It’s usually just assumed why Jason kills teens who just had sex. He is clearly some sort of puritanical force taking slut shaming to its worst, deadliest end. Why not think this? It is just a common cultural trope of the slasher by this point. The Friday the 13th films may not have popularized the notion, that distinction most likely goes to a 6-year old Michael Meyers stabbing his own sister after her own act of sin, but Jason certainly is seen as carrying that torch well into the ’80s and ’90s until the film Scream (1996) firmly codified it, “There are certain RULES that one must abide by in order to successfully survive a horror movie. For instance, number one: you can never have sex. BIG NO NO! BIG NO NO! Sex equals death, okay?” Yet, just as Scream fails to actually explain why these would be the rules, any similar assumption about Jason’s motives is based more on precedent than evidence.
The popular theory that these slasher killers represent ultra-fascist conservatism does have its appeal. When explaining the motives for his wildly absurd film Pieces (1983), Juan Piquer Simón has noted that after living through Franco’s fascist rule of Spain, he saw the teens of American slasher films as symbols of an absolute freedom his own people yearned for. Simón’s teens display a comfort with sex and drugs, which is oddly matched by their teachers’ support for their lifestyles. For instance, at one point, the school puts a waterbed in the gym, seemingly just so teens can have sex on it. Pieces is Simón’s celebration of liberation, and the slasher killer in his film represents that repression and terror that literally executes anyone who embraces such freedom. Again, this is a fascinating take on the slasher, which does seem to bring to light why so many love watching these films. The teens are personable, fun, and free, so their deaths typically have some weight to them. But again, a closer look at what motivates Jason points in a different direction.
As Scream also famously points out, the first killer in Friday the 13th (1980) is not Jason, but his mother. Told from her point of view, the film would read more with her as the hero, though. It would feel like a classic revenge-o-matic ala Death Wish (1974). A group of irresponsible teen camp counselors let her son drown to death. Why? Because they were too busy having sex and doing drugs. Here, it is not a matter of sex or drugs being inherently sinful, but rather that both represent ways that teens are self-centered to the degree of letting a child die. Mrs. Voorhees unfortunately undermines any righteousness to her revenge, though, by systematically murdering not the actual counselors who killed her son, but rather just another group of counselors years later. Hey, we can’t all be perfect.
In the subsequent Friday the 13th films, Mrs. Voorhees’ son Jason ~ either resurrected or just secretly still alive somehow ~ carries on his mother’s legacy. Haunted by visions of his mom, Jason is eternally locked in the role of the victim, never quite able to find equilibrium, no matter how many teens he kills. And yes, most of these films do match a “the slut dies first” model, but this is where something very special to the F13 franchise starts to matter.
In the Friday the 13th franchise, the teen sex scenes are always consensual and, importantly, fairly wholesome. Other franchises often lean into depictions of the boys as pushy at best, date rapists at worst. The first sex scene in the very first A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) is introduced by Tina Gray yelling at her on-the-rocks boyfriend Rod Lane, “What the hell are you doing here?” after he has not only snuck onto the property, but also tried to scare her using a gardening tool which looks eerily similar to Freddy Krueger’s claw. He then proceeds to goad her into having sex, which leads to her death. The choice to give Rod a weapon so similar to the slasher killer’s starts the franchise off from the bat with the notion that there is a direct relation between the libido of boys and serial killers.
Friday the 13th sex feels like sunbeams and rainbows in comparison, with teens casually having laughing romps and giggly romances. In Part 2 (1981) of the series, Sandra and Jeff skip their way into the forbidden part of the woods surrounding Crystal Lake. Their dismissal of the rules feels less devious than it does naive and carefree. For them, sex and weed go hand in hand, and they always have smiles on their faces. They are Simón’s true vision of freedom as innocence, but is it this purity that Jason seeks to destroy?
In the same film, there is even a reminder that attempts from boys to approach sex in a less-than-honest manner provide no reward. When Terry goes for a nighttime skinny dip alone, Scott thinks it will be funny to steal her clothes and towel so that he can see her naked. Immediately, Scott is caught by a rope trap and hung by his legs from a tree. Terry calls Scott a pervert and forces him to promise to “cut out the crap” before she is willing to go find a way to get him down. Jason makes sure that Scott doesn’t live to see that freedom, and Scott absolutely does not get laid as reward for his bad behavior.
This trend continues through the Friday the 13th franchise, only changing course in Freddy vs Jason (2003), where the cynical view of sex from the Nightmare on Elm Street narratives is given preference. In fact, the only time reluctant sex is depicted in the main run of Friday the 13th films is in Part IV Jason Lives (1986), between two adults in the morgue. The female nurse tells the male nurse things like, “For you, I always have a headache,” and, “I’m not going to fake any more orgasms for you.” While it would be stretching things to call the sex they have coerced, it is very utilitarian and, specifically, far from the sparkly-eyed joy which F13 teen couples exhibit.
The sexual innocence in Friday the 13th serves as a powerful foil to Jason, the innocent child who drowned. This is not a case of tyranny vs innocence. It is innocence vs innocence. This makes the ethical ground the film stands on more complex than it would seem on the surface. Were the teens to be sexual deviants, Jason would come across as more righteous. Yet, like the haunting figures of J-Horror to come with characters such as Ringu‘s (1998) Sadako, Jason only makes sense to never rest because there is a lack of justice surrounding his death. His death was murder by the negligence of the innocent. While slaughtering teens not responsible for his death is far from justice, this is the nature of a curse. Combined with most of the films being set literally in nature, it begs the question: Are curses as much a part of Mother Earth’s sense of order as sex? When looked at under this particular microscope, things start to feel like the dichotomy set up in the opening scene of David Lynch’s Blue Velvet (1986), where the camera moves from the beauty of a garden closer and closer to the Earth, through the blades of grass, down to where the insects writhe in a frightening and violent manner. It is a symbolic reminder that the beauty of the world is built upon darkness. So next time you’re getting it on in a meadow on a picnic blanket, just be sure to look out for any millipedes wearing hockey masks. ★
