8 Worst Slasher Horror Movie Fakeout Endings

2. Friday The 13th: A New Beginning

Friday the 13th: A New Beginning - Roy Burns
Paramount Pictures

For your humble scribe, Friday the 13th: A New Beginning is a pretty fun entry in the F13 series, but the reality is that such an opinion is only shared by a minority of this iconic franchise's fanbase.

It's not hard to understand why the big fakeout here left horror hounds frustrated, for A New Beginning's climax revealed that the hockey mask-adorned killer of the picture was not Jason Voorhees.

While Jason had been brutally beaten to death by young Tommy Jarvis at the close of prior entry The Final Chapter, it's not like 'death' had ever stopped Voorhees or countless other villains from returning to action in plentiful other movies. As such, upon a first watch, it was taken as a given that the hulking, murderous sort at the centre of this fifth Friday the 13th offering was clearly Jason Voorhees.

Rather than Jason, the man behind the mask in A New Beginning was Roy Burns, a steely-eyed paramedic briefly seen in the film's opening act as he had to collect the dead body of who we'd come to learn was his son. As a result of that trauma, Roy had embarked on his own copycat killing spree... which certainly split opinion amongst the Friday the 13th faithful.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks/Saints, Jamie Hayter, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.