Jason is sent to the morgue after the end of Part 3 but, guess what? He’s not dead! More carnage ensues.

Back in 1987, I didn’t know that The Final Chapter would be released on video so soon after the release of Part 3 but I just happened to be in the video shop when it was being placed on the shelf for the first time and so I was the first to rent it. Maybe this was some kind of divine intervention and God was making sure that I was in the right place at the right time for such a life changing event.

The BBFC was just as brutal as Jason when it came to its butchery of the film with three scenes being cut including the ending. Funnily enough, I would see the full uncut film years later on Sky TV, as there was a loophole (just as there was with the first home videos) whereby for a limited time, films shown on cable TV didn’t have to be classified by the BBFC and so I got to (finally) see the infamous ‘machete slide’ scene. It was worth the wait.

It feels like sh*t got real with The Final Chapter. Tom Savini was back and produced some of his best (i.e. most gory) effects work. We also got Corey Feldman and a notable cast addition in the guise of Crispin Glover, all nervous energy and *that* dance sequence.

Theres also a fair amount of drama between the teen characters before Jason even makes his way through them all. They seem a likeable bunch and the film makes us genuinely feel for them.

But enough of that flim flam. The kills are brilliant, brutal and just what the fans wanted from a ‘final’ (ahem) film in the franchise. Gone are the colourful, camp shananighans of the previous film. The Final Chapter is all darkness and shadows punctuated by kills so full-on that they’re painful to watch. In other words, great fun for a horror fan.

This is my favourite Friday the 13th film for this very reason. I remember way back when, reading about a follow-up called A New Beginning being in pre-production. I also remember thinking, ‘How could this be as The Final Chapter was the last film’. How naive.

4.5 out of 5 stars