vibe.

SPEAKER_03 50:21

Yeah, I think I would propose that you watch these things in parallel. Now I want to really craft the best watch order for this because this really is a one-night stand, it's a layover, it's a clash of the titans. This movie doesn't overs, this movie doesn't oversate its welcome. But what I do think is really fun is the idea of working out the chronological timeline of the Friday the 13th franchise and then Nightmare on Elm Street and just watching them all in succession in order, finishing the Friday franchise, finishing the nightmare franchise, watching this, then watching Jason X. I think that's the move. Actually, no, watching the reboot? Well, the reboot work in that chronology. We'll do some workshopping then. We'll do some workshopping, and we'll follow up in a future episode over on our blog because this this is gonna be my new hyperfixation. But for now, there you have it, folks. Freddy versus Jason from 2003 has earned a universal slash, and we've certainly had a robust discussion, but the conversation doesn't end here by any means.

SPEAKER_01 51:30

If you want to find out what's on the other side of this nightmare and go further than this episode, consider supporting the show by visiting patreon.com slash hackerslash, because this is where you can enjoy even more of the show, including bonus content with early access, extended episodes with our B sides, movie nominations, and live shows.