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 and Presenter, 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 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 and Eli Roth to Kevin Smith and the Russo Brothers, to Kevin Conroy and Frank Miller, to Bret Hart and Sting, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, and Brian Flynn, to many, many more. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is a long-standing season ticket holder and an FSA Award-winner for his time co-hosting the Fearless in Devotion podcast.